Buzan: The Level of Analysis Problem in International Relations Reconsidered

Buzan, B., 1995. The level of analysis problem in international relations reconsidered. In International relations theory today.

“This chapter surveys the level of analysis problem in international relations. It looks at how the issue came into the field, how it developed, why it generated disagreement and conflict, where the debate is, and where, in my view, it should be going…The argument is that although the concept of levels of analysis has done much to improve the rigor of theoretical thinking in international relations, too little attention has been paid to the idea itself. A central confusion in understanding what ‘levels’ refers to arises from a widespread failure to distinguish between sources of explanation and objects of analysis” (198).

The issue of Levels of Analysis can be traced back to a moment in the study of international relations theory. Waltz is typically seen as the first to bring these tools for assessing international politics to the discipline in his text Man, the State and War. In this text, Waltz dissects previous literature on the causes of war and claims that these can each be broken down into one of three “images”. Either they are rooted in the nature of individuals, the nature of states, or the level of international system.

According to Buzan, two main issues arose out of the work of Waltz (and Kaplan and Singer): how many levels should there be and of what should they consist? By what metric do we make this distinction?

The answer to the first question hinges to a large degree on whether or not the levels of analysis problem is being explored epistemologically or ontologically. “One (ontological) sees levels as being about ‘different units of analysis’, and the other (epistemological) sees them as being about ‘the types of variables that explain a particular unit’s behavior” (203).
If the “ontological question” is taken into consideration, it is not very difficult to explore. The claim is that these different levels exist in a hierarchy, as even the term “level” implies. The different levels would only have to be separated by their existence in different iterations of space/time.
“Waltz’s restriction of the levels of analysis debate to the confines of the reductionist/holist one thus had three distorting effects. First, it rammed the whole debate about levels into an inappropriate dyad, confining it to only two levels, and importing into the relationship between those two levels the oppositional qualities associated with reductionism versus holism. Second, it created a very narrow conception of holism/system, confining it to Waltz’s sparse definition of political structure. Third, it created a bloated and incoherent ‘unit’ level, to which Waltz paid relatively little attention” (208).

Buzan posits making a larger role for “interaction capacity”. This may help to clear up some of the problems presented by Waltz’s construction of levels of analysis. “Interaction capacity is about the technological capabilities, and the shared norms and organizations, on which the type and intensity of interaction between units in the system, or within a unit, depend…As new technologies of transportation and communication spread, they change the quality and character of the interactions among and within units in the system as a whole” (210). Also, process may be a way to get around part of the rigid focus on structure.