Logics of mind and international system: a journey with Robert Jervis

2004 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 559-582 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thierry Balzacq ◽  
Robert Jervis
Keyword(s):  
Political Psychology ◽  
Complexity Theory ◽  
International System ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Pivotal Role ◽  
Rigorous Analysis ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
The Third ◽  
System A ◽  
Squeeze Out

The following exchange builds upon, and reassesses, the intellectual trajectory of Robert Jervis since The Logic of Images. It is organised around three interrelated sections that, tentatively, squeeze out the gist of Jervis' contribution to IR during his three and half decades of remarkable scholarship. The purpose, however, is not to offer a comprehensive view of Jervis' work; instead I want to set signposts that will help us get smoothly into his ‘system of thought’ and substantiate the salience of his account. In the first section, we concentrate on issues of images and (mis)perceptions. Here, Jervis reasserts that political psychology, a crucial site of relevance of actors' behaviour, is perfectly amenable to a rigorous analysis, and should thus be granted a pivotal role in understanding the dynamics of world politics. Insights of political psychology, with their various implications, are taken up into the next section, the rationale of which is to dialogically sketch out the paradoxical ethos of deterrence theory. The third section, on complexity theory, brings forward the breadth of Jervis's reorientation, characterised by a systematic integration of various ideas that have been at the centre of his endeavour since the 1980s. We use contemporary world politics as a thread that connects the aforementioned segments of the discussion and thereby gives the journey its overall coherence.

scholarly journals The Emergence of a Transnational Advocacy Network: International Election Monitoring in the Philippines, Chile, Nicaragua, and Mexico

2004 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Arturo Santa Cruz
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
International System ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
World Politics ◽  
State Sovereignty ◽  
Transnational Advocacy ◽  
Norm Diffusion ◽  
The Third ◽  
Advocacy Network ◽  
Election Monitoring

In this paper I question the existence of a global civil society, suggesting that what we have witnessed in recent years is the emergence of myriad transnational advocacy networks (TANs). I illustrate this claim by looking at a recently novel area in world politics: the international monitoring of elections (IEM), a practice which I claim has partially redefined state sovereignty. This paper takes form as follows. In the first section I present a conceptual discussion on world civil society and TANS , and suggest an unexplored way in which emergent norms might be adopted internationally. In the next four sections I follow the evolution of the IEM TAN. Thus, the second section deals with the foundational 1986 Philippine case; the third section with the 1988 Chilean plebiscite; the fourth with the 1990 Nicaraguan elections, and the fifth with the 1994 Mexican electoral process. I conclude in the sixth section by evaluating the usefulness of the path of norm-diffusion, and by discussing how the practice of non-state actors has contributed to the redefinition of both state sovereignty and the international system.

International Relations and the European Union

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Hill ◽  
Michael Smith ◽  
Sophie Vanhoonacker
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
International Relations ◽  
International System ◽  
The United States ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Theoretical Frameworks ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
The Third ◽  
Unique Approach ◽  
Key Policy

International Relations and the European Union takes a unique approach by incorporating the study of the EU's world role into the wider field of international relations. The text explains the EU's role in the contemporary world. Beginning with an examination of theoretical frameworks and approaches, the text goes on to address the institutions and processes that surround the EU's international relations. Key policy areas, such as security and trade, are outlined in detail, alongside the EU's relations with specific countries, including the United States, China, India, and Russia. Updates for the third edition include expanded discussions of three key perspectives to provide a rounded picture of the EU's place in the international system: as a sub-system of international relations, as part of the process of international relations, and as a power in its own right.

The fragmentation and consolidation of international systems

1997 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-208 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart J. Kaufman
Keyword(s):  
Economic Integration ◽  
Common Sense ◽  
Stability Theory ◽  
International System ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
World Today ◽  
The World ◽  
International Systems ◽  
Hegemonic Stability

The world today, Benjamin Barber points out, is “falling precipitantly apart and coming reluctantly together at the very same moment.” While states from Canada to India are threatened with breakup due to fractious nationalist impulses of their peoples, the power of technology and markets is forcing ever-tighter economic integration worldwide. From a common-sense perspective, these two impulses are among the most important processes in contemporary world politics. Yet, there has been remarkably little attention paid to developing a theory of the international system that examines the effects of both. Hegemonic stability theory considers economic integration but not nationalism; the few studies of nationalism as a systemic force play down the effects of economic integration; and neorealism, the most widely accepted theory of the international system, has no room to address either trend. The field is, partly as a result, a cacaphony of voices largely talking past one another.

scholarly journals Pandemics on the Radar Screen: Health Security, Infectious Disease and the Medicalisation of Insecurity

2011 ◽  
Vol 59 (4) ◽  
pp. 848-866 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Elbe
Keyword(s):  
Global Health ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
International System ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Health Issues ◽  
Global Health Security ◽  
Health Security ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Radar Screen ◽  
Contemporary Practice

How is the rise of global health security transforming contemporary practices of security? To date the literature on global health security has sought to trace how the securitisation of global health is affecting the governance of diseases in the international system; yet no-one has analysed – conversely – how the practices of security also begin subtly to change when they become concerned with a growing number of contemporary health issues. This article identifies three such changes. First, health security debates endow our understandings of security and insecurity in contemporary world politics with an important medical dimension. Second, the rise of global health security enables a range of medical and public health experts to play a greater role in the formulation and analysis of contemporary security policy. Finally, health security debates have also encouraged attempts to secure populations through recourse to a growing array of pharmacological interventions and new medical countermeasures. Drawing upon a rich literature in medical sociology, these three transformations in the contemporary practice of security collectively constitute the ‘medicalisation of security’. This novel perspective on the rise of global health security also reveals new limitations inherent in the emerging health–security interface – limitations associated not so much with the processes of ‘securitisation’ already noted in the global health literature, but rather with wider social processes of ‘medicalisation’. Awareness of the additional limitations renders the threat of a future pandemic even more serious than is commonly thought.

scholarly journals The Cold War, Old and New: A Preliminary Comparative Study of Polarity, Polarisation, and Elements of (In)stability

2021 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Thapiporn Suporn ◽  
Poowin Bunyavejchewin ◽  
Pattanarat Faugchun ◽  
Natthanont Sukthungthong
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
International System ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Major Power ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Preliminary Examination ◽  
The Media ◽  
Power Game ◽  
The Cold War

Recently, the term ‘new Cold War’ has become popular among the media and in academia as a description of contemporary world politics, in general, and major-power relations. Despite the connotations of its name, the Cold War period, sometimes referred to as the long peace, was associated with stability and the avoidance of an all-out world war. This study offers a preliminary examination of the extent to which 21st-century world politics reflects the features of the old Cold War. The findings show that the polarity and polarisation inherent in the current international system are similar to conditions of the early Cold War period (1947–1962), which can be classified as both power bipolar and cluster bipolar. Theoretically, this systemic condition is neither most nor least prone to war. However, similar to the pre-1962 Cold War period, when the implicit rules of the major-power game had yet reached maturity, little consensus on the proper conduct of American–Chinese relations has been reached at present, making current major-power politics highly uncertain and prone to conflict that may lead to war.

Normative Principles

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Zürn
Keyword(s):  
Global Governance ◽  
International Society ◽  
International System ◽  
World Politics ◽  
First Century ◽  
Rational Reconstruction ◽  
Governance System ◽  
The Third ◽  
International Authority ◽  
Political Communities

The global governance system rests on three normative principles, each of which qualifies the Westphalian principle of sovereignty. The first questions the implicit notion that all political communities are territorially segmented by highlighting the notion of common goods that need to be achieved together. The second questions the idea that political authorities are absolute by noting the rights of individuals and entitlements of non-state actors that they have independent of being members of a state. The third principle questions the notion that there are no authorities other than the state by mooting the possibility of international authority. This chapter discusses these normative principles and their “empirical appropriateness.” In using the method of rational reconstruction, it is shown that the assumptions of a global governance system seem to be better suited to understand world politics in the twenty-first century than the notion of an anarchic international system or an international society.

Three approaches to the international system …: a reply to Dr. Little

1979 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 86-90
Author(s):  
John Hoffman
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Fluid Dynamic ◽  
International System ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
The Third ◽  
System A ◽  
Dynamic Perspective

There can be little doubt that of the three approaches to the international system which Dr. Little explores,1 what he calls the “organized complexity model” is the most useful and valid for an understanding of international relations. While the first of the models he considers, the mechanistic one, has “no room for evolution, adaption or self-regulation,” the second, the organic model still focuses problematically on structures which are supposed to maintain a given system and so both lack what the third seeks to provide: a fluid, dynamic perspective which can account for change.

Complexity of World Politics: Methodological Aspects

2015 ◽  
pp. 58-67
Author(s):  
E. Zinov'eva ◽  
A. Kazantsev
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Complex Systems ◽  
Complexity Theory ◽  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
International System ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Traditional Theory ◽  
The World

The article addresses the use of complexity theory in the analysis of international relations. Complexity theory points to the inherent unpredictability of world relations theories. The current international system has reached such complexity level of politics that it cannot be analyzed on the basis of linear rationality used in the international standard, which leads to non-deterministic causality. The article discusses the evolution and basic tenets of the complexity theory, approaches to the world politics analysis established within its framework. The complexity research methodology focuses on actors and their values, interests and beliefs, as well as on the nature of interactions between them. In this regard, complexity theory is closely related to the modern constructivist theory of international relations. Today, the number of international actors is increasing, which increases the complexity of the world system. Therefore, analytical methodology should take into account the role of non-state actors as well as the high complexity of contemporary world politics, which is multi-layered and dynamic. In this respect, the complexity theory is associated with contemporary neoliberalism. Agent-oriented computer-based modeling is the main and a very promising scientific methodology applied to the study of complex adaptive systems, including world politics. In the complexity theory, this modeling implies the simulation of agent behavior (in this regard, agents are international relations actors), based on the simulation of the patterns, according to which agents process the information using adaptive mechanisms or behavior limiting norms and rules. In general, in terms of the complexity theory, foreign policy issues are always multidimensional, decisions have unintended consequences and are never simple. However, complex systems can be controlled, and even their structure can be altered. Still, there are no unambiguous tools of influencing the situation, and all recommendations should be taken with caution. The authors conclude that the complexity theory offers new explanations, research directions and practical perspectives for international relations research. Agent-oriented computer simulation also allows the incorporation into the analysis of a significant part of the knowledge accumulated in the international relations traditional theory framework. Acknowledgements. The article was prepared as a part of the project № 14-18-02973 “Long-Term Prognosis of the International Relations Development” fi nanced by the Russian Scientifi c Foundation. The authors express gratitude to M.M. Chaikovskii, Dr. Sci. (Physics and Mathematics), for the consultations on the mathematical aspects of the complex systems analysis.

Las estrategias discursivas de algunos artículos de opinión de Umberto Eco

2011 ◽  
pp. 266
Author(s):  
Loreta De Stasio
Keyword(s):  
Mass Media ◽  
Italian Society ◽  
Umberto Eco ◽  
Discursive Strategies ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
The Third ◽  
Binary Structure ◽  
Third Millennium ◽  
The Future ◽  
Economic Character

En este artículo examinaremos algunas de las principales estrategias discursivas empleadas en dos artículos publicados por U. Eco en L’Espresso, una revista semanal muy conocida en Italia de carácter político, social, cultural y económico, en el marco de una página personal titulada “La Bustina di Minerva”, es decir, “El Sobrecito de Minerva”. El título es una referencia a la comunicación breve, a las observaciones de cualquier tipo, pero igualmente, de forma simultánea. Los sobrecitos reflexionan sobre el mundo contemporáneo, la sociedad italiana, los medios de comunicación de masas; tratan de la actualidad y la relacionan con la historia y la filosofía, con Internet y el futuro del Tercer Milenio, y nos proponen los pensamientos de U. Eco con más viveza que una conferencia o un tratado.La ironía, la sátira y la parodia son las bases argumentativas de muchos “Sobrecitos”. Generalmente, el humor transmite dos sentidos a la vez. Detrás de una serie de textos tan variados temáticamente aparece a menudo una misma estructura binaria, un cuerpo dual. Con frecuencia, un mismo artículo obedece a una doble orientación tematica, ya que suelen mezclar dos motivos que pertenecen a áreas diferentes, alternando simultáneamente dos sujetos. A esta doble orientación temática del “Sobrecito” corresponde la doble orientación semántica de la palabra irónica que, junto con la parodia es un discurso dialógico o bi-direccional en el que se mezclan dos voces.In this article some of the main discursive strategies used in two articles published by U. Eco are examined. These articles have been published in L'Espresso, a weekly review very widespread in Italy, of political, social, cultural and economic character, within the framework of a column titled “La Bustina di Minerva”, that is to say, “The little bag/envelope of Minerva”. This title refers to a brief communication, to observations of any type, but also, immediate. The “bustine” reflects on the contemporary world, the Italian society, the mass media; they deal with present time and relate it to history and philosophy, Internet and the future of the Third Millennium, and they propose us Eco’s thoughts with more vividness than a conference or an essay.Irony, satire and parody are the argumentative bases of many “bustine”. Generally, humour transmits two senses simultaneously. Behind a series of texts so thematically varied there is often a same binary structure, a dual body. Frequently, a same article obeys to a double thematic direction, since usually they mix two arguments that belong to different areas, alternating two subjects simultaneously. To this double thematic direction of the “bustina” corresponds the double semantic direction of the ironic word that, along with parody, is a dialogic or bidirectional speech in which two voices are mixed.

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