Core module International Relations full notes
EXAM 1:
Lecture 1:
International Relations as:
● Power relations among nation-states in the international system
● As international conflict, war, violence and physical security
● As an international political economy (trade, money, migration, etc.)
● A more complicated cross-border interaction
Ir-specific academic goals: analyse IR as multi-level politics
● Explore theoretical and empirical controversies/debates in IR
○ Categories
■ Descriptive
● Is there more or less globalisation today than ten years ago?
■ Explanatory
● Does economic globalisation increase or decrease the
probability of violent conflict?
■ Normative
● What should foreign economic policies do to discourage violent
conflict?
○ Depth/breadth, topical/mid-level vs perennial
■ Mid-level debates
● Context and problem-specific, partly resolvable through
empirical research
○ How does global climate change affect violent
conflicts?
● Perennial debates
○ All-encompassing, paradigmatic, difficult to solve
through empirics
■ What is the relationship between politics and
economics?
● Articulate a framework for understanding multi level global politics
○ The framework moves beyond the methodological nationalism
○ The framework avoids Western centrism theoretically, methodologically and
normatively
○ The framework recognises equal normative value and agency for all humans
in all corners of the globe
● Build arguments and carry out empirical research to clarify multilevel politics and
address IR controversies
General academic goals: Four skills and a mission
● Argument mapping
○ Conceptually untangle and specify the reasoning, the logical chain of
arguments
, ● Connection-seeing
○ Identify seemingly unrelated connections, even conspiracies but use Occam's
razor
● Empirical testing
○ Carry out empirical research to test, induce or revise theoretical arguments
■ Anecdotes
■ Qualitative cases
■ Descriptive quantitative information
■ Inferential quantitative information
● Courageous curiosity
○ Be open to being wrong, so as to learn
Logistics of CMIR: path to learning IR as multi-level politics
Levels of politics
● Sub-national politics
○ Cities
○ Provinces
● National politics
○ Countries
■ Elections
● International politics
○ Countries
■ Relations with one another
● Regional politics
○ EU
○ Arab League
● Supra-national politics
○ Multinational corporations
○ Transnational terrorist networks
All these levels interplay and are connected
In recent decades, big changes have transformed international relations and hence its study
● Shifting power relations
○ The West vs the rest
○ Decline of the USA
○ Rise of China, India
● Shirting political cleavages
○ Poor vs Rich
○ Globalisation
○ Religion
● More and stronger international institutions
○ EU
○ UN
○ G20
● New actors
○ NGOs
, ○ MNCs
○ Transnational terrorism
● More porous national borders
○ Economic globalisation
○ Contagious politics
○ Policies and practices
,Lecture 2:
Why these and not other debates
● Perennial debates
○ All-encompassing, paradigmatic debates (not mid-level debates) inform IR
thinking on all issues for many decades (centuries)
● Clear focussed debates
○ Some perennial debates are focussed with respect to (mainly) one key
dimension or question about IR, more than just sorting 0 device schools of
thought or conceptual lenses
■ Realism vs liberalism vs constructivism
● Salient debates
○ Some perennial debates are more salient and unresolved than others, some
have been mostly resolved and are now less salient
■ Levels of analysis debate, Waltz: Man the state and war
Realism and Idealism
Idealism Realism
Role of power and Not usually the main or only The most important cause
power-seeking in IR politics cause of shaping shaping motivations and
motivations and outcomes outcomes
Power co-determined by Power is mainly determined
material and non-material by material conditions
conditions (also (geography, guns,
ideas/diplomacy) technology)
Goals of Ir analysis Often normative More positive empirical
To visualise and identify a To reveal what actually
path towards peace, occurs/exists and why
democracy etc.
Marketability/agency Emphasis on Emphasis on political
(maakbaarheid) makeability/agency constraint
Unit of analysis Individuals, groups, nations, Sovereign nation-states and
international organisations the international system
Interests of states Fundamental harmony of Unresolved clashing of
interests interests (zero-sum games)
Conflict avoidable Conflict unavoidable
International order Maintaining international Anarchy, absence of
order due to global supranational authority to
institutions and norms make and enforce decisions
, (norms and institutions not
important
Causes of war Undemocratic government, Natural antagonism
irrational or evil leaders, between states under
nationalism, feudalism, anarchy (striving for
militarism etc. survival/hegemony, where
uncertain power conditions
are dangerous)
Political recommendation Spread the rule of law and Establish stable and
human rights, create IGOs, transparent power
foster democracy, education equilibrium, concentrate on
and consciousness-raising limited vital national
interests
Relationship between Foreign policies are strongly Foreign policies are mainly
domestic and international influenced by domestic shaped by states' position in
politics politics (democratic vs the international system
non-democratic character of (less by domestic factors)
the economy)
Historical torch-bearers Erasmus, Kant, Bentham, Thucydides, Machiavelli,
de Groot, Wilson, Gandhi, Hobbes, Rousseau,
Wendt, Wolfowitz, Von der Churchill, Mearsheimer,
Leyen Waltz, Kissinger, N. Halley
Contemporary realism: the primacy of power
● All realists agree that power and power-seeking are the most important forces in IR
● But they differ over which drivers at which level of analysis underlie such
power-seeking
○ Is it human nature
■ Humans are seen as violent power-seeking animals or social
creatures
● Machiavelli, Niebuhr, Morgenthau, Konrad Lorenz
○ Is it the nation-state
■ Power and its influence are a function of nation-states themselves
■ Sovereignty, but also authoritarian rule, offensive doctrine
● S Walt, S van Evera
○ Is it the international system
■ Anarchy
■ The absence of supranational authority constraints all states in the
international system to rely on self-help for security (through power)
● Thucydides, K Waltz, Mearsheumer, B Posen
, Realism and power-balancing
● Power balancing entails the balancing of the increasing or decreasing power of other
states
○ Realists conceptualise such balancing in varying ways
■ Offensive realism (power maximising)
■ Defensive realism (power balancing)
■ Internal balancing (developing one's army)
■ External balancing (develop alliances with other states)
■ Normative (power balancing should be pursued)
■ Positive (power balancing occurs naturally, almost always)
● Power balancing is universal among states
○ Not just between ideological/economic opponents or rivals, but also between
friends that share norms/institutions/history
■ 20th century France and Britain
○ Not just among old-fashioned Great Powers or militarist nation-stats but also
among more ideologically-oriented, post-realpolitik countries
■ The USSR after 1917, the USA in the 19th century and possibly
American exceptionalism
● Power balancing and security dilemmas
○ Security dilemma: attempts to shore up one’s security can (unintentionally)
undermine the perceived security of others, who then take actions to improve
their security (Herz 1950: Jervis 1977)
■ Power Politics (self-help under anarchy) provokes power balancing,
such that the dilemma emerges
■ Security dilemma is worse with miscalculation, overreaction,
uncertainty offensive-oriented doctrines and military technology
■ Whereby tit-for-tat insecurity spirals can emerge (arms races, war,
etc.)
● Pre-WW1: battleship gap, guns of August outbreak of WW1
● Cold War: bomber gap of the 1950s, missile gap of the 1960s
● Post-Cold War: Sabre-rattling between China-US in the South
China Sea
Realism and War
● War is a natural, almost unavoidable artefact of anarchy, via power balancing and
security dilemma
● But war is particularly likely when power balances are unstable, unclear,
misrepresented or undergoing rapid change (Doran, Waltz, Blainey, Gartzke)
Realism and cooperation
● In international diplomacy, people seek relative gains (not just absolute gains)
○ Relative gains strongly constrain choices
■ The position/status of one’s country is judged relative to the position of
other states, not only or mainly with respect to some ideal position or
one’s past position (Grieco 1988)
