Analyze Hammer Mills Offensive Realism Theory

“Offensive realism” is the latest development of realism theory. John Mearsheimer，the American famous scholar in international relations and Professor of Chicago university fully elaborated this theory in his “The Tragedy of Great‐power Politics”, which was published in2001.Based on The Tragedy of Great‐power Politics，this article systematically analyses Mearsheimer’s offensive realism theory from five aspects including the origin of the theory, its theoretical system path,its contents, contributions by the theory and the defects of the theory so as to expound the theoretical value of offensive realism comprehensively.Chapter one will discuss the origins of offensive realism. Mearsheimer inherited the thought of classical realism of early scholars including Thucydide, Machiavelli and Hobbes and realism representative character Hans Morgan claims and Kenneth.Chapter two will discuss the theoretical development path of the offensive realism. This chapter will introduce the background of the theory came into being and the three books written by Mearsheime which showed how the theory developed step by step.Chapter three will expound the contents of the offensive realism. This chapter analyses The Tragedy of Great‐power Politics, from which Mearsheime put forward his view that in the anarchic world composed by sovereign states, each major power tries to acquire the maximum amount of power. This makes each big power carry on offensive strategy to become the regional hegemon.Chapter four will analyze some values and feasibilities of offensive realism. Offensive realism not only inherits some main doctrines of traditional realism but also surpasses them and brings forth some new points which perfect traditional legalism. Chapter four also analyzes some shortcomings of offensive realism such as overlooking role played by some small countries and international organizations and giving rise to the China Threat theory.