The title of today's class is 'why do states fight wars?'
Wars and peace are central concerns in IR.
Realism would answer for the question as follows.....
The causes of wars are:
●Anarchy and self-help system
●Break of Balance of Power in the international system
●Security dilemma
The solutions for wars are:
●Maintain Balance of Power
●Derrerrance
Liberalism would answer as follows......
The causes of wars are:
●Domestic politics
●Failour/lack of democracy and cooperative regimes
The solutions for wars are:
●Cooperation under security dilemma
●Iterated interaction
●international institutions
Marxism would answer as follows........
The causes of wars are:
●Competition over leardership of global economy
●The legacy of colonialism (North-South relations and wars)
●Civil wars and humanitarian intervention
●State failure, terrorism, drug wars
●The export of arms
The solution for wars is:
●Delink from capitalism
Constructivism would answer as follows.......
The causes of wars are:
●Aggresive norms
●Misperception/Misunderstanding
●identity conflict
The solutions for wars is:
●Positive intersubjective understanding
Defineing the causes are very important to solve the problems. Each theory help us to get closer to the truth.
8/09/2008
8/04/2008
My Fifth Day of Class (Constructivism)
7/31 (Thu)
Today is the final day for learning IR theories. Today we covered Constructivism.
Its main arguments are:
●Reality is not given but socially constructed
●Ideas/Identity mattes the most
●Our language is important - reflect our ideas
●Our perspective not only shapes how and what we see, but the meaning we take
from it
●The Sneetches, by Dr. Seuss
●Emphasize culture, norms, ideas, identity, socialization, ideology,
language,cognition over utility
●Shared ideas, norms, ets can promote cooperatioin
In summary, constructivism claims that reality is constructed by our ideas or perceptions. For example, let's think about international system which realism and liberalism call it 'anarchy.' Constructivism believes that 'anarchical' international system was created by us. It did not preexist. Because we think other countries are not reliable and fearful, we perceive the world as anarchy.
Constructivism analyzes international issues focusing on how ideas affects on them.
Today is the final day for learning IR theories. Today we covered Constructivism.
Its main arguments are:
●Reality is not given but socially constructed
●Ideas/Identity mattes the most
●Our language is important - reflect our ideas
●Our perspective not only shapes how and what we see, but the meaning we take
from it
●The Sneetches, by Dr. Seuss
●Emphasize culture, norms, ideas, identity, socialization, ideology,
language,cognition over utility
●Shared ideas, norms, ets can promote cooperatioin
In summary, constructivism claims that reality is constructed by our ideas or perceptions. For example, let's think about international system which realism and liberalism call it 'anarchy.' Constructivism believes that 'anarchical' international system was created by us. It did not preexist. Because we think other countries are not reliable and fearful, we perceive the world as anarchy.
Constructivism analyzes international issues focusing on how ideas affects on them.
My Forth Day of Class (Marxism)
7/30(Wed)
Marxism is the third theory for me to learn in the course. Marxism mainly explains inequality in the world. For example, it can explain questions like 'why are there rich and poor people and states?' and 'how do we explain the poverty in the third world countries?.' The students in the class guessed that corruption, raw material export, capitalism, colonialism, ethnic conflicts, HIV/AIDS, and the system of world economy might be raised to explain the above questions.
First, let me show you the overview of Marxism in international relatioins.
●Classes drive politics
●Marckets are inherently exploitative, and produce class conflicts
●The state and its foreign policies reflect elite interests
●The expansion of marckets leads to colonialism
- International system is not anarchical but hierachical
- International conflicts are found in global economic competition
●Post-WWⅡprovides new forms of neo-colonialism
Marx believed in capitalist societies that classes determined by the mode of production are devided into the Bourgeosie and the Proletariat. The Bourgeosis has its land and capital to product. In contrary, the Proletariat has nothing but its labor to make ends meet. Thus, the Bourgeosis exploits the Proletariat, which creat a hierarchical society. Applying this Marxism to international system, Marxism in international relations considers that world can be divided between 'Core' and 'Periphery' states. In this system, it is believed that 'Core' states such as the U.S, the Europian countries, and Japan expoit 'Perophery' states such as the African countries, the Asian countries, and the Latin America countries. 'Core' states export manufactured goods to which high value added to 'Periphery' states which exports cheap raw materials and labor to which low value added. Between two sides, there exists uneven terms of trade which yields inequality in the world.
Marxism is the third theory for me to learn in the course. Marxism mainly explains inequality in the world. For example, it can explain questions like 'why are there rich and poor people and states?' and 'how do we explain the poverty in the third world countries?.' The students in the class guessed that corruption, raw material export, capitalism, colonialism, ethnic conflicts, HIV/AIDS, and the system of world economy might be raised to explain the above questions.
First, let me show you the overview of Marxism in international relatioins.
●Classes drive politics
●Marckets are inherently exploitative, and produce class conflicts
●The state and its foreign policies reflect elite interests
●The expansion of marckets leads to colonialism
- International system is not anarchical but hierachical
- International conflicts are found in global economic competition
●Post-WWⅡprovides new forms of neo-colonialism
Marx believed in capitalist societies that classes determined by the mode of production are devided into the Bourgeosie and the Proletariat. The Bourgeosis has its land and capital to product. In contrary, the Proletariat has nothing but its labor to make ends meet. Thus, the Bourgeosis exploits the Proletariat, which creat a hierarchical society. Applying this Marxism to international system, Marxism in international relations considers that world can be divided between 'Core' and 'Periphery' states. In this system, it is believed that 'Core' states such as the U.S, the Europian countries, and Japan expoit 'Perophery' states such as the African countries, the Asian countries, and the Latin America countries. 'Core' states export manufactured goods to which high value added to 'Periphery' states which exports cheap raw materials and labor to which low value added. Between two sides, there exists uneven terms of trade which yields inequality in the world.
7/29/2008
My Third Day of Class(Liberalism)
7/29(Tue)
Today we covered 'liberalism' which is also one of major international relations theories. Historically, Immanuel Kant and Woodrow Wilson are famous for advocates of liberalism.
Now let me show the overview of liberalism in brief here.
●Core belief - Spreding democracy, global economic ties, and strengthing peace
●Wars are not inevitable
●Wars can be reduced by institutional arrangement
●Collective security as a possible
●Interdependency
●Other actors such as NGO, international organizations, multinational coｒporations are included
●Democratic countries do not fight one another
Key Actors:
●States
●International institutions (UN, WTO, etc)
●Non governmental groups
●Multinational coporations
＊States are not unitary/autonomous actors as realists think because they have many intersts and layers in a domestic politics.
Classical liberalism:
Classical liberalism has a belief that human nature is good by nature, and that democracy and
capitalism are keys to make for peace. Kant explains that democracy, trade, and international institutions are essence of peaceful world.
As for trade, there are three reasons to analyze why trade is a good way for peace. First, it is because no one want to destroy their trade relations when trade due to war and military conflicts. Second, trade provides routine interactions between two countries
Third, countries go hand in hand with democracy.
Next, let me describe why international institutions are also the means to establish the peaceful world. It is because internatinoal institutions provide an arena for iterated interactions. And, international institutions have common rules to make each country obey. Also, international institutions provide information to all members. This brings transparency amon countries via international institutions.
Finally, the reason why democracy are needed for peace is because citizens can vote for electing their president, and thus, stop waging wars even if the president wanted to go to war. In other words, the president cannot go to war if he/she did not gain domestic support for war.
At first, I was confused with Kant's theory which capitalism is neccessary for peace because I had read Lenin's article 'From Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism' before I learned Kant's theory in the class. There are lots of theories in international relations, they are competing one another. We should pick up best theories which would apply for contemporary politics. And it is better to be flexible about applying theories to real situations happening in the world.
The class reading for today's content is 'Liberalism and World Politics' written by Michael W. Doyle. You can read the article by clicking the following URL.
http://homepages.stmartin.edu/fac_staff/rlangill/PLS%20300/Liberalism%20and%20World%20Politics%20Doyle.htm
Today we covered 'liberalism' which is also one of major international relations theories. Historically, Immanuel Kant and Woodrow Wilson are famous for advocates of liberalism.
Now let me show the overview of liberalism in brief here.
●Core belief - Spreding democracy, global economic ties, and strengthing peace
●Wars are not inevitable
●Wars can be reduced by institutional arrangement
●Collective security as a possible
●Interdependency
●Other actors such as NGO, international organizations, multinational coｒporations are included
●Democratic countries do not fight one another
Key Actors:
●States
●International institutions (UN, WTO, etc)
●Non governmental groups
●Multinational coporations
＊States are not unitary/autonomous actors as realists think because they have many intersts and layers in a domestic politics.
Classical liberalism:
Classical liberalism has a belief that human nature is good by nature, and that democracy and
capitalism are keys to make for peace. Kant explains that democracy, trade, and international institutions are essence of peaceful world.
As for trade, there are three reasons to analyze why trade is a good way for peace. First, it is because no one want to destroy their trade relations when trade due to war and military conflicts. Second, trade provides routine interactions between two countries
Third, countries go hand in hand with democracy.
Next, let me describe why international institutions are also the means to establish the peaceful world. It is because internatinoal institutions provide an arena for iterated interactions. And, international institutions have common rules to make each country obey. Also, international institutions provide information to all members. This brings transparency amon countries via international institutions.
Finally, the reason why democracy are needed for peace is because citizens can vote for electing their president, and thus, stop waging wars even if the president wanted to go to war. In other words, the president cannot go to war if he/she did not gain domestic support for war.
At first, I was confused with Kant's theory which capitalism is neccessary for peace because I had read Lenin's article 'From Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism' before I learned Kant's theory in the class. There are lots of theories in international relations, they are competing one another. We should pick up best theories which would apply for contemporary politics. And it is better to be flexible about applying theories to real situations happening in the world.
The class reading for today's content is 'Liberalism and World Politics' written by Michael W. Doyle. You can read the article by clicking the following URL.
http://homepages.stmartin.edu/fac_staff/rlangill/PLS%20300/Liberalism%20and%20World%20Politics%20Doyle.htm
My Second Day of Class(Realism)
7/28(Mon)
Today is my second day of class. Its main argument is about Realism in IR.
Realism is one of major IR theories.
The instructor presented an overview of realism to us in the begging of the class.
The way of seeing the world politics for realism is:
1.War is natural and inevitable
2.International system is anarchy
3.States are fundamentally concerned with national interest
4.Power is key to national interest(survive, military strength, wealth, etc)
5.Relative gains is better than absolute gains for realism
6.Talk is cheap(because the strength to survive is much important for realism)
International System
●The international system is anarchic
●"No government over governments"
●No 911 in international system
●Self-help
These descriptions of international system suggest that there is no such people or organization like police and firefighters to protect you or save you in the world. In addition, there is no absolute authorities to restrict each state's behavior. Therefore, you cannot rely on any other states. That is why you should protect you by yourself and cannot ask for help when you need it because international system is anarchic.
Key Actors
●The states
●Rational, unitary actors calculating on the basis of their "national interest" ('Rational' in this context means that the states know the means to achieve their goals.)
●State power - the key means to seek for national interest
- the primary determinant of international relations
Balance of Power
●the ratio of power between states and alliance of states
●balancing occurs out of fear for survival
●war occurs due to imbalances
●balance of power creates three types of polarity
1.Biopolarity(like the U.S and Soviet Union during Cold War)
2.Multipolarity
3.Unipolarity
During the class we discussed which polarity is better for stability in world politics. Most students told that multipolarity is better because, according to one student, they can check one another.
The flaws of Realism
Realism neglects
●non-state actors such as NGO or individual people
●domestic politics
●morality
●weak states
●human rights
These are some parts of explanation of realism. I am quite convinced with its theory. We cannot deny the fact that the state as well as an individual has interest and desire. That is why we sometimes conflict each other and wage wars. What is impressed in the article 'One world, rival theories' is the sentence, "a ruthless pragmatism about power can actually yield a more peaceful world." I agree with the statement because just an ideal plan which is drawing a perfect world cannot help the conflicts in the world.
スライド 4 スライド 4
Today is my second day of class. Its main argument is about Realism in IR.
Realism is one of major IR theories.
The instructor presented an overview of realism to us in the begging of the class.
The way of seeing the world politics for realism is:
1.War is natural and inevitable
2.International system is anarchy
3.States are fundamentally concerned with national interest
4.Power is key to national interest(survive, military strength, wealth, etc)
5.Relative gains is better than absolute gains for realism
6.Talk is cheap(because the strength to survive is much important for realism)
International System
●The international system is anarchic
●"No government over governments"
●No 911 in international system
●Self-help
These descriptions of international system suggest that there is no such people or organization like police and firefighters to protect you or save you in the world. In addition, there is no absolute authorities to restrict each state's behavior. Therefore, you cannot rely on any other states. That is why you should protect you by yourself and cannot ask for help when you need it because international system is anarchic.
Key Actors
●The states
●Rational, unitary actors calculating on the basis of their "national interest" ('Rational' in this context means that the states know the means to achieve their goals.)
●State power - the key means to seek for national interest
- the primary determinant of international relations
Balance of Power
●the ratio of power between states and alliance of states
●balancing occurs out of fear for survival
●war occurs due to imbalances
●balance of power creates three types of polarity
1.Biopolarity(like the U.S and Soviet Union during Cold War)
2.Multipolarity
3.Unipolarity
During the class we discussed which polarity is better for stability in world politics. Most students told that multipolarity is better because, according to one student, they can check one another.
The flaws of Realism
Realism neglects
●non-state actors such as NGO or individual people
●domestic politics
●morality
●weak states
●human rights
These are some parts of explanation of realism. I am quite convinced with its theory. We cannot deny the fact that the state as well as an individual has interest and desire. That is why we sometimes conflict each other and wage wars. What is impressed in the article 'One world, rival theories' is the sentence, "a ruthless pragmatism about power can actually yield a more peaceful world." I agree with the statement because just an ideal plan which is drawing a perfect world cannot help the conflicts in the world.
7/27/2008
Obama's speech in Berlin
In my first day of class, the instructor told us that reading a good news paper such as New York Times and Wall Street Journal will help us understand some current IR issues in class. Therefore, I tried to read some articles on New York Times website.
And I want to show you three pictures from the website.
You can notice Barack Obama in the picture. Then, do you know where he is? He is not in the U.S, but in Berlin, Germany. I can hardly believe my eyes! Such incredible number of people gathering together to listen to his speech! When I see these pictures, I think as if he was in the U.S. You can listen to his speech by accessing to the below URL.
http://video.on.nytimes.com/?fr_story=03fd064efe9f97792bbaa5fa6c33f3a17a188833
Three of these pictures were taken from 'The New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2008/07/24/world/0724-OBAMAGERMANY_index.html)'
7/25/2008
My First Day of Class
7/24(Thu)
Today was my first day of class. My class is held at from 2:20 p.m. to 4:50 from Monday through Thursday. The instructor wraped up today's lecture earlier than the normal time.
My instructor is Korean and in PhD course in Political Science.
By the way, he distributed a sheet of syllabus and carefully explained it. According to the syllabus, I have midtem exam on 7 August, final exam on 21 August, and pop-up quiz. Pop-up quiz is going to be like what is the argument of Kant or what is the argument of Jervis. He told us that it is easy to solve if we read the articles in the textbook.
Then, let me write about today's content. After we looked over the syllabus, we thought about International Relations(IR), theory, and the step for theorizing. First, what is IR? Before answering for the question, the instructor gave us an idea that this course 'Introduction to IR' is for answering WHY do things happen the way they happen in that way. Then, he explained us that IR is the scientific study of the interaction of people or states across state borders. In this sentence, the word 'the interaction' makes a difference between IR and comparative politics. Second, the instructor gave us a question about what is a theory. After a few second, two students in a class suggested that it is an explanation or an educated guess. As they suggested, the instructor told us that theory is an attempt to find general and causal explanation.
Third, what was most interesting topic was studying the step for theorizing. Here, he introduced us the term 'Dependent Variable' and 'Independent Variable.' The first thing for us to theorize about a phenomenon is finding a puzzle, reserch question. For example, let's think about the puzzle of WHY the percentage of those who are saying the U.S is ready to have Black president is rising. In this puzzle, dependent variable is the rising persentage of people who are supporting for black president. During class, the students examined what independent variable is. Some guesses were raised. For instance, rising gas price, dislike of the other candidates, global influence, generation change, media, or good looking.
The important thing of theory is defining independent valiable. It is because the world would be disaster if we failed to define the correct independent variable. In short, independent variable is like the cause of the happening or accident. If we misdefined the cause in the process of solving the happening or accident, we could bring another disaster to the world.
That is all about today's class. I have no class on Friday. So, I will spend time preparing for the next class on Monday.
Misaki
Today was my first day of class. My class is held at from 2:20 p.m. to 4:50 from Monday through Thursday. The instructor wraped up today's lecture earlier than the normal time.
My instructor is Korean and in PhD course in Political Science.
By the way, he distributed a sheet of syllabus and carefully explained it. According to the syllabus, I have midtem exam on 7 August, final exam on 21 August, and pop-up quiz. Pop-up quiz is going to be like what is the argument of Kant or what is the argument of Jervis. He told us that it is easy to solve if we read the articles in the textbook.
Then, let me write about today's content. After we looked over the syllabus, we thought about International Relations(IR), theory, and the step for theorizing. First, what is IR? Before answering for the question, the instructor gave us an idea that this course 'Introduction to IR' is for answering WHY do things happen the way they happen in that way. Then, he explained us that IR is the scientific study of the interaction of people or states across state borders. In this sentence, the word 'the interaction' makes a difference between IR and comparative politics. Second, the instructor gave us a question about what is a theory. After a few second, two students in a class suggested that it is an explanation or an educated guess. As they suggested, the instructor told us that theory is an attempt to find general and causal explanation.
Third, what was most interesting topic was studying the step for theorizing. Here, he introduced us the term 'Dependent Variable' and 'Independent Variable.' The first thing for us to theorize about a phenomenon is finding a puzzle, reserch question. For example, let's think about the puzzle of WHY the percentage of those who are saying the U.S is ready to have Black president is rising. In this puzzle, dependent variable is the rising persentage of people who are supporting for black president. During class, the students examined what independent variable is. Some guesses were raised. For instance, rising gas price, dislike of the other candidates, global influence, generation change, media, or good looking.
The important thing of theory is defining independent valiable. It is because the world would be disaster if we failed to define the correct independent variable. In short, independent variable is like the cause of the happening or accident. If we misdefined the cause in the process of solving the happening or accident, we could bring another disaster to the world.
That is all about today's class. I have no class on Friday. So, I will spend time preparing for the next class on Monday.
Misaki
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