Science & invention / Politics
Kenneth Waltz
1924–2013 · political scientist
Founder of neorealism, the most influential theory of international politics of the late 20th century; born and raised in Ann Arbor.
- Born
Ann Arbor, Michigan- Died
Washington, D.C.
aged 88- Birth name
- Kenneth Neal Waltz
- Also known as
- Kenneth N. Waltz
- Detroit years
- 1924–1942
- Field
- Science & invention, Politics
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Waltz was born in Ann Arbor in 1924 and grew up there, finishing high school in the city before going to Oberlin College in Ohio. His studies were interrupted by Army service in the Pacific from 1944 to 1946, and he was called up again for the Korean War. After graduate work at Columbia he taught at Swarthmore, Brandeis and, for most of his career, the University of California, Berkeley, later returning to Columbia. His first book, Man, the State, and War (1959), sorted the causes of war into three levels of analysis. Theory of International Politics (1979) laid out structural realism, or neorealism, which explains the behavior of states through the distribution of power in an anarchic world. It became one of the most assigned books in the field.
Highlights
- Theory of International Politics (1979), the founding text of neorealism
- Man, the State, and War (1959) introduced the three 'images' of war
- President of the American Political Science Association, 1987–1988
- Born and raised in Ann Arbor; veteran of World War II and Korea