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ChaPTER 3/WEEK 3 International relation theories, Feminist Critiques of…
ChaPTER 3/WEEK 3 International relation theories
Liberalism: a IR theory that suggest that the idea that people are good by nature and that political institutitons are important for social progress
Theory in Brief
characteristics of states: States are smart and rational, they have alliances and enemies, democratic liberal and authoritairian autarkic traits metter and actos withinthe staeas can affect what the states can do
characteristics of the international system : Interdependence between actos brings order to anarchy; world order.
Charateristics of individuals: inheritly good. cabable of being friends
Beliefs about change: States self interest that is managed by the international structure leads to peace and cooperation.
Key actors:States, nongovernmental groups, international organizations
major theorist :Montesquieu, Kant, Wilson, Keohane, Moravcsik
collective secuirty: aggression of one state would be met with a collection of other states holding that state accountable for violation of internatinall order. League of nations, EU , NATO
Neoliberalist Institutionalism: A reinterpretation of liveralism that says that even anarchic internatinal sysytems, states will cooperate because they are alawyas interacting with eachother. It is in their best interest to do so. Insitutions procide the framework for the states to work with eachother
complex intedepenedence:
states are concerned about securrity but on other issues as well
decline in the use of military forces
states are connected through multiple channels.
ststes are engaged in constant internatitnlal cooperation. They care about absolute gains as well. Trade and eciorment are key examples.
international institutions- play a vital role in international politics by fostering cooperative interactions. Framework of internatintoal interactions.
THinking Theoretically and the components of IR theories
A theory: the set of proposition's that are combines to explain a situation by specifying the relationships among several concepts; the " WHY" a relationship exisit.
Theories are important because, if done right, can explain patterns across space and time such as war theories work well in africa sa they do in Europe. and time such as in 10th century authoritarians is the same as there 20th century
Hypothesis: specific falsifiable statements that question the proposed relationship among two or more concepts. EX:“The more authoritarian a state government, the more human rights violations we are likely to see.
Components of IR theories
State: Key actor, some even view it as a actor with its own intrerest
International Institutions: set of rules meant to govern a statee or internatioanl behavior. EX: UN, NATO EU
Focuses include states, international institutions, multinational corporations, and individuals
Multi. Corporations: Facilities that help manufactory and engineer facilities.
Individuals: look at the actors and their individual actions in order to explain. IE leader charateristics,
Identity: a sense of self based on qualities Norms: collective expectations for a behavior
Theoretical Perspectives: The sets of theories in IR that are united with similar actors, states, concepts, and issues.
Realism
Realism: the IR theory that states are unitary actors that rationally pursue their own national interest when they act within the anarchic international system.
Anancy: Refers to the fact that there is no hierarchy in the internatinal sysytem to hold states accountable, force law, and coercive authority.
National Interest: the protection of territory and sovereignty
See the states as increasing their power 1-through wars and 2-by balancing against powerful states by taking action to offset their power and thus fend off attacks.
Neorealism
Propose genreel laws to explain events. Focous more on the international system rrathen then human nature.
neorealism explains internatinaonl politics since 1648
We need theory to understand international politics
Unipolar: when one state has sufficient power to defeat all the other combined against it.
Bipolar: most of the systems power is divided into two states or coalitions of states
multipolar: Power is divided among three or more states or coalitions of states.
the neorealism believe that the structure and the balance of the states determines the outcomes not the human nature.
Hegemons decline 3 ways ( one state over the other states) supreame leader
consume more and invest less over time
diffusion of technology
the tendency for the returns from controlling an empuire to decrease over time
20th century
States are concerned with how much more one state gains over another in RELATIVE GAINS
Security dilemma:Herz, state working to ensure secuirtyty form attack is driven to acquire more power.
Economic power can be used for coercion in so it can be translated to military power.
Struggle for power
realist look at this idea through balancing. both cases ensure the ability to fend off attacks from more powerful states.
External balancing: Allying with a powerfcul state.
internatil balancing: states builkding up its own military reserouuces and capabilities
Not all realist agree on what foreign policy might look like
Defensive realist: see that war could beneift the sttes . the threatened states tend to balance against attackers thus reversing the initial gains of that state.
Offensive realistL See that wat can yield benefits for the state by creating reputaitons for willingness to use force.
Theory In brief
Major theorist: Thucydides, Hobbes, Morgenthau, Waltz, Gilpin, Mearsheimer
Characteristics of states: Rational unitary actors act in their national best interest to protect their soventity and territory
Charateristics of individuals: insecure, selfish power seeking
Characteristics of the international system: Anarchic
Beliefs about change: logic says that peace cannot last forever so the focous is shifted from controlling how often and how bad wars happen
Key actors: States ( most powerful matter most)
Constructivism: an IR theory that explains how ideas, norms and institutions affect how the state sees themselves and what they want.
Socialization: the process through whcih one adopts the identities of antoher group/
Discourse:How we choose to talk about ourselves and others
Theory in Brief
characteristics of the state:
artifacts whoese meaning is made by the way people talk about them idenitfy matters
charateristics of the interntational sysytem
a artifact that meaning id decided by how people talk about them ; iddenitfy matters
Characteristics of individuals
education socialization and culture tie states together and identities are important
beleuifs about change
possible through socalization, diffusion of ideas or interntinaonl norms
Key actors
People, elites, cultures
major theorist
hopt wendt
ststes share or dont share similar charcteristics and ideals.
The Radical Perspective
radicalism offers another perspective that places heavy emphasis on the economic portion of explaining internatinal relations . Marx and otherr thoerist came up with this theory pretty much saying that class connflict between owners and workers lead to the end of capitaliwsm in the long tun .
Dependency theory: a part of radical shcool of economics that tries to explain why dominated states dont develop well
Theory of action: the Russia/ Ukraine
History
1999-2004, NATO exapnded east moving closer to the border of russia.
International relations: One world, many theories
Realism
realism is the cominant Ir theory after the Cold war. Stresses the multipolar, balance of powers system and saw the bipolar rivarry between the US and RUssia. Morggenthau argued that war was inecitable because states could conquer eahcother easily. Walkz argued that this would lead to weaker states losing their gains and balance aginst more powerful rivals.
Liberalism
In the post world war era- liberals generally saw staes as central players in internatintal affairs. Economic interdependece would discourage states from using force against one another because warfare would threaten each sides prosperity. .
Forgein policy members often dismiss academic theories but even poloicy members have their " unspoken": ideas that are techically a theory that they use to make decision's. The
Radical approaches
until the 1980s marrxism was the main alternative to mainstream realist and liveral theories. Neomarxist :" dependency theory" focused on the realtions on advanced states to less developed states.
Domestic politics
A number of important work was focoused on charateristics of the staes govermental organizations and individual leaders.
Realism Reduc
Atteention to relative and absolute gains. NATO would probably piss off russia sometime.
One realist may seeem that war may not be profitable and ususally results from militarism hypernationallism. Compared to the other offensivce realist which sees wwar as inevitable and a consewuence of the anarchic internatinal system almost forcing great powerd to compete with power.
Life of Liberalism
The idea that democratic goverments do not fight eachother lead to the viewpoint that dfemocracies are more peaceful than autocratic states.
Frum explains that bringing China and Russia into the democracxy is the only way to promote both prosperity and peace.
Constructive Thoeires
how the ideas affect the society. intrerest and identities of the state are shaped by hsiutpry ina way that makes them very easy to change.
Domestic Political reconsidered
the past 10 years there has been a huge rise in the intrerest in the idea of culture.
Tomorrows concepttual toolbox
US leaders are adept at cloaking their actions in,loft " world ordeR" but naked self interest lies behind most of them
Realism looks ar the tole of poweer as something that cannot be changed while constructivism looks at how identities and interest cna change ove r time. liberalism ideintity tools and instruments that staes came use to acheive shared interest.
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THEORY AND POLICY IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
Policy makers need strong theories to help the come up with good solutuions to internatioanl affaris.
there is a need for well informed advice on current IR problems. Newsom suggest that alot of researhc done in international ussues today is not useful or hard for policy members to find.
Organizaitons responsible for conducting forgein polocy are not very interested in theory.
What can theory contribute to the conduct of forgein policy
Policy decisions can be influenced by several types of theories and knowledge. Policy makers invariable rely on purely factual knowledge.
a good theory should be logically consistent and be supported by the facts. There should be no gapes within the theory or missing variables that makes its predicitions less acccurate.
theory can aid in policy as mpolicy members belive his or her perferred policy optinn will produce the desired result.
theory is too critical for policy decisiosns as makers need to identity benchmarks that will tell them whetere a policy is achiveing the desired result or not.
Explaining the gap
there is a big difference between theory and polocy because theories tend to be too genreal and vague. Thoery doesnt give nay poliocy advice instead fofocuses on patterns.
theoryb can heklp understand what is going on and what the right polocy responce is but you need mushc more specifific knwolege to figure out how to do that.
whats to be done?
scholars coming up with morte useful infromation those who make poloicy would want to know more about it.
change the current norms of the academic IT field.
more diverse academia
Feminist Critiques of IR