The Realism school of “political philosophy” is when you indiscriminately murder babies and turn entire countries into minefields to protect the interests of your country’s billionaire class from a vague possible threat in the far future.
Realism as in realpolitik? what are you trying to say?
That’s a bit reductive.
How would you describe it?
I don’t have much time to go into much detail, but I’d describe realism itself as a reduction of game theory, and an expansion of the rules of engagement.
Geopolitical decisions (regarding invasions, loans, and funding) are made with the goal of minimizing risk, whether known or unknown, through destruction rather than discovery. And this paradigm often leads to the propagation of capitalism with the US as the dominant power.
A key example is with the IMF and their conditions on lending, which includes the manipulation of gov economic policies, as stated on their website.
https://www.imf.org/en/About/Factsheets/Sheets/2023/IMF-Conditionality
If you look at their 2018 program review, you’ll find the following phrase:
directors recognized the multiple tradeoffs involved in program design and the potential benefits of a shift towards more realism, granularity, gradualism, and parsimony.
The emphasis is on risk management. And by risk management, they mean to stick to “tried and true” free market principles, rather than studies and a nuanced stance on how to maximize productive forces, resolve contradictions, and improve cooperation.
I am not sure if realism in the quoted phrase corresponds to the school of philosophical though that people like Kissinger and Brzezinski are considered to be adherents to. Although it’s true that IMF is an agent of economic domination that the US pursues under policies that can be described as realist.
The realism that I was mentioning sounds like rejection of idealism although you find it described anywhere as such. Think of all the bullshit about “rule of law”, “rules based order”, “international law” etc. that is wantonly tossed around in liberal discourse. Psychopath realists like Kissinger know it’s all bullshit unless an authority exists to enforce these ideals and they acknowledge it as such as when they commit war crimes and atrocities.
There are certain notions that a word like realism can evoke to one not informed about international politics. One of them is about “being realistic”. But when people like Kissinger order 10,000 tonnes of bombs to be dropped on a neutral nation this illusion dissipates and they are revealed to be evil incarnate they are. Words like “realist” and “shrewd statesman” are banal descriptors that provide cover to the worst pieces of shit that have existed in post WW2 history.
The IMF usage of realism is in contrast to ambition. That’s to say “you can’t achieve your ambitions and you don’t deserve ambitions because you’re savages, and all that you’re good for is exploitation. So, you need to be implementing free market policies that will open you up to exploitation so that you can be making money for us, and we’ll give you a bit to repay your loans”.
That’s very similar to realism in geopolitics “we don’t actually know what these savages might be planning, but either way, it’s not pro-American and doesn’t further our interests. Let’s bomb them to be on the safe side.”
In the end, realism is idealism. And this ideal is the ideal of western chauvinism. To be “realistic” is to adhere to the ideal of the western chauvinist and their position at the top of the capitalist pyramid scheme.
Like, you’re completely right in your sentiment but I just want to clarify some things.
Earlier I used the term “risk management”, and while risk management is actually a thing, the way it can be implemented can have bias, similar to how risk management was used to justify redlining.
The contrast to idealism is materialism; to see things as it is without the bias and ideal of chauvinism.
