Alcuni problemi del realismo americano

In recent years, there has been a proliferation of realist theories of internation- al relations. As a result, nowadays we can distinguish between balance of power theory and balance of threat theory, defensive and offensive realism, neorealism and neoclassical realism, and so on. Is this a reflection of the theorethical richness within the realist field, or does it derive from some sort of confusion in the definition of the theory itself? The latter answer may be correct. Many scholars try to use neorealist theory to develop a theory of foreign policy. Unfortunately, it is impossible to elaborate a theory of international politics so accurate as to describe both international outcomes and state behavior: hence the problems of many recent approaches. In the last part of the article, some assumptions are laid out in order to suggest a partial solution of the problems discussed in the text.