Markos Troulis
(PhD Candidate, Department of International and European Studies, University of Piraeus, Greece)
Copyright: Research Institute for European and American Studies (RIEAS) – www.rieas.gr – based in Athens, Greece - (Date of Publication: 1 February 2014).
It is broadly recognized in the light of contradictory theoretical approaches that states form their grand strategy rationally. This does not mean that their decisions are always right; states make decisions via cost-benefit analyses under the prospect of achieving survival and thus, at least preserving their power status in the region they belong to. Therefore, balance of power is the crux of the matter. As Arnold Wolfers declared in 1962, ‘[a nation tends] to regard any shift in the balance of power that favors its adversary as at least an indirect threat to its own survival’. .... Read more
