Australia’s Foreign and Trade White Paper: time to get real (Mike Scrafton, The Strategist)

Realists argue there’s only one genuine philosophical principle to guide a nation’s foreign policy. In the first recorded debate between realists and idealists, Thucydides reported the Athenians telling the Melians, ‘the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must’. Thucydides foreshadowed the realist worldview that nations, ‘are concerned with their own security, act in pursuit of their own national interests, and struggle for power’. Realists believe that the international environment is anarchic and that, consistent with their capacity and opportunities, states will always act in their own economic, ideological and security interests. Philosophically, the new Foreign and Trade White Paper (FTWP) should be firmly based in realism.

http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/time-get-real/