International Relations I

Richard W. Chadwick

Notes on Adapting Abraham Maslow's Social Psychology to the Analysis of International Relations

Maslow is often referred to in social psychological literature as having discovered a hierarchy of basic needs in a "hierarchy of relative prepotency" (Maslow, p. 38), along the following lines:
                                            ------------------
                                           |Self-actualization
                                -----------       \
                               |Self-esteem        (complete, ideal)
                  -------------      \
                 |Belongingness       ("deserved respect from others"
         --------              \        p. 46)
        |Safety                 (affection, place in group or family
--------       \                   P. 43)
Physiological   ("security, stability, dependency, protection,
Needs \          freedom from fear, from anxiety and chaos" p. 39)
       (hunger, thirst, sex, and many others)

Maslow himself referred to his theory as one of "basic needs" and characterized it as a "holistic-dynamic theory" (Maslow, p. 35). Each "step" above is related to the others as follows: once the needs at any step are satisfied, the needs at the next higher step become dominant. And vice versa, when the needs at any one step become unmet, those needs become more important than meeting any of the "higher" needs. However, this hierarchy is not impossible to override; it is, rather, a collection of predispositions which can be overridden with training (cf. pp. 36-38).

My adaptation to international relations is as follows. First the relationships between the basic needs is clarified, broadened and strengthened, thus:





                                                -------------
                                               |Fulfilment
                                 --------------  \
                                |Responsibility   (anticipated
                   -------------  \                roles, status)
                  |Community       (role, status)   
         ---------          \
        |Security            (social identity, position)
--------          \
Survival           (anticipated likelihood survival)
        \
         (satisfaction of "immediate" physiological
          needs to maintain life being met)

Second, the relationship isn't conceptualized as hierarchical but rather two-tiered or two-leveled, one the realm of the biological individual and social psychology, the other the structure of the social system adapted to and further developed and modified by individuals in dynamic interaction with each other's expectations and activities:

                position                     anticipated
                |      |                     |         |
   SOCIAL:    role    status               role       status
   -----------------------------------------------------------------
                 C o m m u n i t y    i d e n t i t y
   -----------------------------------------------------------------
   PERSONAL:    survival                     anticipated
                                             likelihood
                                             of survival

            PRESENT (perception)           FUTURE (anticipation)

              (action for                 (planning, preparation
         immediate gratification)         for future gratification)

Abraham Maslow, Motivation and Personality, 2nd ed. 1954, 1970: Harper and Row, Publishers, New York. References are principally to Ch. 4.
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This file was created January 15, 1996; last revised January 21, 1996.
© Copyright 1996 Richard W. Chadwick / email chadwick@hawaii.edu