Who Recognizes? U.S. Nuclear Diplomacy and the Conferral of Legitimacy

Abstract

This chapter theorizes America’s unique power to recognize, and thereby legitimize, ostensive pariahs and rogues in international society. Existing literature on the politics of recognition typically focuses on relations of mutual recognition. But many recognition conflicts occur in hierarchical contexts. The U.S. is in a unique position to grant recognition and legitimacy to the identities, rights and behaviors of all states in the international system and does not require recognition in return. I argue that this power is a consequence of the kind of post-World War II order the U.S. created—one that has both coercion and consent characteristics. To illustrate this dynamic, the chapter turns to the context of U.S. nuclear diplomacy with India while negotiating the 2008 civil nuclear agreement and Iran while negotiating the 2015 nuclear deal. Both states have a long history of wrapping recognition concerns into the bargaining process. But such recognition-seeking only reinforces an order in which the U.S. stands firm as the recognizing agent without needing recognition in return. The chapter ends with a consideration of whether China, a challenger to U.S. hegemony, will supplant the U.S.’s power to recognize in the future.