The Remnants of Honor: Pathology, Credibility and U.S. Foreign Policy.

Few leaders worry about the status of their honor; they do worry, at times obsessively, about their credibility. The "credibility imperative" has occupied a central position in every major U.S. foreign policy debate in the last fifty years. It affects discourse and decisions in predictable - and deeply pathological - ways. This paper examines the continuing importance of honor in modern U.S. foreign policy. It first discusses the traditional importance of honor in international and interpersonal politics, and explains of the central role it plays in the construction of security in any system that lacks a central authority. Second, it describes the predictable, consistent effects that honor has on state behavior in general, and U.S. foreign policy in particular. Third, it argues that the lingering concern for honor is pathological, for a couple of reasons: There is no evidence that it helps states attain their goals, and it certainly has no relevance in those systems (like today's international) where no existential threats to member security exist. The paper then speculates about the genesis of the honor pathology, and why it continues to have such salience in the new century. Honor as a motivation for action seems as anachronistic today as horse-drawn carriages, alchemy and the duel. But it persists, if under different guises; and to the extent that it persists, it pathologizes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]