International Relations Studies in China

2002 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-87 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jianwei Wang
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
Political Control ◽  
Degree Programs ◽  
Teaching And Research ◽  
Intellectual Community ◽  
Ir Studies ◽  
Western Intellectual

This article traces the evolution of international relations studies as an academic discipline in China in the last two decades or so. Almost non-existent before the 1980s, IR studies has become an increasingly dynamic, sophisticated, and popular field of social science in both teaching and research. This is reflected in the growth of institutions, degree programs, scholarship and paradigmatic debate as well as interaction with the Western intellectual community in both theory and personnel. Nevertheless, the development of IR studies in China is still in its primitive stage and it must contend with various problems such as political control, a lack of well-trained scholars, inadequate funding, and ideational uncertainty.

scholarly journals WORLD REGIONAL STUDIES AS A RESEARCH FRAMEWORK AND ACADEMIC DISCIPLINE

2016 ◽  
pp. 63-69
Author(s):  
E. V. Koldunova
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Regional Studies ◽  
International Studies ◽  
Research Framework ◽  
Ir Studies ◽  
International Environment ◽  
Correct Understanding ◽  
Academic Debate

Dynamic development of international processes at the regional level, various trajectories of regionalization in Europe, Asia, Latin America and other parts of the world created a complex and multidimensional picture of the contemporary international relations. However Social Sciences and IR retained a distinct eurocentrism. This eurocentrism only partly meant that students of IR did not take into account non-European or non-Western realities. Thus, a German Scholar J. Vullers from German Institute of Global and Area Studies analyzing in 2014 three leading International Relations journals (International Organization, World Politics, European Journal of International Relations) diagnosed a serious geographic imbalance in the international studies, which meant a very limited number of articles based on the nonWestern empirical data.Even with such geographic imbalance in IR studies more important for preserving eurocentrism there was the absence of non-Western IR theories or IR theories originating from non-Western political context. The collective monograph edited by Barry Buzan and Amitav Acharya focused exactly on this problem. The title of the book was provocatively asking why there is no non-Western IR theory. Thus, the book in question provoked a lively academic debate on the topic. Russia was not covered in this book. Therefore, this very fact gives one some reasons to reflect on how Russian research in the field may face a double challenge of a changing international environment and an inappropriate level of its intellectual assessment. Against this background this article analyzes World Regional Studies, a research framework and discipline, which is rapidly developing in Russia and may to some extent contribute to a more correct understanding of the international processes.

scholarly journals Development of International Relations at the Periphery: The Case of Bangladesh

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 247-255
Author(s):  
Lailufar Yasmin
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
Western Country ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Major Powers ◽  
Ir Studies ◽  
Significant Area ◽  
History Of ◽  
To Come ◽  
The University

International Relations (IR) is no longer considered as an academic discipline that analyzes the major powers or great powers’ activities only. From its Cold War content of emphasizing on traditional state-centric security, it has traversed a long way to expand its subject matter. Similarly, smaller nations and their imprints on international politics are also emerging as a significant area of inquiry in IR. This article seeks to contribute to this inquiry by discussing Bangladesh’s rising significance and how academic IR addresses this issue. It traces the history of IR in Bangladesh as well as its gradual expansion. It discusses the growth of IR as an academic discipline at the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh, that gradually led to the development of IR studies in other parts of the country. The article documents this growth, which is the first of its kind to trace the rise and development of IR in Bangladesh. It therefore fulfils the lacuna in understanding how and where the growth of IR took place in a non-western country. One might contend what is the relevance of studying IR in Bangladesh. The article argues that despite being physically small , academic IR has generated interest in Bangladesh due to the changing geostrategic significance of the country. The article outlines the rising geopolitical significance of Bangladesh where great powers are interested to come and be a part of Bangladesh’s development. It is in this context, the study of IR becomes more pertinent in Bangladesh.

1. International Relations and Social Science

2020 ◽  
pp. 12-32
Author(s):  
Milja Kurki ◽  
Colin Wight
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Empirical Research ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Historical Overview ◽  
Philosophy Of Social Science ◽  
Theoretical Approaches ◽  
Theoretical Assumptions ◽  
Implicit And Explicit

This chapter focuses on the major debates within International Relations (IR) theory with regard to the philosophy of social science. The philosophy of social science has played a key role in the formation, development, and practice of IR as an academic discipline. Issues concerning the philosophy of social science are frequently described as meta-theoretical debates. Meta-theory primarily deals with the underlying assumptions of all theory and attempts to understand the consequences of such assumptions on the act of theorizing and the practice of empirical research. The chapter first provides an historical overview of the philosophy of social science in IR before discussing both the implicit and explicit roles played by meta-theoretical assumptions in IR. It then considers the contemporary disciplinary debates surrounding the philosophy of social science and concludes by analysing how theoretical approaches to the study of world politics have been shaped by meta-theoretical ideas.

1. International Relations and Social Science

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Milja Kurki ◽  
Colin Wight
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Historical Overview ◽  
Philosophy Of Social Science ◽  
Theoretical Approaches ◽  
Theoretical Assumptions ◽  
Implicit And Explicit

This chapter focuses on the major debates within International Relations theory with regard to the philosophy of social sciences. The philosophy of social science has played a key role in the formation, development, and practice of IR as an academic discipline. Issues concerning the philosophy of social science are frequently described as meta-theoretical debates. Meta-theory primarily deals with the underlying assumptions of all theory and attempts to understand the consequences of such assumptions on the act of theorizing and the practice of empirical research. The chapter first provides an historical overview of the philosophy of social science in IR before discussing both the implicit and explicit roles played by meta-theoretical assumptions in IR. It then considers the contemporary disciplinary debates surrounding the philosophy of social science and concludes by analysing how theoretical approaches to the study of world politics have been shaped by meta-theoretical ideas.

Feudal Europe, 800–1300: communal discourse and conflictual practices

1992 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 427-466 ◽  
Author(s):  
Markus Fischer
Keyword(s):  
Critical Theory ◽  
Social Science ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Social Theory ◽  
Structural Theory ◽  
Historical Change ◽  
Fundamental Significance ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Scientific ◽  
Scientific Argument

The discipline of international relations faces a new debate of fundamental significance. After the realist challenge to the pervasive idealism of the interwar years and the social scientific argument against realism in the late 1950s, it is now the turn of critical theorists to dispute the established paradigms of international politics, having been remarkably successful in several other fields of social inquiry. In essence, critical theorists claim that all social reality is subject to historical change, that a normative discourse of understandings and values entails corresponding practices, and that social theory must include interpretation and dialectical critique. In international relations, this approach particularly critiques the ahistorical, scientific, and materialist conceptions offered by neorealists. Traditional realists, by contrast, find a little more sympathy in the eyes of critical theorists because they join them in their rejection of social science and structural theory. With regard to liberal institutionalism, critical theorists are naturally sympathetic to its communitarian component while castigating its utilitarian strand as the accomplice of neorealism. Overall, the advent of critical theory will thus focus the field of international relations on its “interparadigm debate” with neorealism.

scholarly journals Platonic metaphysics and the ontology of international relations: a sketch

2021 ◽  
pp. 004711782110214
Author(s):  
King-Ho Leung
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Human Life ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
World Order ◽  
Social World ◽  
Levels Of Analysis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Ir Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
Human Individual

This article offers a reading of Plato in light of the recent debates concerning the unique ‘ontology’ of International Relations (IR) as an academic discipline. In particular, this article suggests that Plato’s metaphysical account of the integral connection between human individual, the domestic state and world order can offer IR an alternative outlook to the ‘political scientific’ schema of ‘levels of analysis’. This article argues that Plato’s metaphysical conception of world order can not only provide IR theory with a way to re-imagine the relation between the human, the state and world order. Moreover, Plato’s outlook can highlight or even call into question the post-metaphysical presuppositions of contemporary IR theory in its ‘borrowed ontology’ from modern social science, which can in turn facilitate IR’s re-interpretation of its own ‘ontology’ as well as its distinct contributions to the understanding of the various aspects of the social world and human life.

From the Colonial to Feminist IR: Feminist IR Studies, the Wider FSS/GPE Research Agenda, and the Questions of Value, Valuation, Security, and Violence

2017 ◽  
Vol 13 (04) ◽  
pp. 739-746 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna M. Agathangelou
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Research Agenda ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Global Political Economy ◽  
Personal Lives ◽  
Ir Studies ◽  
The World ◽  
Forms Of Violence

International relations (IR) feminists have significantly impacted the way we analyze the world and power. However, as Cynthia Enloe points out, “there are now signs—worrisome signs—that feminist analysts of international politics might be forgetting what they have shared” and are “making bricks to construct new intellectual barriers. That is not progress” (2015, 436). I agree. The project/process that has led to the separation/specialization of feminist security studies (FSS) and feminist global political economy (FGPE) does not constitute progress but instead ends up embodying forms of violence that erase the materialist bases of our intellectual labor's divisions (Agathangelou 1997), the historical and social constitution of our formations as intellectuals and subjects. This amnesiac approach evades our personal lives and colludes with those forces that allow for the violence that comes with abstraction. These “worrisome signs” should be explained if we are to move FSS and FGPE beyond a “merger” (Allison 2015) that speaks only to some issues and some humans in the global theater.

The Ambivalent Relationship of Japan's Soft Power Diplomacy andPrincess Mononoke: Tosaka Jun's philosophy of culture as moral reflection

2014 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 683-698 ◽  
Author(s):  
KOSUKE SHIMIZU
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Soft Power ◽  
Critical Reflection ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Moral Reflection ◽  
The West ◽  
Soft Power Diplomacy

AbstractCulture is a demanding word, particularly when it is used in the context of the contemporary academic discipline of international relations (IR). It is often employed in order to distinguish one identity from another, allegedly illuminating idiosyncrasies embedded in a particular society or group of people. The essentialized understanding of culture is also detectable in the case of the current debate on the non-Western international relations theories (IRT). Non-Western politicians and scholars often employ the term culture in order to distinguish their values from alleged Western values. However, culture has another important function mainly advanced by a left-wing Kyoto School philosopher Tosaka Jun, that is, culture as a mirror for critical reflection for morality (Tosaka, 1966). This article is based on Tosaka's argument that culture has an important function for moral reflection beyond that of a mere means to identify one's distinctiveness from the West, and it criticizes Japan's soft power diplomacy or the total absence of it from that point of view. It also argues that this absence is the result of the soft power discourse's over-simplified interpretation of culture that results in confrontation between the West and the rest, particularly when it is employed in non-Western IRT discourses. Towards the end, I examine Miyazaki Hayao's films,Princes Mononokein particular, as examples of cultural works facilitating a moment of critical reflection, and I extract embedded messages of relevance to critical reflection on contemporary IR literature, particularly non-Western literature.

The Edwards' Report and the International Relations profession

1988 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 149-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Nicholson
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Science ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Research Council ◽  
Social Research ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Social Science Community ◽  
The Social ◽  
Science Community

The Economic and Social Research Council recently published a Report commissioned from a committee chaired by Professor Edwards, a psychiatrist, so that the Council, and the social science community in general, might know what was good and bad in British social sciences, and where the promising future research opportunities lie over the next decade. Boldly called ‘Horizons and Opportunities in the Social Sciences’, the Report condensed the wisdom of social scientists, both British and foreign, and concludes with a broadly but not uncritically favourable picture of the British scene.

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