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Singer's Levels of Analysis

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Singer's Levels of Analysis
J. David Singer weighs the merits and limitations of the state and system levels of analysis in his essay "The Level-of-Analysis Problem in International Relations." He assesses these levels on their effectiveness in describing, explaining, and predicting phenomena. Below is a brief summary of his basic views on each level:

International System Level of Analysis

* the most comprehensive level of analysis -- "encompassing the totality of interactions which take place within the system and environment" * more holistic analysis * more deterministic in nature * Effectiveness in describing: * primary advantages lie in its comprehensiveness * disadvantages lie in its lack of detail * Effectiveness in explaining: * disadvantage: exaggerates the impact of the system upon the actors and discounts the impact of the actors upon the system * disadvantage: requires that "we postulate a high degree of uniformity in the foreign political operational codes of our national actors" → thus we assume that all national actors "think and act in terms of interest defined as power"; however, nations may differ to a large extent in the nature and substance of their national interests → creation of "black box" concept of national actors * advantage: adequate for making not causal but correlative statements based on general system level trends * advantage: "singularly manageable model" * Effectiveness in predicting: * advantage: "reasonably satisfactory as a basis for prediction" * disadvantage: predictions can only be made in gross and general terms

National State Level of Analysis

* traditional focus of western students * Effectiveness in describing: * advantage: does not attribute great similarity to all actors and allows for differentiation → thus greater detail and less homogenization * disadvantage: may produce an exaggeration of differences among sub-systemic actors → over differentiation * Effectiveness in explaining: * uses the "decision-making" approach * advantage: factors goals, motivation, and purpose of national policies into interpretation and explanation * advantage: able to question how and why certain nations pursue specific goals * disadvantage: "goals and motivations are both dependent and independent variables" → muddles explanation to a certain extent * disadvantage: introduces issue of national perception of objective factors vs. simply "objective factors" as causation for phenomena * danger: this over differentiation may produce Ptolemaic parochialism * what is this?? tendency to attribute these differences as virtues of one's own nation and vices of others (eps. adversary at time) * e.g. "we-they" interpretation during Cold War period in America * Effectiveness in predicting: * "predictive power would appear no greater than the systematic orientation"

Concluding words: utilization of either system depends not on value, but on the purpose of one's research; "one [level of analysis] may well be corollary of the other, but they are not immediately combinable;" the synthesis of both levels of analysis is crucial to the progress and growth of the theory of international relations

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