Remarks Towards the Security Threat That North Korea Possess

In January 2014, US Secretary of State John Kerry spoke at a conference in Washington DC to discuss the economical, security and political topics of the Republic of Korea with Foreign Minister Yun. Secretary Kerry says “So the relationship between our two nations has always shown its ability to be able to adapt to face new challenges... as together we work to make the world more secure.” From Secretary Kerry’s and Minister Yun’s remarks it shows that the current U. S.-South Korea relationship is best explained by the theoretical tradition of realism. This paper will demonstrate the superiority explanation of a realist point of view through the secretaries’ and ministers’ remarks towards the security threat that North Korea possess on the world by testing two realist theories, political realism through the use of defensive realism (security dilemma) and defensive neorealism, as well as briefly considering economic liberalism as a contrasting alternative.

Realism as a theoretical tradition states that world politics are basically driven by competition and self-interested ideals. In accordance of realism, states are the main actors in international politics. Secretary Kerry stated that the United States and the Republic of Korea are both in agreement of the lack of propriety of North Korea. Kerry and Yun both express their solicitude towards the nuclear weapon that North Korea is trying to build. Power is what drives the states to do what they do for survival. With the threat that North Korea poses with the nuclear weapons it throws the balance of power off into the wrong hands. This is pursued in for only self-interested reasons on both sides of North Korea v US-South Korea. The states as a whole are really only interested in survival either through an approach of offensive or defensive realism (inherently aggressive or concerned with security). It is important that political realism considers a rational policy to be good in that it helps for people to...