Theorising the international system: perspectives from Historical Sociology

1999 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 257-271 ◽  
Author(s):  
STEPHEN HOBDEN
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
State Formation ◽  
International System ◽  
Historical Sociology ◽  
The State ◽  
Historical Account ◽  
International Context ◽  
Recent Interest ◽  
State Context ◽  
Inter State

Recent interest in the work of Historical Sociologists has concentrated on their renewed interest in the state. There is considerable regard for the historical account of state formation and development produced by writers such as Mann, Skocpol and Tilly. Surprisingly there has been less attention paid to another feature of their writings—the locating of states in an inter-state context. This article examines the international context envisioned by four historical sociologists. It argues that, although these writers have been successful at historicising state formations, this powerful account has not been matched with a historical account of international relations. If this project is to move forward, a complementary historical account of international contexts, or global structures, is required.

Societies, states and geopolitics: challenges from historical sociology

1989 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 281-293 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony Jarvis
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International System ◽  
Historical Sociology ◽  
The State ◽  
Classical Realism

Many scholars in International Relations will register surprise and perhaps amusement at the recent 'discovery' of the state by sociologists. They could accurately claim, it has never been similarly neglected in their own discipline. International Relations is about states and the system of states. Classical realism relies on explicit understandings about what states are and their place in the international system.

The position of the State in the international system from the perspective of major schools of thought in international relations

2019 ◽  
pp. 79
Author(s):  
Salah Hassan Mohammed ◽  
Mahaa Ahmed Al-Mawla
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Politics ◽  
International System ◽  
International Order ◽  
The State ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Status ◽  
Future Vision

The Study is based on the state as one of the main pillars in international politics. In additions, it tackles its position in the international order from the major schools perspectives in international relations, Especially, these schools differ in the status and priorities of the state according to its priorities, also, each scholar has a different point of view. The research is dedicated to providing a future vision of the state's position in the international order in which based on the vision of the major schools in international relations.

International Relations as a Prismatic System

1961 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 144-181 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fred W. Riggs
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
International System ◽  
Well Being ◽  
League Of Nations ◽  
State System ◽  
American Society ◽  
State 1 ◽  
Executive Body ◽  
Inter State

Conventional theories of international relations assume, implicitly, the model of an “inter-state system.” According to this model, individually states possess a set of characteristics which differ fundamentally from the characteristics of a system of those states interacting with each other. On this basis we can construct theories about the behavior of component states in the system, and more general propositions about the nature of the inter-state system viewed as a whole. Some of the difficulties of this model will be noted here, and an alternative model proposed.Before pointing to these difficulties, however, we need a clear image of the inter-state model. A classic formulation is contained in a speech given by former Secretary of State John Foster Dulles at a meeting of the American Society for International Law. In it Mr. Dulles identified six characteristics of the nation-state: (1) laws which “reflect the moral judgment of the community”; (2) political machinery to revise these laws as needed; (3) an executive body able to administer the laws; (4) judicial machinery to settle disputes in accord with the laws; (5) superior force to deter violence by enforcing the law upon those who defy it; and (6) sufficient well-being so that people are not driven by desperation to ways of violence. The international system, Mr. Dulles pointed out, in large part lacks these characteristics. He went on to assess the limited success of attempts, ranging from the League of Nations and Kellogg-Briand Pact through the United Nations, to create such a “state system” or “order” at the international level. Mr. Dulles sadly reported that, despite notable progress in the development of international law and judicial machinery, the desired international order does not, as yet, exist.

Foreign and Domestic Factors in the Transformation of Frelimo

1993 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 309-337 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Simpson
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Recent Work ◽  
Economic Change ◽  
Historical Sociology ◽  
The State ◽  
Complex Interplay ◽  
Role Of The State ◽  
Per Se ◽  
Ruling Party

This article examines the trajectory of the Frente de Libertação de Moçambique (Frelimo), currently the ruling party in Mozambique, focusing on the complex interplay between various factors which contributed to the metamorphoses it has undergone since its founding in 1962. Recent work in the field of international relations and historical sociology has thrown light on the rôle of the state as an administrative-coercive entity constantly cross-pressured by domestic and foreign forces, and acting simultaneously on both fronts in pursuit of advantage. While this scholarship has not focused on ruling parties per se, it is arguable that the standard government versus state dichotomy is of limited analytical value in cases such as Mozambique, where the distinction between party and state remained in practice, until recently, a constitutional nicety. When the ruling party has been institutionalised to the extent of Frelimo, and where the state has become almost an extension of the party, it is the latter that is the key variable in any explanation of political and economic change within society.

scholarly journals Geopolítica como Luta de Classes: Marxismo Político, Relações Internacionais e Sociologia Histórica | Geopolitics as Class Struggle: Political Marxism, International Relations and Historical Sociology

2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 186-202
Author(s):  
Pedro Salgado
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Class Struggle ◽  
Historical Sociology ◽  
Historical Account ◽  
The Core ◽  
The Social

Ao inserir a luta de classes no centro da análise histórica, o Marxismo Político propõe uma reinterpretação da disciplina de Relações Internacionais que pode ser entendida em três passos. O primeiro é uma visão histórica da formação do sistema de estados moderno, a partir de transformações da geopolítica feudal após a origem do capitalismo. O segundo, uma metodologia historicista que parte da forma como a operação de tal sistema pode ser entendida através dos conflitos entre classes com suas respectivas estratégias de espacialização. Por fim, resta justificar a centralidade da luta de classe, e de “classe” enquanto categoria analítica, através do retorno à obra de Marx, resgatando a forma como a noção sociológica de agência é antecipada em sua filosofia da práxis. Assim, reinscrevendo a distinção entre “global” e “(inter)nacional” nas relações sociais que lhe dão origem, a disciplina de Relações Internacionais assume a forma de Sociologia Histórica.ABSTRACTBy bringing class struggle into the core of historical analysis, Political Marxism suggests a reinterpretation of International Relations that can be understood in three steps. Firstly, a historical account of of the rise of the modern states-system through the transformations in feudal geopolitics after the rise of capitalism. Secondly, the development of a radically historicist methodology that is explains this system's operation through the conflict between classes and their respective spatialization strategies. At last, the justification for having class struggle at the core of the analysis, and of "class" as an analytical unit, comes from a return to Marx's work to see how he grounds the sociological notion of agency in his philosophy of praxis. Therefore, by reviving the distinctiong between "global" and "(inter)national" in the social relations that give birth to this very distinction, the discipline of International Relations assumes the form of Historical Sociology.Palavras-chave: Relações Internacionais, Marxismo, GeopolíticaKeywords: International Relations, Marxism, GeopoliticsRecebido em 24 de Abril de 2017 | Aceito em 07 de Agosto de 2017Received on April 24, 2017 | Accepted on August 7, 2017 DOI: 10.12957/rmi.2016.28437 

Liberalism and Security

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
John M. Owen IV
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International System ◽  
The State ◽  
Democratic Peace ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Reformation ◽  
Foreign Policies ◽  
International Interaction ◽  
The Individual

Liberalism has always been concerned with security, albeit the security of the individual; institutions, including the state, are all established and sustained by individuals and instrumental to their desires. Indeed, liberalism cannot be understood apart from its normative commitment to individualism. The tradition insists that all persons deserve, and it evaluates institutions according to how far they help individuals achieve these goals. Nor is liberalism anti-statist. Liberal theory has paid particular attention to the state as the institution defined by its ability to make individuals secure and aid their commodious living. Although liberal security literature that only examines individual states’ foreign policies may be guilty of denouncing the role of international interaction, the general liberal claim argues that the international system, under broad conditions, permits states choices. As such, for liberalism, states can choose over time to create and sustain international conditions under which they will be more or less secure. Liberalism’s history can be traced from the proto-liberalism in the Reformation to the emergence of the social contract theory and neo-theories, as well as liberalism’s focus on increasing security. Meanwhile, current debates in liberalism include the democratic peace and its progeny, reformulations of liberal international relations (IR) theory, and meta-theory. Ultimately, liberalism’s most striking recent successes concern the democratic peace and related research on democratic advantages in international cooperation. Liberalism is a useful guide to international security insofar as individuals and the groups they organize affect or erode states.

Articulations of Sovereignty

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claudia Aradau
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Social Space ◽  
International System ◽  
The State ◽  
Social Construct ◽  
Community Politics ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
The Given

Sovereignty has been variously understood as the given principle of international relations, an institution, a social construct, a performative discourse subject to historical transformation, or a particular practice of power. The “articulations” of sovereignty refer to sovereignty as a practice that is worked on and in turn works with and against other practices. Alongside territory and supreme authority, sovereignty is characterized by the capacity to make and enforce laws. Sovereignty has also been defined in opposition to rights, as the spatiotemporal limits it instantiates are also the limits of rights. Another conceptualization of sovereignty has been revived in international relations, partly in response to the question of exclusions and limits that sovereign practices enacted. In addition, sovereignty is not inextricably tied up with the state but is articulated with heterogeneous and contradictory discourses and practices that create meaning about the international, and has consequences for the kind of community, politics, and agency that are possible. There are three effects of the logic of sovereignty in the international system: the ordering of the domestic and the international, the spatio-temporal limits to politics, and the exclusions from agency. In addition, there are three renditions of the international as a “thick” social space: those of globalization theories, of biopolitics, and of empire.

Rawls on Global Economic Justice

John Rawls ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 313-328
Author(s):  
Rekha Nath
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Economic Justice ◽  
The State ◽  
Careful Examination ◽  
Law Of Peoples ◽  
International Context ◽  
Economic Position ◽  
The Law ◽  
State Context

This chapter canvasses the debate between John Rawls and his cosmopolitan critics over the demands of economic justice that arise beyond state borders. In particular, it examines the merits of three defenses of the position Rawls advances in The Law of Peoples that justice does not call for a cross-society egalitarian distributive principle: first, that such a principle would fail to hold states responsible for their economic position; second, that satisfying such a principle would not be feasible; and, third, that appeal to Rawls’s constructivist methodology can explain why the egalitarian principles he takes to be suited for the state context are not suited for the international context. The chapter concludes that upon careful examination, none of these defenses succeeds in plausibly motivating Rawls’s rejection of global egalitarianism.

The Future of International System

1976 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 199-213
Author(s):  
James A. Nathan
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Behavior ◽  
Moral Obligation ◽  
International System ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
The State ◽  
Human Interaction ◽  
Military Policy ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Future

There are at least three ways we can describe international political behavior: (1) We can view international relations as taking place in an arena marked by military competition for the scarce commodity named security; (2) we can see international political behavior as a complex set of human interaction, where the ‘high politics’ of military policy is being eroded by the increasing stalemate of power and the emergence of global interdependencies; and (3) we can see international politics as an arena of moral obligation. Each of these views implies a different prognosis of the future. A future world based on power seems, however, little likely, given the diminishing utility of the state to serve traditional security ends and the erosion of the use of force. An increasingly interdependent world is possible, but there is no governmental structure presently developing which seems likely to manage these dependencies. And there is little likelihood the third view will receive sufficient institutional sustenance.

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