Israel as a Modern Hobbesian State: Survival and Anarchy

Introduction: Hobbes and the State of Nature

According to the British philosopher Thomas Hobbes, in a state of nature, human life is "nasty, brutish, and short." Hobbes takes a dark view of humanity, and while he concedes that the governments of nations are very often less than ideal, he argues that even imperfect government is preferable to anarchy. As Long (2008: 91) explains: "In Hobbes's state of nature, men find themselves in a state of anarchy, understood as the absence of authority and order. The violent nature of this state of anarchy — the war of all against all — is the determinant aspect of Hobbes's political philosophy, which is a theory of survival. The aim of the social contract, of accepting hierarchy and the power of the sovereign, is to escape the inescapable and universal danger presented by anarchy."

Hobbes takes a "dog-eat-dog" view of the world and stresses the need for a strong sovereign power to govern. This emphasis on strength and mistrust of others is one reason why the state of Israel is often described as a Hobbesian state — a nation fighting for its survival in a sea of enemies.

Hobbesian Culture and the Arab-Israeli Conflict

"Hobbesian culture is constituted by shared ideas that others are enemies. Agents do not recognize the right of others to exist" (Frederking 2000). At the beginning of Israel's existence, it was embroiled in a territorial dispute with the Palestinians, who contested the right of the Jewish state to exist at all. Israel won its civil war, and the Palestinians came to exist within Israeli-controlled territories and occupied settlements. However, the memory of that conflict remains fresh; whenever Israel enters into negotiations with Palestinian or Arab representatives, many of those representatives still deny Israel's right to exist. In counterpoint, Israel has resisted making concessions as well, further contributing to the Hobbesian state of nature in the Arab-Israeli conflict.

"Both the Arabs and the Israelis consistently accepted the necessity of using force to resolve the conflict. For the Arabs, Israel was the embodiment of Western imperialism in the area. Israel was indeed an enemy to militarily destroy, not a rival with which to politically and economically compete" (Frederking 2000).

Preemptive Strikes and Military Posture

The current stand-off in the Middle East between Israelis and Palestinians reflects the Hobbesian notion that "enmity is a property of the system; the military capabilities of others convey an ominous meaning. Relative military capabilities are thus seen as crucial, and agents use pre-emptive strikes if violence is deemed inevitable" (Frederking 2000). This basic principle of preemptive action was demonstrated in the Six-Day War, in which the small nation overcame a larger and better-armed coalition of Arab states. It was also applied against Israel during the Yom Kippur War, when Arab nations chose to attack on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar in order to catch the country unawares. At the time of the Six-Day War, Israel was spending 21% of its GNP on defense (Frederking 2000).

The Camp David Accords and a Lockean Exception

Only a single successful peace accord has been established over the course of the modern Arab-Israeli conflict. Even the Camp David Accords, which created peace between Egypt and Israel, fell short of a comprehensive settlement: "Israel did not explicitly commit to withdrawing from the West Bank and Gaza; indeed, the agreement does not even mention Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. And Israel did not explicitly recognize Palestinian rights to self-determination. Hobbesian rules still applied in the region as a whole. Only the rules governing Israeli-Egyptian interactions changed from Hobbesian to Lockean rules. The ensuing peace treaty between Israel and Egypt formally ending the state of war and recognizing each other's sovereignty solidified this transition" (Frederking 2000).

"Lockean" rules refer to the philosophy of the English democratic philosopher John Locke, who believed that citizens could renegotiate social contracts and that cooperation was possible in the international community. Another uncharacteristic feature of the peace treaty was that Israel conceded territory. At the end of the Six-Day War, Israel had "acquired extensive territories — the Sinai desert, the Golan Heights, and the West Bank — that were several times larger than the 1948 borders" (Isseroff 2009). To maintain a larger buffer zone between itself and the Arab powers, Israel strove to retain these territories and, despite intermittent negotiations with the Palestinians, continues to retain control over the West Bank and Gaza. It has conceded only the Sinai territories back to Egypt. Its one moment of meaningful conciliation has been fleeting — and Hobbes would no doubt regard it as purely self-interested on the part of both Israel and Egypt.

References

Frederking, Brian. (2000). From enemy to rival: Constructing the Camp David Accords. Presented at the International Studies Association — Midwest. Retrieved from http://faculty.mckendree.edu/brian_frederking/papers/david.htm

Duncan, Stewart. (2009). Thomas Hobbes. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved from http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hobbes/

Isseroff, Ami. (2009). A brief history of Palestine. Middle East Web. Retrieved from http://www.mideastweb.org/briefhistory.htm

Long, Katya. (2008). The "anti-Hobbes"? Montesquieu's contribution to International Relations Theory. In-Spire Journal of Law, Politics and Societies, 3(2). Retrieved from http://www.in-spire.org/archive/vol3-no2/Long32.pdf