ABSTRACT
How can traditional realist variables of power, security and the structural constructs of anarchy and the distribution of power help us understand the conduct of international relations in the digital age? More specifically, how can realist analysis that has focused on the segmentation of state power through an emphasis on (securing) territoriality explain the dynamics that flow in and through cyberspace – an environment that rests on interconnectedness? To address these questions, this chapter analysis borrows, builds and broadens off realist logic to provide a new theoretical understanding of core global dynamics in the digital IR environ. The chapter turns to understanding cyberspace through a structuralist lens and argues that cyberspace’s unique features function as an intervening layer – a lattice – that cannot be disentangled from the overall distribution of power and induces its own structural imperative in the way units must pursue their fundamental interest in relative autonomy. In structuralist terms, cyberspace represents a distributed power environment in which tight margins of capability to impact other units’ sources of power induce states (among others) to compete intensely.
