ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that Strange' version of realism has been systematically oscillating between two poles: opposing the ideal and the apparent. This oscillation, which can also be found in E. H. Carr, produced perhaps her most important conceptual contribution, namely 'structural power'. Strange' realism displays a central duality. Traditionally, the discipline of international relations conceives of realism in opposition to idealism, to Utopian thinking. The double heritage of political realism, opposing both the ideal and the apparent, is ripe with tensions. Realism as anti-idealism is status quo-oriented. Being both a critique of disciplinary realism and a renewal of realist materialism, it comes as no surprise that her approach centers on the old realist obsession with the concept of power. The chapter explores the tension between the diffusion of power on the one hand, and the critique of US action on the other.
