According to the nature of the Westphalian system, the independent state is the central actor in international relations. However, the discipline has not developed theoretical approaches regarding the independence process, which is considered more a concern of the international law and the political interests of state actors. Then, in this article, the issue of independence is analyzed as a basic step for political entities to access statehood, becoming a basisfor understanding the role of the independent state in the Westphalian order. It is necessary to observe the variations in the conception of independence, especially regarding self-determination and recognition principle, acknowledging the existence of deep changes in the international system. This principle has had greater relevance since the 1990s due to the disintegration processes of some countries, particularly the case of Kosovo. Taiwan is also a relevant experience. Another key point is the weakening process of the state, with the appearance of variants that question the status and existence of the state actor. At the end of this paper, a brief reference is made to the Latin and Central Americanexperience, which shows particularities since the 19th century. ; El actor central en las relaciones internacionales es el Estado soberano independiente, según la naturaleza del sistema westfaliano; sin embargo, en la disciplina no se han desarrollado enfoques teóricos sobre el proceso de independencia. Se considera más un asunto del derecho internacional y de los intereses políticos de los actores estatales. Por ello, se analiza en este trabajo, la cuestión de la independencia como un paso básico para que las entidades políticas accedan a la categoría de Estado, lo que sirve de fundamento para entender el papel del Estado independiente en el orden westfaliano. Al reconocer que hay cambios profundos en el sistema internacional, es necesario observar las variaciones en la concepción de independencia, sobre todo en relación con el principio de autodeterminación y el reconocimiento.Esto tiene mayor relevancia a partir de la década de 1990, por los procesos de desintegración de algunos países, en particular, el caso de Kosovo; otra experiencia relevante es Taiwán. A lo anterior, se suma el debilitamiento del Estado, con la aparición de variantes que cuestionan la estatidad y la existencia del actor estatal. Al final,se hace una breve referencia a la experiencia latinoamericana y centroamericana, que muestran particularidades desde el siglo XIX.
In the nineteenth century, one of the essential conditions for obtaining recognition of the sovereignty of a state by the international community was the ability to maintain internal order and guarantee the lives and property of foreign nationals. Justice then becomes a major political element and the case of Spanish-Mexican relations is particularly significant. For Mexico, the aim is to preserve national independence, avoid military intervention and integrate into the international system. For Spain, it seeks to assert its status as a major power with the capacity to intervene in defence of its citizens and to obtain the necessary reparations. This work is then structured around three issues: the debt and financial claims of the Spaniards, the punishment of those guilty of the murders of Spaniards and the negotiation of an extradition treaty for offenders and deserters. ; International audience In the nineteenth century one of the key conditions for recognition of sovereignity of a state by the international community was the ability to maintain order and ensure the lives and properties of nationals abroad. Justice, then, becomes a political element of the first order and the case of Spanish-Mexican relations is particularly significant. For Mexico, it is to preserve national independence, to avoid a military intervention and to integrate into the international system. For Spain, it is asserting its status as a great power with the ability to speak in defense of its citizens and to obtain the necessary repairs. This work is structured so on three issues: debt and financial claims of the Spaniards, the punishment of those guilty of the murders of Spaniards and the negotiation of a treaty on extradition of criminals and deserters. ; In the nineteenth century, one of the essential conditions for obtaining recognition of the sovereignty of a state by the international community was the ability to maintain internal order and guarantee the lives and property of foreign nationals. Justice then becomes a major ...
El artículo plantea en primer lugar un acercamiento a la problemática global de las migraciones a nivel mundial y su relevancia en la coyuntura actual, para poder centrarse en la segunda parte al caso de África. Debido a la complejidad de la cuestión, el trabajo se limita solamente al análisis de la migración laboral. El continente africano azotado por la pobreza, la sequía, las hambrunas y los conflictos políticos conoce una ola sin precedente de movimientos migratorios. En nuestro estudio analizamos en primer lugar el factor económico, como la Inversión Extranjera Directa, como un elemento central para detener el flujo migratorio. Sin embargo, la inestabilidad continental, no permite atraer las inversiones necesarias. La tendencia migratoria en África, como también en el caso de América latina, se ha incrementado drásticamente en la última década y podemos prever un incremento aún más fuerte en los próximos decenios. Los fenómenos socio-políticos ponen de manifiesto que el continente Africano presenta muchos cambios en los patrones que se habían estado viviendo por años. Por mencionar algunos, destacan transformaciones que van desde el cambio de destinos clásicos para la migración, hasta la nueva dinámica de inserción al mercado laboral de los países receptores. El VIH también marca nuevos patrones modificando el estilo de vida de la sociedad. Desgraciadamente la mayoría de ellas presenta un panorama negativo, por lo que se pone de realce que el continente tiene una infinidad de retos que afrontar en pro de un desarrollo que permita mejorar las condiciones de vida de sus habitantes. ; The article first proposes to analyse the global theme of world migrations and their relevance within the present world situation in order to focus in the second part on the African case. Due to the complexity of the question, the paper only deals with work migration. The African continent, hit by poverty, draughts, famine and political conflicts, presents an unprecedented migration. In our paper we seek to analyse first the economic factor, such ad Direct Foreign Investment, as a central element in order to stop migration flux. However, continental lack of stability does not make it possible to attract the necessary investments. The African migratory trend, as well as the Latin American case, has drastically increased over the last decade and we can foresee an even grater increase in the coming years. Socio-political phenomena show us that the African continent shows many changes in the patterns which had been commonplace in the previous years. Just to mention a few, there are transformations that range from the typical migration destinations to the new dynamics of labour market insertion in the receiving countries. HIV also shows new patters by modifying social lifestyles. Unfortunately, most of them present a negative pattern, and this is why it is highlighted that the continent faces a number of challenges in order to develop and improve its inhabitants standard of living. ; Instituto de Relaciones Internacionales
The Anthropocene as a new epoch brings into question the traditional modes of conceptualising International Relations. We believe that it does this by forcing students and practitioners of International Relations to think through how the discipline works as a set of ideas and practices, in fact, as a way of understanding the nature of problems and policymaking per se. As a discipline, International Relations is particularly sensitive to the questioning of the problematics of human exceptionalism, rationalist problem-solving and liberal modernist imaginaries of progress, which have shaped the agendas of international peace, development and democracy. Beyond the dark days of the Cold War, when International Relations was essentially a strategic exercise of Realpolitik, the discipline has staked a lot on the basis that Enlightenment liberalism is the universal panacea to human ills and that irrational structures or agencies can be civilised or tamed to further the interests of humanity, both in national or global regimes of good governance and the rule of law. These dreams of liberal universal solutions appear to have run aground in the Anthropocene as the last decade has marked a shift away from universal, modernist or 'linear' understandings of power and agency. In a world, construed as more complex, contingent and relational and replete with crises and unpredicted 'tipping points', traditional assumptions are up-ended and unintended consequences seem more relevant than 'good intentions'. Concomitantly, the methodological focus has switched away from understanding the essence of entities and towards privileging the analysis of relations, networks and contexts. Key to this has been debates focused around climate change and global warming which explicitly cast policy problems not as external threats to the 'good life' (that requires securing) but as instead questioning the starting assumptions of separations between inside/ outside, humanity/ nature, solutions/ problems and referents/ threats. This elicits a very ...
Reseña de: Baiasu, S., Loriaux, S., (ed.), Sincerity in Politics and International Relations, Routledge Advances in International Relations and Global Politics, London & New York, Routledge, 2017, 210 pp., ISBN: 978-0-415-70417-5. ; Laura Herrero Olivera, Profesora Asociada de la Facultad de Filosofía de la Universidad Complutense
Reseña de: Baiasu, S., Loriaux, S., (ed.), Sincerity in Politics and International Relations, Routledge Advances in International Relations and Global Politics, London & New York, Routledge, 2017, 210 pp., ISBN: 978-0-415-70417-5. ; Laura Herrero Olivera, Profesora Asociada de la Facultad de Filosofía de la Universidad Complutense
There's always been two histories to tell about International Relations. One that explains structures and processes and another that understands individual and collective actions. But the first one has always been predominant in our discipline, forgetting what International Relations truly means for the states and for global political actors. ; Siempre habrá dos historias que contar de las relaciones internacionales. Una que explique estructuras y procesos, y otra que comprenda las acciones de los individuos y de los agregados sociales. Pero siempre ha sido la primera de estas historias la que ha dominado la disciplina, olvidando los significados que las relaciones internacionales tienen para los Estados y para otros actores de la política mundial.
Siempre habrá dos historias que contar de las relaciones internacionales. Una que explique estructuras y procesos, y otra que comprenda las acciones de los individuos y de los agregados sociales. Pero siempre ha sido la primera de estas historias la que ha dominado la disciplina, olvidando los significados que las relaciones internacionales tienen para los Estados y para otros actores de la política mundial ; There's always been two histories to tell about International Relations. One that explains structures and processes and another that understands individual and collective actions. But the first one has always been predominant in our discipline, forgetting what International Relations truly means for the states and for global political actors
The world's smallest sovereign states, which in fact comprise the majority of sovereign states worldwide, have a great deal to teach us about different interpretations of power. Much international relations (ir) scholarship has traditionally focused on power as control or coercion; however, power can also mean capability, which is accomplished through what this article identifies as creative agency. Here creative agency is defined as capability according to how one interprets power and the benefits associated with that power. Thus, certain components of power, such as regional or global hegemony, may not be relevant to creative agency; conversely, strong cultural identity or a niche economy may be essential. This article divides small states into three categories: (1) microstates, defined herein as states with populations of fewer than a half million and/or a non-sea area of fewer than 1,000 square kilometers; (2) states with populations of between a half million and one million; and (3) states considered small primarily in relation to their larger neighbors. It uses examples from all these categories to illustrate the phenomenon of creative agency with regard to state formation and type of government and governance. Because the focus of the article is pedagogy, the text includes references to key themes that instructors can introduce with small states, as well as to representative works on small states from political science, law, history, and anthropology. ; Los Estados soberanos más pequeños del mundo, que de hecho comprenden la mayoría de los Estados soberanos en todo el mundo, tienen mucho que enseñarnos sobre las diferentes interpretaciones del poder. La gran parte de los estudios de relaciones internacionales (ir) se han centrado tradicionalmente en el poder como control o coerción; sin embargo, el poder también puede significar capacidad, que se logra a través de lo que este artículo identifica como agencia creativa. Aquí, la agencia creativa se define como la capacidad de acuerdo con la forma en que uno interpreta el poder y los beneficios asociados con ese poder. Por lo tanto, ciertos componentes del poder, como la hegemonía regional o global, pueden no ser relevantes para la agencia creativa; por el contrario, una identidad cultural fuerte o una economía de nicho puede ser esencial. Este artículo divide los Estados pequeños en tres categorías: (1) 2 microestados, definidos aquí como Estados con poblaciones de menos de medio millón y/o un área no marítima de menos de 1,000 kilómetros cuadrados; (2) Estados con poblaciones de entre medio millón y un millón; y (3) Estados considerados pequeños principalmente en relación con sus vecinos más grandes. Utiliza ejemplos de todas estas categorías para ilustrar el fenómeno de la agencia creativa con respecto a la formación del Estado y el tipo de gobierno y gobernanza. Debido a que el enfoque del artículo es la pedagogía, el texto incluye referencias a temas clave que los instructores pueden presentar con Estados pequeños, así como a trabajos representativos sobre Estados pequeños de ciencias políticas, derecho, historia y antropología
1-. International relations (IR) theory has suffered a restructuring among several lines over the past two decades. The gradual but uninterrupted decline of systemic theories - primus inter pares in the discipline since the 1970s- is one of those. (1) This decline was accompanied by a rise of those approaches that privilege domestic politics as the place to look for answers. For reasons I will develop below, such an intellectual step was logical, expected, and partially appropriate. (2) While the current state of affairs should not be seen as immutable and a systemic comeback is plausible, the truth is that domestic politics, and non-systemic approaches in general, are well entrenched in a semi-hegemonic position. In this essay I will explain the reasons behind the aforementioned shift, assess its consequences, and advance some hypotheses on the future of systemic theories of IR.2-. Born between the interwar period and the dawn the Cold War world, IR was created with the explicit objective of explaining the causes of war –particularly great wars, understood under the lenses of the two devastating conflicts of the first half of the 20th century. Since then, IR scholars have struggled to respond to the main challenges –or what they perceive as the main challenges- in world politics. (3) This "duty" to explain the world drives theory to follow the patterns of change in international politics, which, as they develop, suggest new problématiques and novel ways to approach them. In important ways then –although, as discussed later, this is not the whole picture- (4) a sociology of inquiry is needed to better understand some of the key transformations in IR theory -e.g. the shift from systemic to domestic theories. Systemic approaches (5) made their meteoric rise under the shelter of K. Waltz's Neorealism. (6) They were created as a tool for a particular time with particular problems. (7) This was a world in which the primary preoccupation was how to manage the bilateral relationship between the United States and the USSR so that it would not en up in World War III. There were certainly other interests in the discipline, but this one outweighed all the rest. A Cold War context made systemic theories very appropriate. Needless to say, the bipolar conflict had been in place a long time before Waltz's path-breaking Theory of International Politics. (8) The essential point is, however, that Neorealism proved to be very successful in explaining the basic patterns of interest in this particular period of the history of IR –i.e. dynamics of polarity, relevance of nuclear weapons, consequences of anarchy and its relationship with war and cooperation, inter alia- in a more parsimonious and convincing way than the discipline had ever been able to do.The IR community recognized this "Copernican turn", as Waltz defined it, as progress and systemic approaches were established as mainstream, maybe even as "normal science." Anyone trying to explain something in international politics had to reckon with the system. This was true for realists (see the work of Gilpin, Walt, and Grieco) but also for scholars with a line of inquiry that differed substantially from Waltz's (see Keohane's Cooperation after Hegemony for a good example). 3-. A dramatic event that shakes the bases of an academic discipline is sometimes needed to motivate scholars to devise new lines of inquiry and surpass research programs that appear to be losing heuristic power. This is what the fall of the Soviet Union did with Neorealism, and systemic approaches in general. (9) Structural realism was in many ways, and problematically so, a theory for the Cold War. Its discussion on nuclear weapons, bipolarity, uncertainty, and superpower dynamics seemed to be too tied to a specific historical context. (10) The inability of neorealism, or any other systemic theory for that matter, to foresee –or even explain- the disappearance of the bipolar world –a systemic change par excellence-supposed a hard blow to its appeal. (11) Both the fall of the USSR and the subsequent appearance (or uncovering, once the Cold War veil was lifted) of new "themes" in international politics -IPE, civil wars, the role of leaders, the democratic peace, inter alia- opened a fertile camp over which to argue for the need to "go beyond systemic theory." (12) I argued supra that this was an appropriate move (or partially appropriate). But the reasons implicitly inferred up to know -failure in predicting events and a crisis in the IR community (in a Kuhnian sense)- cannot support this claim. The other face of the coin is that the thorough self-examination of the 1990s also responded to internal problems of systemic theories as research programs. For example, in the 1980s the discipline was stuck in the mud of absolute vs. relative gains debate, a degenerative discussion from a Lakatosian perspective. (13) Visible problems of heuristic power were calling for a partial move beyond the system. This was the real cause for the shift, and the best argument to characterize it as "appropriate". The exogenous shock (fall of the USSR) had the role, not at all minor, of opening a window of opportunity for dissenting scholars. Helen Milner was one of the most eloquent advocates for this turn. Her argument, in short, was that "systemic theory simply cannot take us far enough" (Milner, 1992). The assumption that anarchy was the principal variable defining states preferences and the primacy of a straight causal line from the system to the state and then to policy-making was excessively simplistic, Milner argued. How could the discipline solve this quagmire? By studying domestic politics to understand states' preferences and, consequently, the differing patterns of conflict and cooperation in international politics. (14) As Milner contended: "…cooperation may be unattainable because of domestic intransigence, and not because of the international system." (15) A reaction against systemic theories was not exclusive to the liberal trenches. Following this turn toward domestic politics, some realist scholars directed their efforts at the incorporation of domestic variables as a way to add complexity to systemic models that they saw as too crude. In his From Wealth to Power, F. Zakaria argued that anarchy and the distribution of power were not enough to explain the behavior of rising powers. After observing that at the end of the 19th century the US was not as assertive as a structural approach would have predicted, he hypothesized that this was because it did not have the governmental capacity to do so. To solve this puzzle he argued for the incorporation of models of resource extraction and governmental capability to try to get through the Neorealist corset. This was an important intra-realist challenge to a somewhat ossified systemic realism. (16)The rise of domestic approaches represented a generalized discontentment with the excessive importance given to parsimony and the inflexibility that came with it. Parsimony, which should be no more than a tool in theory building, was placed as a goal in itself, restricting research in a way that went against the discipline's own progress. Those boundaries had to be overcome if we wanted to say something about some of the important issues left unstudied by a focus on the system. Once again, the Cold War world with its apparently clear strategic problems may have seemed more propitious to a highly parsimonious approach to theory building. In a post Cold War world, the costs of parsimony were too heavy. Domestic theories certainly lost in parsimony, but they gained in a more real approach to IR problématiques. This was the primary rationale behind the turn here discussed, and in this limited sense, the shift was appropriate. (17)4-. It would be nice to unambiguously assert that the fall of systemic theories made IR a coherent and progressive discipline. This, unfortunately, is not the case. The past two decades have seen the formation of a different ethos of theory building and discipline development that may end up doing more harm than good to our broader understanding of international politics. Something not mentioned up to now is the ascent of quantitative and strategic-choice approaches in the discipline. Quantitative approaches gained prominence by the same time that, and related to, domestic theories were supplanting systemic theories. (18) Strategic choice and game theory, following developments in other academic areas -especially economics-, also gained importance in the 1990s under the idea of formalizing theories and going beyond the "isms." There is nothing wrong with these approaches per se. Quantitative work has been very important in the empirical development of IR -maybe too neglected in the past. Formal theory, on the other hand, is a powerful and clear tool to build and evaluate theories while avoiding problems of underspecification all too common in the discipline –though, this is only true if one can get through its assumptions. (19)The problems of this new "methodological bets" are to be found in the costs for the general development of the discipline. The most pressing are the ones related to the idea that theory construction should be a bottom to top affair, and the implicit notion that by building the parts individually we will eventually end up in a progressive accumulation of theoretical knowledge. However, this epistemological decision may well result in the proliferation of particularistic theories of problems ever more sophisticatedly studied, increasingly particular and micro, and in crescendo uninteresting. (20) By depending on a kind of magical automatic accumulation of theoretical knowledge we are risking to end up with an even more chaotic and incoherent discipline (more on this in the conclusion). 5-. As said in the introduction, the fall of grace of systemic theories cannot be taken as an irreversible given; it is possible to devise some scenarios in which systemic approaches could make a comeback.The first one is linked to the relationship between theory and History discussed earlier. The post Cold War world, particularly the 1990s, was a strange period for the discipline. The study of IR has historically dealt with great power politics as its core. The "curious" 1990s came with a certain absence of great power politics, especially due to the overwhelming power position of the US. This goes a long way in explaining the growing emphasis on domestic politics, civil wars, international organizations, inter alia, during those years. A partial return of classical great power politics (or the perception of it) -for example under the banner of the rise of China and some other middle powers- might motivate a recasting of systemic theories -particularly for those wanting to study polarity (a passé topic in the unipolar 1990s), (21) systemic change and its consequences, etc. (22)Another plausible scenario would be the success of some of the ongoing projects to make systemic theories more sophisticated and comprehensive by, for example, incorporating domestic variables. A good example is "Neo-classical Realism" (see fn. 16). This research project proceeds from a systemic assumption of the influences of the system (that is, a neorealist basis) but incorporates domestic politics as an intervening variable between systemic pressures and decision-making. Though a rather interesting proto-school, Neoclassical Realism is still in its infant stages and has yet to produce work of remarkable characteristics. Lastly, domestic politics, as should have been expected, were not the panacea for the development of IR theory. There might well be a social exhaustion with the results of domestic and micro-theory –a Kuhnian crisis analogous to the one that discredited systemic theories. This may eventually take IR on unexpected paths. Nevertheless, if measured by academic output and Geist, predicting a comeback of systemic approaches seems a risky bet. The discipline appears to be quite comfortable with increasing its empirical production, formalizing theories towards an Icarian "scientism", and avoiding, at its own peril, a "wholist" view of international politics. 6-. Going beyond systemic theories –not in the sense of vanishing them, but of relaxing some of their strictures, increasing their sophistication, and trying new approaches- was the necessary thing to do for a methodology that was unable to cope with many of the relevant problems in IR. The turn to domestic and particularistic perspectives brought much needed renovation, indeed. However, the excesses incurred by systemic theorists as a result of an obsession with parsimony and structural effects may now seem analogous (although for the opposite reasons) to a fixation with the particular and micro-level studies in contemporary IR theory. A blind push to obtain ever more data of increasingly micro phenomena puts at risk what we can say about international relations in general. We may, for example, be more much prepared to sophisticatedly answer why a specific insurgent group responded in a specific way to the level of aggression of a specific state, (23) but we may also be losing our interest and capacity to think about the nature of conflict in its most elemental condition. The stakes are too high for the IR community to avoid an honest discussion on how far we are willing to continue on this path. (1) This essay works with the assumption of a relative decline of systemic apporaches. To argue that they have vanished would be utterly incorrect. For a convincing argument on the inevitability of structural constraints see Jervis'sSystem Effects.(2) Although a change may be welcomed, the results are not always as encouraging as expected (more on this qualification of "appropriate" later).(3) This does not mean, of course, that there is an exclusive focus on policy or immediacy, It means that in its most basic essence, the idea of the discipline is to be able to provide some answers to the pressing problems in the international system. To give an example, few people would be interested in studying the prospects of war between France and Germany in the 21st century per se –though it surely is studied as a historical case that can shed light on other issues-, while this was one of the main topics in the nascent IR discipline.(4) Social science does not progress only by exogenous shocks, but also for endogenous reasons that cannot be explained by what happens outside theoretical disscusions.(5) Understood simply as those that privilege the influence of the structure over the behavior of the units.(6) This type of theories certainly were not born with Waltz; systemic is a much broader category than Neorealism. The important point is that Waltz devised the more convincing type of systemic theory. For simplicity, Waltz' Neorelism will be used here as the epitome and a kind of proxy for systemic theory. (7) It must be said that the rise of systemic theories also responded to changes in the social sciences in general; for example, the influence of structuralist anthorpoligist Levi-Strauss' work, which Waltz knew well.(8) Theories of IR before Waltz hosted a diverse group of analysts: Classical realism from the hand of a Hans Morgenthau, Geroge Kennan and Raymond Aron; liberal approaches from a Stanley Hoffman, Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye; Bureacratic Organization and foreign policy from a Graham Allison; and a long et cetera.(9) See R. N. Lebow, "The Long Peace, the End of the Cold War and the Failure of Realism."(10) See I. Oren's Our Enemies and US: America´s Rivalries and the Making of Political Science.(11) As with its rise the decline of systemic theories was also linked to broader transformations in the world of ideas, to which IR seems to always be a latecomer. From a broad perspective, this phenomenon had started in the 1960s with the work of Foucault, Derrida, Geertz and others.(12) The end of the immediate preoccupation with bipolarity also gave the opportunity to rethink some long-term historical problems of Neorealism (see Schroeder 1994).(13) Some of the scholars engaged in this deabate were: Keohane, Grieco, Axelrod, and Mastanduno; cf. Milner (1992).(14) In another article in International Organization (1987) she argues that to understand the way in which states make decisions in the international economy it is not enough to look at anarchy. Her model studies the type of economic links between countries (high or low interdependence) and the influence of interests groups that may pressure the state to make particular decisions; these policy outcomes would have been incomprehensible from a systemic/anarchic stance. According to Milner, there is an important dynamic of preference construction and strategies adopted that are to be found in domestic politics.(15) See also Putnam (1988) for an interesting effort to move beyond lists of domestic factors and towards a coherent two level theory.(16) This line of research has been given the title of Neoclassical Realism (see G. Rose 1998). See the work of R. Schweller, J. Taliaferro, A. Friedberg, and T. Christensen.(17) Systemic theories were also attached to what has been discussed as the "paradigm wars" between realism, liberalism, constructivism, etc. The turn away from them can also be given credit for helping to discredit this unproductive way of theorizing.(18) This trend was tied to the notoriety of the "democratic peace" project that was, and still is, an empirical enterprise at its core. See Russett and Oneal (1999); cf. Gartzke (2007).(19) See Wagner, War and the State, and Lake and Powell Strategic Choice and International Relations.(20) This is not the nature of all the work in this approach, of course, but just a possible trend of the school as a whole. See Walt's "Rigor or Rigor Mortis" for a sharp, but not always convincing, critique.(21) For an exception see the work by N. Monteiro on unipolarity. This does not mean that polarity disappeared from the IR map, but it was certainly shrinked as a research question.(22) Some young scholars on this line of research are: P. MacDonald, J. Parent, D. Kliman and M. Beckley.(23) See Jason Lyall's "Does Indiscriminate Violence Incite Insurgent Attacks? Evidence from Chechnya" To be fair, Lyall's work attempts to generalize from this specific case –how convincing he is not very clear, however. *Ph.D. StudentDepartment of Political ScienceUniversity of Pennsylvania.E-mail: gcastro@sas.upenn.edu
Review of: Steven C. Roach, (2020). Handbook of Critical International Relations. Edward Elgar, 384 pp. ; Reseña de: Steven C. Roach, (2020). Handbook of Critical International Relations. Edward Elgar, 384 pp.
*This series is the result of an adaptation of a paper presented as part of a seminar on "Theories and Research in International Relations" at Hebrew University, July 2012. Commentaries are welcome to daniel.wajner@mail.huji.ac.il Controversial discussions about the nature of Power have characterized the study of Social Sciences, in general, and International Relations (IR) in particular. This seems logic - if we consider politics as a "game", their "participants" tend to develop a range of "skills", which allow them to assume different "roles", influencing thus in the "results". Thus, understanding the mechanisms by which this whole process ("the game") operates is intrinsic to the analysis of the outcomes, what explains why the revision of the concept of power has always been especially popular, including in recent times.Throughout this series we will review some academic approaches to the concept of power and its implementation in international politics. We will present in this first article the debates on the ontology of power (generally referred as "the faces of power"), and the ways in which this influenced the theoretical divisions in IR.In a second article we will introduce epistemological approaches, leading to controversies on the mechanisms involved in the activation of power and its dimensions (such as today's mantra "hard vs. soft power"). Finally, we will deal in a third article with some methodological schemes for Power Analysis in IR, while indicating areas for possible innovation using cases of the "Arab Spring" as illustrations.Power, Powerful, Powerless: The Ontological DebateThe first ontological debate around the concept of power could be placed in the dispute between those who address it as an interaction and those who understand it as a resource.To this end, Weber constitutes our first station. He identifies power in a relationship as the ability to control the behavior of others, even against its will. Weber is focused on the context of that relationship (one's position vis-à-vis others), which determines the capacity of empowerment.1That led him to approach the topic of legitimacy by dividing between power (Macht) and authority (herrschaft, i.e. legitimate power), issue that will be reminded in next articles.Against Weber's integral approach came out Dahl with his renowned definition: "A has power over B, if A gets B do something that B would not otherwise do", which installed "officially" the controversy in political sciences on how power is operated. According to Dahl, that "something" must be based in a change of behavior produced by an observable act - possible to analyze and be measured. His attention was centered on the characteristics of the material resources (their Base, Means, Amount and Scope) and how they are utilized to get certain effects; however, power is still conceptualized as a relationship, since what needs to be clearly discernible is the conflict, the interaction. Non-observable acts, according to Dahl, should be included in a different concept, such as Influence.2The Realist tradition in IR, as well as many scholars in the Liberal tradition, adopted Dahl's definition as a starting point for their analysis on Power Relationships, and even went one step forward. They saw the context as secondary, since certain power bases are so critical that do not really depend on circumstances or specific nature of interaction. Consequently, for classical realists as Carr, Morgenthau and Aron, the military force is "that" observable act which represents the power of the actors (albeit in most of the cases the economic resources were a prerequisite, as explain Berenskoetter and Williams).3Against that mainstream idea, some scholars battled in the sixties and seventies by presenting two approaches which became popularly known as The Second Face of Power and The Third Face of Power. It is important to note that both approaches emerge from this ontological debate on "what is power?", but their main implications would be on the epistemological discussion on "how do we study power relations?", which helped to the development of Critical and Constructivist research programs, as we will see in the next article.In the first approach, Bachrach and Baratz argue that not always a concrete change in behavior needs to be detected to confirm the existence of a conflict in Power Relationships; it could be expressed through the "mobilization of bias", an "unmeasurable element".4 In the second approach, Lukes went beyond that idea and expressed that the mere existence of conflict is not a condition; in other words, the absence of conflict do not necessarily indicate the absence of Power Relationships.5 Lukes, as a neo-marxist building on Gramsci, introduced the structural sphere of the concept of Power. Powerful and powerless agents are characterized in function of their ability to shape the system through culture and education, which will determine the interests of the actors. Foucalt and Bourdieu, with their vision of Knowledge-as-Power6 and Symbolic Power7 , respectively, went in the same direction.More recently, a similar ontological debate could be found in terms of Power Over-Power To, presented by Barnett and Duvall. In the first one, they define power as "the capacity of the actor to determine his own actions", so the perspective is based on the actor itself; by contrast, in the second one a Power Relationship is needed.8 In that sense, the famous article of Nye about Soft Power, which would be broadly approached in the following articles, builds also on this issue - power could be understood as "the ability to get the outcomes one wants" (in the form of Power-To), but also as "the ability to influence the behaviors of others to get the outcomes one wants." (in the form of Power-Over)9.1 Max Weber, Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive Sociology. (California: University of Berkeley, 1978. Edited by Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich).2Robert A. Dahl, "The concept of Power", Behavioral Science 2(3), July 1957, 201-2153Felix Berenskoetter and Michael .J. Williams. Power in World Politics. (NYC: Routledge, 2007), p.64Peter Bachrach and Morton S. Baratz. "Two Faces of Power". The American Political Science Review 56 No4 (December 1962), 947-9525Stephen Lukes, "Power and the Battle for Hearts and Minds", Millennium, 33, No3 (2005), 477-4936Michael Foucalt, Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972-77 (Brighton: Havester, 1980)7Pierre Bourdieu, Language & Symbolic Power (NYC : Polity Press, 2001)8Michael Barnett and Raymond Duvall, "Power in International Politics," International Organization 59, No1, (Winter 2005), p. 469Joseph S. Nye, Soft Power- The Means to Success in World Politics (NYC: PublicAffairs, 2004), p.2 Fabian Daniel Wajner is a Research and Teaching Assistant at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Department of International Relations) and a Fellow of the Liweranth Center for Latin America Studies.
*This series is the result of an adaptation of a paper presented as part of a seminar on "Theories and Research in International Relations" at Hebrew University, July 2012. Commentaries are welcome to daniel.wajner@mail.huji.ac.il In the first article of this series we have introduced the debates on the ontology of power and the ways in which these debates have influenced the theoretical divisions in International Relations (IR). In this second article we will present the main epistemological approaches of the different paradigms, leading to controversies on the mechanisms involved in the activation of power and its dimensions.Mechanisms of Power: different theoretical approachesOur first step is to address the questions "how power is activated" and "how power proceeds once it is activated". Scholars of diverse backgrounds proposed different approaches to answer those questions, leading us to the possibility of dealing with the controversies around the epistemology of power.According to the realist tradition, as explained previously, the regular way by which actors operate to assert control over the others and the system is coercion. Through the manipulation of material resources (either via sanctions or inducements), an actor could generate changes in the other's actor conduct even in contrary of their interests. As main representatives of the neo-realist paradigm, Waltz and Mearsheimer went one step forward when they affirmed that the distribution of military capabilities constitutes the best measurable expression of power1; and consequently, that the display of alterations in capabilities is what explains the main changes in decision-making.However, most of the neo-realists tend to accept another way to activate power that is based on the concept of socialization. Although renowned for being "mentioned" by Waltz himself, the concept is in fact developed by other scholars, among them Ikenberry and Kupchan, who move large away from Waltz. They explain the mechanisms and conditions of socialization using the neorealist scheme but, unlike Waltz, Ikenberry and Kupchan incorporate the "normative" element as "a different aspect of power" which guides the state's behavior.2 Moreover, they assume a pseudo-liberal perspective on the role of specific agents (elites) in providing systemic change, undermining the unitary actor assumption and thus abandoning the structuralist approach that neo-realists have usually adopted.Ikenberry and Kupchan seek to describe how hegemonic powers have a tendency to activate processes of socialization, through which secondary countries internalize the norms of the hegemon. According to them, socialization occurs primarily when countries suffer the fragmentation of internal coalitions (especially after wars and political crisis), stimulating certain elites to embrace the norms that the hegemon is articulating. If the receptivity and realignment of the elites is linked with coercive power, norms could be consolidated as well as the policies in line with them (albeit this order may vary depending on whether the socialization is carried through normative persuasion, external inducement or internal reconstruction).3 It is important to note that this is a "one-player" argument; the authors say little about "real" cases - where there are many candidates to hegemony and the socialization processes are "in competition". This appears as a very interesting research agenda for the future.The eighties and nineties developed other interesting realist approaches who explore ideational elements in power analysis. One of them is the Krasner's approach on institutional power, which consists of a "metapower" that has indirect control over outcomes by changing the setting of the confrontation.4 Baldwin went also in that direction by embedding what he called the paradox of unrealized power, in which the will of using the power is a resource by itself.5 Likewise, Walt´s theory about the balance of threat adds aggressive intentions as a main variable, what makes power not a function of material resources but of inter-subjective factors.6 The three went clearly beyond neorealist assumptions.Of course the incorporation of normative elements to analyze power relationships did not only emerge in the realist tradition, but also in the liberal one, the natural candidate. The most famous liberal twist came recently from Nye's soft power concept.7 Accepting coercion" and inducement as two relevant forms of displaying power, Nye suggests co-opting as "a third dimension of power" which affects behavior without being commanded through threats or payments, but through attracting with indirect resources (such as values, culture and policies). This "soft" version of power, argues the prestigious scholar, becomes crucial in a global information era in which "winning hearts and minds" matters more and more; an era in which hard sower and soft power are required to be connected (in what he calls smart power) in order to enable the legitimate use of power, as the war in Irak showed to the United States.Is not casual that Nye writes from a (North)American perspective in a period of time in which their legitimacy was so questioned; anyhow, his concept was rapidly attributed to other situations. Despite the popularity of Nye's scheme, the theoretical contribution is still weak. As Guzzini argued years before, it is clear that "power alone is not what we are looking for"8- what is lacking is an approach that could address the causal mechanisms of the different types of power and could identify their devices once they are activated.Guzzini himself will provide an answer to that challenge, by recommending the separation of the two types of power structural power and interactionist power in two different concepts: governance and power.9 Citing economical-rationalist terms, this new dyadic conceptualization examines the interactions between systemic rules (market constraints) and the decisions of the agents (strategic behaviors), in a power analysis. As a constructivist, Guzzini sustains that in this (inter-subjective) relationship of power, the actors change interests and identities, stressing the value of legitimate power (authority) in enabling "a widing realm of possible (in political action)".10 Despite Guzzini paved the way to other constructivist approaches11, he still leaves us with the confusion between the two different stages of the argumentative chain: the first one based on the agent-structure distinction, and the second one on the material-ideal division.Barnett and Duvall would release us from that confusion by presenting their taxonomy of four dimensions of power.12 It combines the two variables presented above with different names; on one side, the expression of the power (actor's interactions vs. structural constitution), and on the other side the specificity of the power relations (direct connection vs. diffuse relation).13 The analytic combination leads us to four types in which power operates: compulsory, institutional, structural and productive. Therefore, while in a simultaneous power analysis, one side would explain what is "possible" (closer to the Compulsory corner), the other one would explain what is "legitimate-desirable" (closer to the Productive corner).14Once this has been approached, the next challenge consists of transferring these theoretical understanding to a methodological scheme for power analysis in IR. This will be addressed on the next and last part of the series.1 John Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great power Politics (NYC: Norton, 2001); Kenneth Waltz, Theory of International Politics. (NYC: McGraw-Hill, 1979)2 John G. Ikenberry and Charles A. Kupchan, "Socialization and hegemonic power", International Organization 44, No3 (Summer 1990), p. 284.3 Ibid., p. 290-2914Stephen D. Krasner, "Regimes and the Limits of Realism: Regimes as Autonomous Variables", International Organization 36 (Spring 1982), 497-5105 David A. Baldwin, Paradoxes of Power (NYC: Basil Blackwell, 1989).6 Stephen Walt, The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1987)7 Joseph S. Nye, Soft Power- The Means to Success in World Politics.8 Stefano Guzzini, "Structural power: the limits of neorealist power analysis", International Organization 47, No3 (Summer 1993), p.478.9 Ibid.,, p.471.10 Stefano Guzzini, "Structural power: the limits of neorealist power analysis", p.477.11 In that sense, Hurd presents a similar conclusion to pose legitimacy as an ordering principle at IR, building also on Weber´s approach at the beginning. Another concept that might be reminded in constructivist literature is Risse´s "normative power", that although lacks the "material side", it contributed to highlight the devices of the "logic of truth-seeking arguing" (considered as "the power of the better argument").12 Michael Barnett and Raymond Duvall, "Power in International Politics", 48-57.13 Although is true that Barnett-Duvall do not present this as hard power vs. soft power, with the examples given it is possible to infer that applies a similar logic.14 Ibid., p.44. Fabian Daniel Wajner is a Research and Teaching Assistant at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Department of International Relations) and a Fellow of the Liweranth Center for Latin America Studies.
El artículo presenta un análisis acerca de las relaciones internacionales norteamericanas. Los cambios producidos al final de la década de los años ochenta motivaron la discusión de nuevos enfoques teóricos. Como se verá en las siguientes páginas, son el realismo y el neorrealismo los que quedan en el centro del debate. Posteriormente, se presentan distintas perspectivas respecto a la redistribución del poder mundial y al rol que le tocará asumir en adelante a los Estados Unidos, evaluando su política exterior dentro de/nuevo contexto mundial. También se analizan aspectos como el nuevo rol de los organismos internacionales, el poder militar y el poder económico, y la democracia y los derechos humanos. ; This article looks at US foreign relations. The changes that occurred at the end of the 1980s brought new perspectives on theory into discussion, with realism and neorealism at the heart of the debate. The author goes on to dissect different outlooks on the redistribution of world power and the role that will fall to the US in the future, stemming from an analysis of its foreign policy in the new international environment. The author also turns his attention to the new role of international organizations, military and economic power, as well as democracy and human rights.
This article looks at US foreign relations. The changes that occurred at the end of the 1980s brought new perspectives on theory into discussion, with realism and neorealism at the heart of the debate. The author goes on to dissect different outlooks on the redistribution of world power and the role that will fall to the US in the future, stemming from an analysis of its foreign policy in the new international environment. The author also turns his attention to the new role of international organizations, military and economic power, as well as democracy and human rights. ; El artículo presenta un análisis acerca de las relaciones internacionales norteamericanas. Los cambios producidos al final de la década de los años ochenta motivaron la discusión de nuevos enfoques teóricos. Como se verá en las siguientes páginas, son el realismo y el neorrealismo los que quedan en el centro del debate. Posteriormente, se presentan distintas perspectivas respecto a la redistribución del poder mundial y al rol que le tocará asumir en adelante a los Estados Unidos, evaluando su política exterior dentro de/nuevo contexto mundial. También se analizan aspectos como el nuevo rol de los organismos internacionales, el poder militar y el poder económico, y la democracia y los derechos humanos.
