scholarly journals Ontological security as temporal security? The role of ‘significant historical others’ in world politics

2021 ◽  
pp. 004711782110456
Author(s):  
Kathrin Bachleitner
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Ontological Security ◽  
Yom Kippur War ◽  
State Behaviour ◽  
Oil Crisis ◽  
Reflective Conversation

This article explores the link between collective memory and state behaviour in international relations. In that regard, it develops a new concept entitled ‘temporal security’. Building on the existing ontological security literature, it extends a temporal understanding to its underlying identity concept. Countries are now assumed to be temporal-security seekers vis-a-vis a ‘significant historical other’ from their past. Decision makers thus enter into a self-reflective conversation with their country’s ‘collective memory’ when choosing courses of action. Contrasted with existing physical-security and ontological security explanations for state behaviour, the explanatory potential of the temporal-security approach is in a second step illustrated by the empirical case of West Germany and Austria, two former Nazi perpetrator states, and their respective assignments of support during conflict in the Middle East. Through a comparative, qualitative discourse analysis of historical documents during the Six-Day War of 1967 and the Yom Kippur War and oil crisis of 1973, the empirical study finds that West Germany and Austria adopted different courses of action in their international politics, because they looked to Nazi Germany as their significant historical other.

Memory as State Behaviour

2021 ◽  
pp. 87-119
Author(s):  
Kathrin Bachleitner
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Analysis ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Ontological Security ◽  
Collective Memories ◽  
Yom Kippur War ◽  
State Behaviour ◽  
Emotional Trigger ◽  
Oil Crisis

This chapter shows how collective memory channels a country’s international behaviour. To that end, it first lays out the nexus between memory and state behaviour put forward by the temporal security concept. It then goes on to distinguish it from international relations’ classical realist and ontological security approaches and their predictions on state behaviour. To keep their temporal security intact, countries are assumed to enter into an ‘in-between-time’ conversation with their ‘significant historical others’. Through the emotional trigger of shame, policymakers avoid potential disconnects with their country’s ‘narrated self in the past’, thus bringing their courses of action in line with collective memory. To illustrate this process, the empirical case study looks at the reaction of West Germany and Austria to two wars in the Middle East. It contrasts their support for either of the warring parties during the Six Day War of 1967 and the Yom Kippur War and international oil crisis of 1973. The qualitative analysis demonstrates that West Germany and Austria’s different collective memories of the Nazi legacy channelled their behaviour along diverse reasonings to support either the Israeli or the Arab side.

Collective Memory in International Relations

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathrin Bachleitner
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
World Politics ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Political Strategy ◽  
Long Run ◽  
State Behaviour ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Over Time

This book traces the influence of collective memory in international relations (IR). It inquires where a country’s memory first emerges and how it guides states through time in world politics. It locates the origins of national memory in political strategies within the international environment. The study then turns to the domestic landscape, where among a country’s public, it finds memory to be the carrier of national identity over time. From there, however, the analysis reverts to the international sphere: in the medium term, collective memory begins to channel international state behaviour, whereas, in the long run, it circumvents a country’s normative horizons. In this book, collective memory is thus assumed to become manifest in world politics in four varying forms: as a country’s political strategy, as its public identity, as underwriting its international state behaviour, and finally, as a source for its national values. All four theorized manifestations of memory are tested in a comparative study of (West) Germany and Austria and the impact their diverse post-war interpretations of the Nazi legacy had on their international policies over time. With the illustrative help of the empirical cases, the book not only explores whether collective memory has an influence on political outcomes but how and why it matters for IR.

scholarly journals A ‘model of reconciliation’? Fifty years of German–Israeli relations

2018 ◽  
Vol 53 (4) ◽  
pp. 507-527 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruth Wittlinger
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Academic Literature ◽  
Grass Roots ◽  
Memory Culture ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Micro Level ◽  
Key Aspects

This article argues that German–Israeli reconciliation after 1945 has not been as exemplary as is often suggested. Drawing on key aspects which emerge from a discussion of relevant concepts in the first part of the article – transitional justice and reconciliation – it will show that Germany’s memory culture, as evidenced in the elite discourse, has indeed developed in a way that points to a successful reconciliation between the two countries. On the other hand, however, German regret emerged only reluctantly, was by and large confined to West Germany, and took a long time to establish itself formally, with emphasis on German suffering rather than suffering caused by Germans always playing an important role in German collective memory after 1945. It will also show that at grass-roots level, reconciliation between Germany and Israel is far from unproblematic. Apart from providing a critical assessment of the reconciliation between Germany and Israel after 1945, the article contributes to current academic literature on transitional justice, reconciliation and the role of memory which suggests that even though commemoration and micro-level reconciliation might be important, the geopolitical context in which reconciliation takes place and strategic security considerations also play a significant role.

Separatists, state subjectivity, and fundamental ontological (in)security in international relations

2021 ◽  
pp. 004711782110456
Author(s):  
Janis Grzybowski
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Sense Of Self ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
The Other ◽  
Security Threats ◽  
Ontological Security ◽  
Security Dilemma ◽  
Starting Point

Ontological security studies (OSS) in International Relations (IR) emphasize the role of identity, anxiety, and a sense of self in world politics. Yet suggesting that states act in certain ways because of ‘who they are’ also assumes that they are in fact states. In this article, I problematize the presupposition of state subjects in the context of separatist conflicts in which claims to statehood compete and overlap. Where unrecognized de facto states are pitted against their unyielding parent states, the two threaten each other’s very state personhood, thereby presenting a more radical challenge to their existence than traditional ‘physical’ and ‘ontological’ security threats. Separatist conflicts thus reveal a widely overlooked dimension of fundamental ontological security, provided by the constitution and recognition of states as such. Moreover, because of the exclusiveness of state subjects in the modern international order, any third parties attempting to resolve such conflicts inevitably face a meta-security dilemma whereby reassuring one side by confirming its claim to statehood simultaneously renders the other side radically insecure. Thus, rather than regarding particular state subjects as merely the starting point of quests for ontological security in international relations, they should also be understood as already their result.

Anxiety, fear, and ontological security in world politics

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 238-239
Author(s):  
Catarina Kinnvall ◽  
Jennifer Mitzen
Keyword(s):  
World Politics ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Ontological Security ◽  
The Unconscious ◽  
Existential Anxiety ◽  
Anthony Giddens ◽  
Existentialist Philosophy ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Do So

AbstractThis symposium addresses the role of anxiety, fear, and ontological (in)security in world politics. Proceeding from the recognition of the scholarly interest and multitude of approaches that characterize the field of ontological (in)security studies, the Symposium homes in on the relationship between anxiety and fear, and between anxiety, subjectivity, and agency. The Introduction critically engages with Anthony Giddens' understandings of ontological (in)security, in an effort to spur the revisiting, questioning, and, in some cases, leaving behind Giddens' assumptions in order to develop a more dynamic conception. In response, the first three contributions draw on resources in existentialist philosophy, especially Heidegger, Tillich, and Kierkegaard, to further unpack the relationship between anxiety and ontological (in)security. They do so by returning to the experiential moment of confronting existential anxiety, a moment that Giddens quickly closes down, to better grasp how existential anxiety resolves into an orientation to action. The final two essays, in comparison, bring anxiety ‘back in’ to locales where Giddens' theory occludes it: the unconscious and the international, thus arguing that emotional configurations other than fear are always possible.

Temporal Security in IR

2021 ◽  
pp. 12-36
Author(s):  
Kathrin Bachleitner
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Political Strategy ◽  
Ontological Security ◽  
Temporal Dimension ◽  
State Identity ◽  
Public Identity ◽  
New Approach ◽  
National Values ◽  
State Behaviour ◽  
Definition Of

The first chapter of this book theoretically conceptualizes collective memory in international relations (IR). The link between the IR discipline and the interdisciplinary collective memory concept is provided through the framework of ontological security. The inquiry begins by extrapolating the nature of ontological security and its most essential component: state identity. It then moves on to theorize collective memory as the underlying carrier of state identity. Collective memory highlights identity’s temporal dimension and manifests it within the collective frameworks of narration. At the end, a new approach, ‘temporal security’, is developed. It combines the ontological security of being with the definition of memory as being-in-time. Security-seeking behaviour for states now implies to be temporally grounded in a consistent narrative that links past, present, and future. The reference point for this as of yet untheorized security need is collective memory. Manifesting itself in the varying forms of political strategy, public identity, state behaviour, and national values, collective memory thus navigates countries through time in IR.

scholarly journals Affect, practice, and change: Dancing world politics at the Congress of Vienna

2020 ◽  
pp. 001083672095446
Author(s):  
Felix Rösch
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Practice Theory ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Theoretical Argument ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Political Transformations ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
External Conditions

How do practices change? To approach this in practice theory (PT) is a widely debated question. This article brings PT in conversation with the study of emotions in International Relations by considering the role of affect in practice changes. For it is affect that permeates the placiotemporal and bodily constellations during practice performances, continuously provoking changes in and through practices. In initiating this conversation, this article adds to current PT literature by arguing that world political transformations not only find their origin in external conditions, identified as such through individual reflection, but also in affective dynamics of the everyday. To elaborate this more theoretical argument, this article evolves against the empirical backdrop of dancing as an everyday international practice at the Congress of Vienna (1814–1815). Affect that permeated dances in Vienna not only substantiated changes in this practice but, with the waltz replacing the minuet as the preferred dance among international political decision-makers, also changes through it occurred. While the minuet embodied collective sentiments of a transboundary European elite, the waltz helped to further national imaginations of world politics.

Rethinking Private Authority

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica F. Green
Keyword(s):  
Green Building ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Multilateral Environmental Agreements ◽  
The Past ◽  
Delegation Of Authority ◽  
Private Authority ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
Private Actors ◽  
Treaty Implementation

This book examines the role of nonstate actors in global environmental politics, arguing that a fuller understanding of their role requires a new way of conceptualizing private authority. It identifies two distinct forms of private authority—one in which states delegate authority to private actors, and another in which entrepreneurial actors generate their own rules, persuading others to adopt them. Drawing on a wealth of empirical evidence spanning a century of environmental rule making, the book shows how the delegation of authority to private actors has played a small but consistent role in multilateral environmental agreements over the past fifty years, largely in the area of treaty implementation. This contrasts with entrepreneurial authority, where most private environmental rules have been created in the past two decades. The book traces how this dynamic and fast-growing form of private authority is becoming increasingly common in areas ranging from organic food to green building practices to sustainable tourism. It persuasively argues that the configuration of state preferences and the existing institutional landscape are paramount to explaining why private authority emerges and assumes the form that it does. In-depth cases on climate change provide evidence for the book's arguments. The book demonstrates that authority in world politics is diffused across multiple levels and diverse actors, and it offers a more complete picture of how private actors are helping to shape our response to today's most pressing environmental problems.

After Victory

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. John Ikenberry
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Politics ◽  
World Order ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
The United States ◽  
Big Bang ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Napoleonic Wars ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
The Cold War

The end of the Cold War was a “big bang” reminiscent of earlier moments after major wars, such as the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 and the end of the world wars in 1919 and 1945. But what do states that win wars do with their newfound power, and how do they use it to build order? This book examines postwar settlements in modern history, arguing that powerful countries do seek to build stable and cooperative relations, but the type of order that emerges hinges on their ability to make commitments and restrain power. The book explains that only with the spread of democracy in the twentieth century and the innovative use of international institutions—both linked to the emergence of the United States as a world power—has order been created that goes beyond balance of power politics to exhibit “constitutional” characteristics. Blending comparative politics with international relations, and history with theory, the book will be of interest to anyone concerned with the organization of world order, the role of institutions in world politics, and the lessons of past postwar settlements for today.

METAMORPHOSES OF THE POSTMODERN DISCOURSEAND CURRENT CHALLENGES NEOMODERNISM

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu.V. IRKHIN
Keyword(s):  
World Politics ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Postmodern Theory ◽  
The World ◽  
Conservative Values

The article analyzes the problems, achievements and contradictions in the genesis of the contemporary postmodern discourse. The author has carried out complex research, systematized and showed the main features and differences of postmodernism and metamodernism, as well as the role of neoliberal values in their development. The author has considered a new approach to the study of society and politics: neomodernist discourse with the dominant conservative values, opposing postmodern theory, methodology and practice he has identified the features of neomodernism: historicism, patriotism and healthy nationalism, populism, transactionalismn and realism in the world politics.

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