Abstract

Scholarship on ontological security (OS), the security of being, reveals how national narratives delineate communities within which individuals have OS and how the corresponding self-interest in upholding these narratives influences foreign policy. A hereto-unexplored implication of these works is how the desire to maintain national narratives influences decisions on balancing and bandwagoning. The article uses Raymond Aron’s classical realism to develop an OS theory of balancing, drawing upon what it argues are his “early OS intuitions.” Specifically, using Aron’s concept of “secular religion,” the article shifts the analytical focus of current ideological approaches of balancing toward the “secular religion” of nationalism. It argues decisions on balancing and bandwagoning are made with reference to perceived (in)compatibility between national narratives and the distribution of power. The case of North Korean responses to the Sino-Soviet split demonstrates the utility of an OS perspective on balancing compared to traditional balance of power formulations.

摘要

关于本体安全（OS）的学术研究，即存在的安全性，揭示了国家叙事如何描绘个人拥有 OS 的社区，以及维护这些叙事的相应自身利益如何影响外交政策。这些作品迄今尚未探索的含义是，保持民族叙事的愿望如何影响平衡和随波逐流的决定。这篇文章使用 Raymond Aron 的经典现实主义来发展一种 OS 平衡理论，并借鉴了他所说的“早期 OS 直觉”。具体而言，本文利用阿伦的“世俗宗教”概念，将当前平衡意识形态的分析重点转向民族主义的“世俗宗教”。它认为，关于平衡和随波逐流的决定是根据国家叙事和权力分配之间感知到的（不）兼容性做出的。朝鲜对中苏分裂的反应案例表明，与传统的权力平衡公式相比，OS 观点在平衡方面的效用。