Theories of International Relations

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Theories of International Relations

• Constructivism

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Learning Objectives

• Understand the bases of constructivist theory.
• Understand how constructivists analyze world
  politics.
• Understand differences between constructivism,
  realism, liberalism, and Marxism.

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Key terms

• Constitutive rules
• Identity
• Individualism
• Logic of Appropriateness
• Logic of Consequences
• Materialism
• Normative structure
• Regulative rules
• Social construction of reality
• Structuration

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The Rise of Constructivism

• The end of the Cold War meant that there was a
  new intellectual space for scholars to challenge
  existing theories of international politics.
• Constructivists drew from sociology to
  demonstrate the importance of identity and norms
  in world politics.

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What Unites Constructivists?

• Knowledge shapes how actors interpret and
  construct their social reality.
• Constructivists are concerned with human
  consciousness, treat ideas as structural factors,
  consider the dynamic relationship between ideas
  and material forces as a consequence of how
  actors interpret their material reality, and are
  interested in how agents produce structures and
  how structures produce agents.

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What Unites Constructivists Normative Structure

• The normative structure shapes the identity and
  interests of actors (e.g. states).
• Rules
• Beliefs
• Norms
• Social facts (e.g. sovereignty) exist because of
  human agreement
• Brute facts (e.g. mountains) are independent of
  such agreements.

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What Unites Constructivists? Rule Governed
Behavior

• Social rules are regulative
• constrain already existing activities
• Stop at red lights drive on the right side of
  the road
• Social rules are constitutive
• make possible and define the very activities
  people engage in.
• Rules of chess

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What Unites Constructivists? Logic of
Appropriateness

• Logic of Consequences Decisions are made on the
  basis of anticipated consequences.
• Cost-benefit analysis.
• Logic of Appropriateness Decisions are made
  based on an assessment of what is socially
  acceptable.

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What Unites Constructivists Idealism

• Anti-materialist. Materialism is the view that
  the most fundamental feature of social
  organization is the distribution of material
  forces.
• Military power
• Geography
• Technology
• Constructivists argue that collectively held
  ideas are at the root of the social world.
• Social construction of reality.

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What Unites Constructivists Structuration

• Individualism is the view that structures can be
  reduced to the aggregation of individual actors
  and their interactions. Assumes that individual
  actors have fixed interests.
• Structuration View that normative structure
  constrains and constitutes identity of actors.

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Feminism A Constructivist Theory

• Constructivists generally agree that power exists
  when identities and interests are constructed in
  ways that benefit some to the disadvantage of
  others.
• Feminist scholars focus on one social division
  that creates advantage for some and disadvantage
  for others gender.

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Gender

• Gender refers to the social relationship between
  women and men as groups.
• Masculinity and femininity.
• Socially constructed categories