The Tragedy of Christian Power Politics 

From the Napoleonic Wars of the early nineteenth century to the successive World Wars and later the Cold War that marked the twentieth century, modern history is nothing if not contentious. In a welcomed change, the collapse of the Soviet Union marked an apparent end to global conflict, and a period of relative peace that political scientist Francis Fukuyama famously referred to as The End of History. But history, greatly offended at this snub, made a strong comeback with numerous conflicts in the Middle East, many tied in one way or another to the Global War on Terror. Today, as wars like Russia’s invasion of Ukraine rage on, Fukuyama’s grand declaration could be regarded with a sense of distant and hollow irony. 

The book of Ecclesiastes makes clear that there is a time for everything, and international conflict is no exception. “There is a time for war,” the preacher says in Ecclesiastes 3:8, “and a time for peace.” In other words, war is an inescapable reality of life under the sun. Recognizing this verity from a secular perspective, in his book entitled The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, political scientist John Mearsheimer builds a framework explaining the ubiquity of war as a function of the international system’s structure and incentives. Dubbed “offensive realism,” Mearsheimer’s theory appears to clash with the dominant thread of Christian thought exemplified by Augustine’s just war theory even as it agrees with the preacher in Ecclesiastes.  

But this tension, which may at first glance appear difficult to reconcile, seems to have its roots in a limited understanding of the role of government, as laid out by Christian thinkers in accordance with the Bible, and the realities of the international system as catalogued by Mearsheimer. Ultimately, while Augustine makes clear that just wars are sometimes necessary to restrain evil, an examination of the biblical role of government and the structure of the international system extends the tragedy further: Christians must wrestle with the idea that sometimes, the survival of a state—and by extension its ability to execute God-given duties—may require offensive action. 

The Just War Tradition 

In polite society, offensive action is limited to sports games; indeed, the mere suggestion of a state assuming an aggressive posture on the international stage is an affront to the senses of most Christians and Westerners. Part of the reason for this can be found in the legacy of Augustine’s just war theory. Christianity has played a rather unique role in changing the western perspective on war; the categorization of different reasons for going to war as “just” or “unjust” can trace its roots back to the early Church, specifically to Augustine of Hippo and his work The City of God. The book was written in the wake of Rome’s collapse, and it served as a rebuttal to the accusations that Christianity was inherently weak in the political realm.  

In City of God XIX.7, Augustine observed that “wrongdoing of the opposing party compels the wise man to wage just wars,” highlighting war’s often unpreventable nature and its need to be understood in moral terms. Augustine goes on to posit that for a war to be just, it must be reactive, restorative, or punitive.  

In sum, Augustine’s just war theory is a defensive one. The attribution of this characteristic to just wars certainly contributed to the contemporary notion that offensive action cannot be justified. 

The Logic of Offensive Realism 

While Augustine framed war in moral terms, John Mearsheimer, by contrast, approaches it in descriptive and structural terms. The theory of offensive realism, as laid out in his work The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, claims to show not how states ought to act, but how states have acted in the past and will act in the future. A core assumption of the theory is that states desire survival above all else. This makes sense because a state cannot pursue its interests if it does not exist. But in the international community, who ensures state survival? That is, who is there to stop a stronger state from taking a weaker one by force?  

Mearsheimer’s answer cut against the grain of the post–Cold War liberal utopianism that was dominant when his book was written. He said that since the international system is an inherently anarchic place, states must fend for themselves. Thus, the goal for each state is to be the strongest in its region, and therefore the most able to secure its survival and further its interests. This desirable position is something Mearsheimer calls “regional hegemony.”  

With each state trying to maximize its power, an important concept called the “balance of power” emerges. The concept comes from the fact that in most cases, a region will have two or more powerful states. This means that these states will have to contend with each other in their quest for survival through power maximization. While all the states want to become regional hegemons, none of them want their neighbors to gain that status. Therefore, if a state sees the opportunity to become a hegemon, it will often take a calculated risk by using aggression to gain power. Likewise, if one state becomes too powerful and threatens to gain hegemony, its neighbors will balance against it.  

This is where the contrast becomes most apparent. According to offensive realism, it is balance of power calculations like these, made to maximize power and ensure survival, that guide nations’ decisions about war. Mearsheimer’s theory reasons that due to systemic realities, states must sometimes act offensively to survive.  

But the question remains: from a Christian worldview, is it ever morally permissible for them to do so? Answering this requires looking not only at the international structures but also at the God-ordained purposes of the state. 

The Divine Mandate of State Survival 

The defensive bent of most Christians on the topic makes it difficult to immediately answer in the affirmative, but a biblical view of the roles and responsibilities of government shows such an answer in a more appealing light. In multiple passages, the state is recognized as being instituted by God for good and necessary purposes. In Romans 13:1, the Apostle Paul makes this explicitly clear: “Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.” Furthermore, the purpose of government is made explicit in 1 Peter 2:14, where it is referred to as “sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good.”   

Since states are established by God, and he gives them duties to carry out, their mere existence comes with a divine mandate. Survival goes from being a simple self-interested goal to a moral imperative. If a state failed to act in the natural way Mearsheimer described and did not ensure its survival through the rational maximization of power, then it would not be ensuring its ability to continue performing its God-ordained duties to its citizens. It would be a disobedient and abdicative state, from both an offensive realist and biblical perspective. On the other hand, a state that seeks regional hegemony on the international stage could be viewed as obedient, and paradoxically, even ordered toward peace. 

Although the interplay of the determinative structure of the international system as proposed by Mearsheimer on one hand, and the God-ordained nature of the state on the other, is fascinating, it is important to recognize the necessity of Augustine’s just war theory. Mearsheimer’s structurally descriptive work is complementary rather than contradictory to Augustine’s morally prescriptive ideas. It is still necessary to fight wars that are moral and abstain from fighting wars that are not. However, the limited and exclusively defensive application of this theory means that offensive wars for state survival and therefore state obedience are often characterized as unjust, though in light of both structural realities and scripture, there may be reasonable grounds for reconsideration. 

Augustine saw with clarity the sometimes necessary tragedy of war, but our view of this tragedy must be expanded due to the intersection of power politics and a Christian view of the state. The tragedy of Christian power politics is a function of the Fall, and power-driven decision-making cannot be eliminated until all things are made new. Thus, the Christian state, tasked with carrying out its God-given functions, must compete for survival in a threatening international system to satisfy the need to survive, a primary prerequisite to obedience.  

Christians must not forget structural realities when examining the justice or morality of war. Perhaps offensive wars ordered toward state survival do not fit neatly within Augustine’s reactive framework; but since states are God-ordained entities with duties, the moral calculus of aggressive state posturing must at least be reconsidered. The unfortunate reality of faithfulness in statecraft is that apparently offensive action is integral to the historic order, and history is not going anywhere.  

Considering the bleak and mechanical nature of international power politics with which believers must contend, it is essential to look forward, beyond the cyclical and ultimately ephemeral physical world. Even amid sobering power struggles, God’s reign and redemptive work through Christ provides perspective: 

In the latter days, the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and all the nations shall flow to it, saying, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths. For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations, and shall decide disputes for many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. O house of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord (Isaiah 2:2–5). 

The eschatological promises of the Bible indicate that the harsh realities of conflict will become unrealities. “There is a time for war,” says the preacher in Ecclesiastes, “and a time for peace.” Let the present time point toward the time of perfect and ultimate peace, when the swords of nations shall be beaten into plowshares. Until then, though, the great powers of the world, spurred on by the invisible hand of survival, will continue the tragic struggle of power politics. 

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