To gain acceptance and make the case that constructivist ideas mattered empirically, constructivists endeavored to demonstrate how their ideational perspective could provide superior understanding and explanation of political phenomena. Social Constructivism Summary Notes. Identity informs preferences and interests, so to understand why certain states behave the way they do on the international stage, paying attention to how their identities drive their interests and actions matters. Although the theory lies more on non-material factors that govern states, it explains that politics also plays a role in international relations. Treating social norms as fully formed, static constructs, even for analytic convenience, underplayed this dynamism. Constructivism argues that culture, social structures and human institutional frameworks matter. Norms and identity in world politics. Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, VIC, Australia, You can also search for this author in The Washington Quarterly, 41(3), 89109. There is considerable confusion in the field on what precisely constitutes social constructivism and what distinguishes it from other approaches to international relations.1 As a result, it has become fairly common to introduce constructivism as yet another substantive theory of international rela- In P. M. Haas (Ed. But a constructivist reading of the Melian Dialogue (Lebow 2001) shows how ideas rather than material factors played a role in the decision of the Melians, even if the outcome was grim (Agius 2006). Their embrace of the constructivist paradigm and its application as a natural teaching and learning response to the specific needs of ELLs is a unique and remarkable contribution to the theoretical and research-based literature on this topic." Denmark exhibits of soft form of neoliberalism compared to that of the USA or UK, affecting views of the role of the market in terms of outsourcing security; moreover, Denmark has hard commitments to international humanitarian law which is likely to have tempered direct engagement of PMSCs (2019, pp. While states may choose to participate in war or not for strategic or material reasons, it is often ideational justifications (i.e., related to justice, values or existential threat) that provide the compelling argument for or against war. Understanding how ideas about danger and threat are socially constructed, and how states form social relations in the international system is a key starting point in discussions about global security. Chapter 4 Constructivism and Interpretive Theory CCRAIGPARSONS [A constructivist argument claims tear people do one thing and not anurher due co the presence of certain social construct ideas, belies, noms, idenies, or some other iterpreuire fer through which people perceive the wood. (2019). (2006). Constructivist ideas are present when attention is turned to alliances and security communities. Recent efforts to ensure gender equality in militaries represent a normative shift, affecting operations and culture. Both compliance and contestation studies have broadened our understanding of norm dynamics allowing norms themselves to change and exploring the conditions under which norms will elicit conformance but they do so in different ways. While neorealists argued that attacking Iraq was not in the national interests of the USA and that containment was more effective (Mearsheimer and Walt 2003), neoconservative hawks determined otherwise. In essence, they theorized norm diffusion as taking place from a community of Western states constituted by compliance with universal human rights norms to individual Southern states. This was a vastly different kind of theorizing than was current in the mainstream of international relations that was locked in the neorealist/neoliberal debate (e.g., Krasner 1983; Keohane 1984, 1986; Baldwin 1990; Grieco 1990). Christine Agius . Constructivism in international relations: The politics of reality. The culture of national security. ), Handbook of military sciences (pp. It examines the socialization process as more one of contestation between different normative systems and has broadened the scope of analysis to include attempts at socializing both powerful and weaker actors. Further, constructivists became more cautious about basing their analyses on the logic of appropriateness. Yet this dominant view of international relations was significantly challenged by Alexander Wendt in the early 1990s with the simple premise: anarchy is what states make of it (Wendt 1992, pp. Instead, attempts at synthesis of constructivism and rationalism are now en vogue (e.g., Fearon and Wendt 2001; Schimmelfennig 2001, 2005; Checkel and Zurn 2005; Kornprobst 2007; Culpepper 2008; Kelley 2008). Constructivism has provided a broader approach to understanding international relations and security beyond rationalist frameworks. forthcoming). Even so, more recently there has been some rejection of the ICC by a few African states, signaling that some states are unwilling to accept its authority. (3) Normative emergence how an idea reaches intersubjective status in a community. Norm contestation during the US War on Terror. On the contrary, this analytic device has a deep history in the sociological and economic literatures. Cham: Springer. (pp. Just as liberalism was a response to realism, economic structuralism is a response to liberalism. Both of these critiques run afoul of constructivist logic yet are legitimate given how norms were conceptualized in the initial wave of empirical constructivist work. (1996). Captured by Alexander Wendts now-famous maxim anarchy is what states make of it, social constructivism is the idea that the world out there is not given, as realists would argue, but rather, socially constructed. In doing so, social constructivism places a focus on the importance of mutual constitution: international politics is shaped by both structures, such as anarchy, or agents, such as states and other actors. This perspective states that the . Clearly this is a continuum because if agents were truly independent from or entirely dependent upon social structures, we would not be talking about constructivism. Hagstrm, L., & Gustafsson, K. (2015). Some constructivists stress reflection and consider that agents are able to reason about the various pulls on their possible behavior (either solely normative/ideational pulls or those in addition to material/strategic pulls). Hidden in plain sight: Constructivist treatment of social context and its limitations. In international relations, constructivism is a social theory that asserts that significant aspects of international relations are shaped by ideational factors (which are historically and socially constructed), not simply material factors. Critical constructivists would seek to include different identities in how they understand the nation and present a more complex picture of what identity means and how it is contested and can be deconstructed (Fierke 2001). Social phenomenon such as states, alliances or international institutions, are not thought to exist independent of human meaning and action. Having made the case that norms matter and having developed a number of theoretical frameworks to show how norms emerge, spread, and influence behavior, normsoriented constructivists have begun to turn their attention to a new set of questions. Wendt, A. International Organization, 59(4), 701012. Similarly, treating social norms as static independent variables led to calls for constructivists to define the conditions under which normative and nonnormative influences on behavior are likely to be the most important in determining behavior (Legro and Kowert 1996; Risse et al. Constructivism insists that reality is subjective. In more historical examples, states that chose neutrality during times of war did so against strong material factors that would have potentially granted them safety and survival had they opted to join one side or the other. For philosopher John Searle, language played an equally significant role. IR: The resurrection or new frontiers of incorporation. Millennium, 33(3), 495521. Introduction: Ideational AlliesPsychology, Constructivism, and International Relations . Constructing institutional interests: EU and NATO enlargement. In the last decade the development of constructivist thought and empirical research has been occurring more on terms defined by constructivism itself (Checkel 2004). Constructivism and the nature of international relations Constructivism efforts to give a better understanding of international relations by its method which is based on social theory. They were aware of and noted the simplifications being made caveating their work with notations about the fluid and inherently contested nature of norms. Cham: Springer. In A. M. Sookermany (Ed. The first is endogenous contestation actors that accept a general norm and are constituted by it nevertheless have different understandings of it or operationalize its strictures differently, leading to disputes and change in the meaning of the norm from within. The way in which issues are constructed and interpreted as threatening can also depend heavily on identity and views of the external realm. The empirical studies in this area were diverse. However, when defined as ideas or expectations about appropriate behavior for actors with a given identity (Finnemore and Sikkink 1998:891), it became an ideal conceptual tool for operationalizing processes of social construction. States may join military alliances to bandwagon with stronger powers, as realists tell us. Norms are born anew every day as actors instantiate them through their beliefs and actions and, as Sandholtz (2008:101) notes, normative structures, in other words, cannot stand still.. In essence, these scholars and those who draw upon their work consider that much of behavior in world politics arises from ingrained, unconscious motivations either habits or practices that drive precognitive behavior. Moreover, one of constructivisms strongest contributions has been in relation to the agency-structure debate, showing how mutual constitution provides a different reading of world politics and international relations but also opens the possibility for change. Baumann, M. (2022). Mearsheimer, J. J., & Walt, S. M. (2003). Douglas, B. Anarchy is what states make of it: The social construction of power politics. This criticism over methodology, it should be noted, does not wholly apply to the conventional strand of constructivism, which Wendt says can employ positivist scientific methods to verify or falsify claims (Wendt 1999); for example, to know something about a states military culture, one could look to opinion polls, regulations, training manuals, and the curricula at military academies that can provide data or information about how ideas and norms inform approaches to military organization and culture (Farrell 2002, pp. In A. M. Sookermany (Ed. Actors (usually powerful ones, like leaders and influential citizens) continually shape - and sometimes reshape - the very nature of international relations through their actions and interactions. About us. Wiener (2007) has advanced what she is calling a new logic of contestedness and has explored (2004) the dynamics of interpretation and contestation in European responses to the 2003 Iraq War. (1999). 5. Adler, E. (1997). Contemporary Security Policy, 26(2), 335355. - Ikechukwu Aloysius Orjinta - Google Books Sign in Try the new Google Books Books View sample Add to my library. A notable example that Searle uses to explain this is money. Constructivism's approach to the subjects of threat, conflict and security in global politics originated from their fundamental emphasis on the social dimensions of international politics, thus it defined them as socially constructed elements in the process of identity formation under the influence of the norms and shared values of society. Introduction: Reconstructing epistemic communities. Hoffmann (2005) employs insights from the study of complex adaptation to understand how states that all accepted the norm of universal participation in climate governance came to have different subjective understandings of that norm. Structures and agents influence each other. International Relations is in Social Studies, thus this study field tries to theorize a model that could explain everything that is going on between countries. What is the main argument of constructivism? For constructivists, a focus on identity makes it possible to consider more deeply how domestic factors, ideas, discourses, cultures, and norms shape the interests of states and the choices states make. Perhaps this is simply a matter of what questions are being asked. Instead of calculating what is best for improving its utility, an actor motivated by the logic of appropriateness will instead reason what actors like me should do. - Checkel (1998) argues that "without more sustained attention . The logic of anarchy is but one way in which it is possible to imagine how the international system works. Guzzini, S. (2005). Within this The development of and debate over logics of behavior is the foundation of the reasoning about normsreasoning through norms spectrum. Discourse has power because language can shape how we view phenomena simple acts such as defining a conflict as one of terrorism, for example, then calls into effect a range of policy options associated with countering terrorism. This recent research speaks to and is driven by broader questions of conceptualizing the relationship between actors and norms whether actors reason through or about social norms. It will then consider some key criticisms of this approach and conclude with a short summary. The dominant belief about identities in our societies is essentialism. Wiener (2004:203) argues that the interpretation of the meaning of norms, in particular, the meaning of generic sociocultural norms, cannot be assumed as stable and uncontested. International relations require various perspectives to comprehend the complexity of the interactions that take place in the international sphere. Social constructivism emerged out of key debates in international relations theory in the 1980s concerned with agents and structures and has come to be seen as the fourth debate in international relations theorizing, which pitches constructivist against rationalist perspectives (Fierke and Jrgensen 2001, p. 3). The inescapable tension between general rules and specific actions ceaselessly casts up disputes which in turn generate arguments, which then reshape both rules and conduct. The logical chain from general norms to contestation is not long. Silverstone, S. (2021). Oxford Research Encyclopedia of International Studies, Department of Political Science, University of Toronto Scarborough, Establishing Constructivist Social Norms Research, Contestation from Within a Normative Community, Open Questions for the Current Norms Research, https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190846626.013.60, Inter-Organizational Relations: Five Theoretical Approaches, Challenges to Traditional International Relations Theory Posed by Environmental Change, The Practice Turn in International Relations Theory. The translation requires interpretation a subjective understanding of the intersubjective context to decide on a behavior. But we dont call it torture! Seizing the middle ground: Constructivism in world politics. - 51.75.65.162. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. This analytic move facilitated conversation and competition with rational/material theoretical competitors. The basics of constructivism Our assessments, publications and research spread knowledge, spark enquiry and aid understanding around the world. Social Constructivism, especially after the 1980s, has become a common approach in dealing with and examining different issues in the field of humanities and social sciences. INRODUCTION T O INTERNA TIONAL RELA TION THEO RIES 23/10/2018. Recent studies have taken the generic nature of norms more seriously and have subsequently focused on how actors must operationalize their normative context to take specific actions (Hoffmann 2005; Van Kersbergen and Verbeek 2007; Sandholtz 2008). Regional order and peaceful change: Security communities as a via media in international relations theory. The irreducible core of constructivism for international relations is the recognition that international reality is socially constructed. But the nuclear issue is also important because it shows how competing ideas about norms co-exist or contrast for example, former US President Donald Trump tried to change the norm around the use of nuclear weapons, arguing for the ability to use low yield nuclear weapons and the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review returned to the idea that nuclear superiority mattered (Tannenwald 2018). (2016). Steele, B. A number of recent studies have examined just this tension and the range of empirical topics being considered from this perspective is now quite broad. The norms (both established and potential) meaning, constitutive properties, and behavioral strictures remain unchanged throughout the analysis (Van Kersbergen and Verbeek 2007). Norms are shared beliefs, knowledge, and practice about the world in this sense, they are intersubjective, meaning a norm can be understood and shared amongst actors. Zehfuss, M. (2002). Ontological security in international relations. The construction of social reality. Second, analytic tractability is necessary and is no trivial accomplishment. The international system is defined by anarchy. The link was not copied. forthcoming). (2) Socialization how an extant norm or a nascent norm from one community diffuses and is internalized by actors outside that community. Constructivists hold that . And while the focus on norms is important, there is an overwhelming tendency to examine good norms theres often the assumption that norms are good or ethical without critically analyzing what makes them good and what they mean for international change (Erskine 2012; Kowert and Legro 1996). Constructivism is an International Relations (IR) theory. Steele, B. Realists have traditionally seen neutral states as weak and small, responding only to the external anarchic realm (Agius 2006). For neorealists, who take a structural explanation of international relations and argue that anarchy shapes world politics, states are like units distinguished only by their distribution of power and capabilities states were primed to behave the same way because the anarchic structure instructs them so. Critics too began to understand social norms as static and specific and this facilitated an erroneous notion that evidence of norm-breaking behavior somehow invalidated or falsified constructivist theorizing. Wendt, A. The category of social norm was not an invention of constructivism. Seeing the world in this way as mutually constituted, driven by the interests of actors which relies on their ideas of themselves and others, and their approach to phenomena brings about different possibilities in international relations and security. American Political Science Review, 95(3), 547560. forthcoming). In this regard Social Constructivism ushers itself in, in the discipline of International Relations as a new alternative to the traditional theories that have hitherto monopolized the way political scientists have been viewing the inter - and intrastate events. Early empirical studies of social norms tended to consider social norms as static and relatively specific social facts.
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