IR Theories

IR Theories

1. Liberalism

   • main prnciples
     • domestic structure
     • dem peace
     • capitalism = good
     • intn institutions = good
   • neoliberalism
     • structure and agents
     • cooperation in anarchy
     • cooperation = negotiating interests
     • agents= states
   • absolute gains
   • cooperation more likely the more it is done
   • STERLING FOLKER
     • neoliberalism focuses more on intn institutions
     • states are self interested
   • UN - states retain control
     • EU - governs states
   • MORAVSCIK
     • EU created to increase cooperation
     • EU solves the prisoners dilemma
     • Realists: EU created bc threat and will break up if no threat
     • state behaviour = the rational actions of states constrained by domestic societal pressures and abroad by their environment
   • eu and uk now in prisoners dilemma
   • critique: accepts states as rational agents
   • critique: normative bias of hegemonic stability theory
   • BALDWIN
     • neoliberalism = intentions, interests and info
       • like constructivism
   • rationality = utility function
   • liberal intergovernmentalism = rational state behaviour, nat preference formation, interstate negotiation
     • does not assume preferences of security and power
     • autonomy of national leaders
   • Federalists: European integration is a cosmopolitan ideal, justified by common identity and purpose

2. Critical Theory

   • purpose of theory: human emancipation
   • no such thing as value free
   • social knowledge iscontextual
   • disrupts the status quo
   • Kant
     • enlightenment comes from questioning the presuppositions of our beliefs
       • what about colonialism? suggests liberal values should be spread
   • capitialism underpins world politics
   • the power of the core relies on the powerlessness of the periphery
     • relative gains
   • world politics is shaped by economic inequality/ exploitation
   • Cox
     • aimed to develop the theoretical tools appropriate for analysing and promoting the conditions of human emancipation in world politics
     • structure = the framework and the effects of human activity
       • it conditions but does not determine individual actions
         • can be resisted and opposed
           • criticism of realism
     • wants to focus on the agents that create the structure
     • the state is only one type of actor
       • unlike realism
     • there can be structural change
   • Beck
     • switch to cosmopolitan view
     • human fates compete with national identity
     • methodological nationalism
   • the current social order is one historical possibility
     • continually evaluates power and social relationships
     • aims to expose contradictions to bring around an alternative future
     • realism: ahistorical, life has always been the same bc anarchy
   • Gramsci
     • dominant groups make their beliefs seem natural and necessary, covincing others to accept subordination
     • shaping the dominant culture influences individuals' sense of reality
   • methodological nationalism
     • putting the state at the centre of analytic frames
     • state primacy
     • need methodological cosmopolitanism for pooled sovereignty etc
   • linklater
     • critical theory stresses the need to build solidarity to promote human interests
     • English school stresses the need for the intn /world society to enhance solidarism by developing minimum standards for state behaviour
       • together they promote global solidarity to liberate humanity from injustice causing suffering
       • E School ignores abstract harm
     • cosmo harm cons do not conflate moral borders with state borders
       • cooperation to reduce harm
     • historical materialism is good
       • situates state/society activity in a particular context
     • The west decides which rights need protecting
   • problem solving theories legitimise dominant perspectives
   • material capabilities not enough to analyse intn politics without institutions/ ideas

3. English School

   • order = patterns of activity to sustain societal goals
   • intn values
     • security against harm
     • promises kept
     • stable possessions
   • raison d'etat (nat interest) vs raison de systeme (collective interest)
   • order and justice
   • intn system = HOBBES
     • sufficient contact to make states impact each other's decisions
     • balance of power and competition
   • Intn society = GROTIUS
     • can be pluralist
       • states co exist
     • can be solidarist
       • states cooperate
     • common norms, values and institutions
   • World society = KANT
     • deeper concern
     • focus on human beings
     • ontological tension
   • institutions = durable social practices
   • BULL
     • primary institutions
       • intn law
       • diplomacy
       • war
       • great power management (UNSC)
       • balance of power
   • historical understanding
   • no escape from values
   • normative
   • realism uses history to prove patterns of states behaviour in wp
     • ES studies history in its own right, focusing on order, patterns etc
     • both state centric and look at anarchy
   • like liberalism: state centrism, anarchy, institution,s human rights, cooperation
     • BUT more historical, more political-military, more norms/values, less emphasis on non stat actors
   • Like constructivism: postpos ontology, ideas and identities, material factors not dismissed
     • BUT more historical
   • less interested in epistemology than critical theory
   • analysis method (Iraq war)
     • historical context (terrorism, unipolarity, previous war)
       • order (liberal principles, human intervention, great power m from un)
         • Leaders (Bush = tried previously to disarm iraq but was vetoed) Putin = wants to start political solutions)
           • institutions (failure of diplomacy, gpm not observed, not legit war)
   • dialogue is important

4. Postcolonialism

   • settler colonialism: indigenous communities wiped out (USA)
   • ir is eurocentric so is unable to cope with pc
   • Hobson
     • western society seen as evolved.
     • western politics is neutralised
     • hypersovereignty
     • not western knowledge overlooked
     • ir defends and celebrates the west
   • seth
     • our education makes us biased
   • post positivist
   • globalization = spreading modernisation
     • washington concensus
       • seen as benign and wanting peace
     • German fp used to be called "race development theory"
   • realist hegemony = imperialism
   • English school based directly on Europe
   • Marx believed in cultural historicism
     • cultures living in the past
   • enlightenment
     • voltaire
       • their knowledge is inferior
     • Mill
       • races in their childhood
       • some states not civilised enough for democracy
   • Spivak
     • aims to create knowlelgde about the colonised but not through the lens of the coloniser
   • Fanon
     • epistemicide
       • destruction of foreign knowledge
   • mignolo
     • knowledge = a commodity
     • colonialiality portrayed as salvation/ development/ democracy
   • Chakrabarty
     • universities only teach european knowledge
     • historicism
       • historical time + cultural distance

5. Constructivism

   • middle ground in the neo neo date
   • critique of other theories
   • how change happens
   • agents always make choices
   • context informs how choices are made and influence how actors are percieved
     • does not predetermine agency like realists think
       • anarchy doesn't always mean self help
       • individualistic security system = absolute gains, competitive sec system = relative gains
   • agents and structures are co constituted and mutually reinforcing
   • nuclear weapons
     • should not be detached from context
     • identities matter - UK and N Korea
       • interests matter
   • conventional Constructivism
     • wendt
     • merges a social ontology (anarchy is wsmoi) with a positivist epistemology. inconsistent methodology?
   • critical constructivism
     • fierke
   • doesn't study power but security = power
     • security is created by language
       • brexit/indyref
     • iraq war was pre emptive self defense
       • the threat was constructed and misconstrued
   • securitisation = breaking the rules and blaming security threats
   • 'security threats' allowed the bush administration to legitimise torture as 'enhanced interrogation techniques'
   • discursive power
   • identities alter the security dilemma
     • uncertainty is a variable, not a constant
   • power politics can't explain alliances but threat politics can
   • epistemological holism
     • social facts need social explanations
   • lacks a theory of agency
   • needs to pay more attention to negative norms

6. Purpose of Theory

   • general purpose
     • why something happened
     • a lens to make sense of the world through
     • which facts matter
       • Brexit = nhs or immigration?
   • positivist
     • material ontology
     • scientific methodology
     • knowledge from causal laws (epistemology)
     • realism, liberalism,
   • postpositivist
     • feminism, postcolonialism constructivism, ct
     • constructed ontology
     • non scientific methodology
     • knowledge is produced (epistemology)
   • ontologically subjective
     • knowledge dependent on humans
   • epistemically objective
     • not reliant on the observer's state of mind
   • monism
     • the world and knowledge are linked
     • Weber - sscience is the world + cultural values
   • dualism
     • separation of the world and knowledge
   • snidal
     • truth is socially relative
   • multiple theories needed

7. Realism

   • states in anarchy are fundamentally undiifferentiated
     • postcolonialsim
     • constructivism
   • WALTZ
     • the arrangements of units matters, not their attributes
     • structure emerges from state interaction
       • autonomised
     • rational states
       • self interest
   • relative gains
   • all bodes act through the state
   • waltz
     • neorealism
     • anarchy
     • defensive realism
   • morgenthau
     • human nature not anarchy
     • interest defined as power
   • traditional realism
     • conflicting state desires/ interests
     • human nature is evil
     • anarchy = conflict
   • not opposed to change, but looks for patterns
   • criticism: cannot cope with inter- dependence
   • Carr - condemnation of the past on ethical grounds has no meaning
     • postcolonialism?
   • privaleged groups/ dominant groups push their agenda as a group agenda
     • UK in the 19th century prescribed world interests
     • Secularisation
     • climate change
   • NEIBUHR
     • man's capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but his capacity for injustice makes it necessary
   • waltz: important principles
     • order of the system
       • anarchy
     • the function of units
       • self help
     • the ability of units
       • power distribution
   • mearshimer = offensive
     • no status quo states
     • all states want power

8. Feminism

   • the personal is intn and the intn is personal
     • power relations
       • patriarchy
     • usually overlooked
   • states use masculine qualities
     • strength, rationality, protector
   • normative
     • studies ethics
   • liberal feminism
     • WOLLERSTONECRAFT
     • men and women are alike and want equal treatment
     • add women and stir
     • positivist
     • just need to remove obstacles
   • critical feminism
     • WHITWORTH
     • what ideas about gender have been used to create, sustain and legitimise inequality
     • malaysian state supported exploitation of female workers
       • Chin
     • identify power relations in order to change them
   • Standpoint feminsm
     • men and women are different
     • look at things from a female pov
     • ENLOE
   • poststructural feminism
     • SHEPHERD
     • all women are different
     • looks at alternative social orders
     • gender evolves with context
     • men gain power from creating knowledge
     • language is constitutive of gender roles
   • postcolonial feminism
     • AGATHANGELOU
     • mainstream feminists are predominantly western
     • western feminists project a homogenous entity
   • identities are constructed
     • states create masc identities
   • both gender and the state are performative
     • not fixed ontological beings or fixed realities
   • security should include private security
   • violent women are othered
     • maintains myths of purity and fargility
   • women who don't conform to stereotypes are not given agency
   • bush/bin laden - hypermasculinized and hyperfminized
   • first gen feminists critique epistemology
     • second gen critique realities
   • most knowledge created about men, by men
   • women less involved in the implimentation of sanctions but more often the vicitms
   • women have to prove they belong in the masculine public sphere