Are rap celebrity squabbles analogous to world politics?

Marc Lynch set off a rich discussion by applying International Relations concepts and strategy to the recent verbal attacks unleashed by rap artist The Game against Jigga.

Jay Z, Lynch argues, is the top force in rap. The Game is seeking more power in the industry, and has set his eyes on who he probably thinks is an artist on the descent. Lynch argues it is analogous to the conundrum faced by the United States. As the hegemon many see as in descent, America will face weaker parties seeking to advance their own standing through confrontation.

The question is, how should the hegemon respond? Should it react vigorously, and thereby risk its prestige by possibly strengthening the challenger? Or should it “rise above the fray” and let things play out, perhaps undertaking in less public counter-measures?

Lynch believes Jay Z is taking the realist path:

His best hope is probably to sit back and let the Game self-destruct, something of which he’s quite capable (he’s already backing away from the hit on Beyonce) — while working behind the scenes to maintain his own alliance structure and to prevent any defections over to the Game’s camp.

Several pundits and scholars responded with their own interpretations and re-framings of the analogy.

One interesting response came from Judah Grunstein at World Politics Review who felt that KRS-One’s overreaction to PM Dawn, which hurt KRS’s standing, especially as he sought to be the hip-hop philosopher, was a good analogy for the normative decline of US power since the Bush administration.

I am no expert on Jay Z. I tuned out of mainstream rap in 6th grade when MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice were all the rage, so naturally the KRS-PM Dawn scuffle works better for me. I knew Jay Z as that guy from Original Flavor, but never really felt his work. I only put my head above ground for Nas’ Illmatic, Lupe Fiasco, more recently, and E-40 and the hyphie craze when it was big.

With that disclaimer, I ultimately have to be critical of such an exercise, albeit while appreciating it:

Lynch’s analogy was a fun and relevant prompt to an important topic: what America can anticipate as a hegemon perceived to be in decline or more vulnerable (unless the intention was to give Jay Z advice and counsel). I am attracted to such analogizing and find it a fresh way to explore well-worn material. However, I have two critiques ultimately. First, the analogy is very limited because of inherent and instrumental differences between celebrity feuds and states’ rivalries. Second, the analogy ignores the historic reasons for why other states may want to diminish American power. States may have justifiable and moral claims, whereas The Game has none.

First, while this analogy makes for an interesting theoretical application, I think this conversation ultimately rests on some of the same shortcomings of many IR approaches in general: The Game and Jay Z are much freer actors than any states could be. They are more independent and self-guiding than states. Too much IR theory has assumed that states are unified and independent actors. This analogy is limited because the relations between states are infinitely more complicated. The foreign policies of states have more pressures and ultimately are less likely to be as rational as discussions of stratagem assume.

I could see some arguing that because states are institutions they may produce more rational outcomes than would individual artists (even if they are businessmen). However, the internal diversity of states mean that their foreign policies are never as clear cut as they may seem. Interconnections at the elite-level across states, flux in public opinion, and contests between domestic interest groups have made states less than the clearly individuated actors this analogy treats them as.

A more useful analogy for this potential beef lies in domestic politics. Jonathan Wallace at the Washington Note compared Jay Z’s attack on Auto-Tune to Barack Obama’s critique of the war on terror. They both took advantage of a trend on the decline to boost their popularity. Rap artists, as public figures with networks and rings of loyalty, are more analogous with domestic political contests than they are with international relations. After all, The Game and Jay Z are operating within the same industry, share overlapping circles, and are both ultimately bound under American courts — their game is not comparable to states either in the anarchical world system, or one constrained by norms and international institutions.

Second, on a related note, history matters more for states’ conflicts than for rap battles. For instance, The Game’s attempt at beef has little or no relation to the KRS-MC Shan, Kool Moe Dee-Busy Bee, and Ice Cube-Common dramas, just to name a few. Similarly, whatever history there may be between Jay Z and The Game, it cannot compare to the legacy of American hegemonic behavior in South America, the Middle East and Southeast Asia in terms of violence, resource exploitation and betrayal.

Unlike the United States, Jay Z never invaded or bombed The Game’s home, re-structured his economy, or overthrew his elected leader. This critique is important in that it shows that actors in a strategic game, as some IR scholars tend to treat them as, are not independent, ahistorical creatures, but have through legacies of interaction come to have richer and more complicated relations than games of power-centered strategy imply. States carry more institutionally-ingrained historical baggage, whereas feuding pop stars can be more fickle and unpredictable, for instance, they can make-up more easily (especially since they cannot possibly have committed crimes on the scale that states have).

Treating American foreign policy as innocuous as Jay Z’s rap career trivializes the extent to which it has victimized people around the globe, from the invasion of Vietnam, to the US sanctions on Iraq, to the economic destruction wrought on nations by the neo-liberal agenda. In formulations that posit American foreign policy as benevolent or the country as just another actor as many, why other states would want to diminish American power can only be read in realist terms. Isn’t it possible that other states see the United States as oppressive and too-powerful; weakening it is therefore in self-defense.

The analogy does not allow for this possibility. It, instead, presumes maintenance of American primacy as the end.

Still, Lynch’s set-up was thought-provoking and reflects the kind of creativity that much of our political thinking/discourse could benefit from. I encourage readers to dig through the exchange it spawned.

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3. Israel Lobby 1, America 0
4. America is F%*ked
5. Seymour Hersh: America Provoking Iran