After tragedy: Melodrama and the rhetoric of realism

2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 316-331
Author(s):  
Daniel J Levine
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Rhetoric ◽  
Modern Politics ◽  
Narrative Mode ◽  
Late Modern ◽  
Nuclear Condition

Responding to renewed interest in political rhetoric among contemporary International Relations (IR)–realists, this article advances three main claims. First, it suggests that tragedy—the dominant aesthetic-narrative mode to which these realists have turned in their rhetorical considerations—is ill-suited to the contemporary political moment. In the context of a late-modern “nuclear condition,” the turn to classical tragedy seems set to reproduce the resentful, anti-realist hubris that its promulgators hope to dispel or disenchant. Second, it suggests that late modern politics is widely experienced not in tragic terms but in melodramatic ones, and that contemporary reflexive realists would do well to alter their rhetorical approaches accordingly. Third, it explores rhetorical frameworks that might better meet the challenges posed by politics experienced in such terms.

Leviathan on a Leash

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean Fleming
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Sovereign Debt ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Thomas Hobbes ◽  
The State ◽  
State Responsibility ◽  
Modern Politics ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The World

States are commonly blamed for wars, called on to apologize, held liable for debts and reparations, bound by treaties, and punished with sanctions. But what does it mean to hold a state responsible as opposed to a government, a nation, or an individual leader? Under what circumstances should we assign responsibility to states rather than individuals? This book demystifies the phenomenon of state responsibility and explains why it is a challenging yet indispensable part of modern politics. Taking Thomas Hobbes' theory of the state as a starting point, the book presents a theory of state responsibility that sheds new light on sovereign debt, historical reparations, treaty obligations, and economic sanctions. Along the way, it overturns longstanding interpretations of Hobbes' political thought, explores how new technologies will alter the practice of state responsibility as we know it, and develops new accounts of political authority, representation, and legitimacy. The book argues that Hobbes' idea of the state offers a far richer and more realistic conception of state responsibility than the theories prevalent today and demonstrates that Hobbes' Leviathan is much more than an anthropomorphic “artificial man.” The book is essential reading for political theorists, scholars of international relations, international lawyers, and philosophers. It recovers a forgotten understanding of state personality in Hobbes' thought and shows how to apply it to the world of imperfect states in which we live.

Why Talk Tough? Explaining Japanese Prime Ministers’ Proactiveness in National Defense Rhetoric

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine Liu
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
National Security ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
Political Rhetoric ◽  
Threat Perception ◽  
National Defense ◽  
National Security Policy ◽  
Prime Ministers ◽  
Dependent Variables ◽  
External Threat

Abstract What explains variations in the proactiveness of Japanese Prime Ministers (PMs) toward national defense? Although the Japanese Constitution renounces the use of force, leaders sometimes speak assertively over national security. Drawing on competing international relations and Japanese foreign policy theories, this study seeks to quantitatively model and analyze predictors of political rhetoric in PMs’ speeches and statements from 2009 to 2019. Each statement is coded into four sets of binary dependent variables through content analysis and tested against five competing hypotheses. The main finding reveals that leaders become more likely to advocate for specifically assertive national security policy when Chinese vessel intrusion increases, but not when North Korea missile tests and aircraft scrambles increase. Instead of a diversionary use of words, an emboldening effect is evident in rhetoric that evokes responsibility in international defense, moderated by ruling government strength. The findings advance academic understandings of Japanese national security policy messaging and highlight the effect of external threat perception on political rhetoric.

Rethinking youth bulge theory in policy and scholarship: incorporating critical gender analysis

2020 ◽  
Vol 96 (3) ◽  
pp. 711-728 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lesley Pruitt
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
Political Rhetoric ◽  
Gender Analysis ◽  
Accurate Analysis ◽  
Public Media ◽  
Theoretical Assumptions ◽  
Peace And Security ◽  
Effective Policy ◽  
Youth Bulge

Abstract For decades ‘youth bulge’ theory has dominated understandings of youth in mainstream International Relations. Youth bulge theory has also become part of some public media analyses, mainstream political rhetoric, and even officially enshrined in the foreign policy of some states. Through the ‘youth bulge’ lens, youth—especially males—have been presented as current or future perpetrators of violence. However, this article argues that the youth bulge thesis postulated in mainstream IR is based on flawed theoretical assumptions. In particular, supporters of youth bulge theory fail to engage with existing research by feminist IR scholars and thus take on a biological essentialist approach. This has led to theoretical and practical misunderstandings of the roles youth play in relation to conflict, peace and security. These partial and biased understandings have also resulted in less effective policy-making. In critically reflecting on the ‘youth bulge’ thesis, this article argues that applying gender analysis is crucial to understanding the involvement of young people in general—and young men in particular—in conflict. Doing so will contribute to advancing more accurate analysis in scholarship and policy-making.

scholarly journals Installation “Breakthrough”, Implementation and Memorialisation of the “Cold War” in the USA

2021 ◽  
pp. 58-64
Author(s):  
V.E. Dergacheva ◽  
Yu.G. Chernyshov
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Political Rhetoric ◽  
The United States ◽  
Berlin Wall ◽  
Politics Of Memory ◽  
Archival Documents ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Cold War

Using the installation “Breakthrough” as an example, the article examines the widespread in the United States assessments and methods of memorializing the results of the Cold War. The authors note that the thesis of a US victory in the Cold War was central to official US political rhetoric in the early 1990s. This is confirmed by the politics of memory — in particular, the creation of the installation “Breakthrough”, the establishment of the commemorative medal “Cold War Victory Medal”, etc. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 is considered the most symbolic event of the end of the Cold War. One of the fragments of this wall is called “The Breakthrough”, it is now in Westminster College in Fulton (Missouri), where W. Churchill in 1946 pronounced his famous speech and where (in a symbolic sense) the Cold War began. Installation “Breakthrough”, being a symbol of the beginning and end of ideological confrontation, carries a certain ideological message — it is a “breakthrough to freedom” and victory in the “cold war”. However, by the early 2000s, when passions subsided in society and wider access to not only American, but also Soviet archival documents was opened up, more ba-lanced assessments of the causes and results of the Cold War began to appear in American scientific circles. Some American historians started talking about the common victory of the USA and the USSR over the ideological confrontation, which could develop into a dangerous “hot war.” Globalization also influenced the perception of the outcome of the Cold War: this confrontation is assessed by some American researchers as a natural stage in the development of international relations, which led to a new redistribution of centers of influence on the map of the “multipolar” world.

scholarly journals Epilogue The Scandal of the Refugee: Some peflections on the "Inter" of International Relations

Refuge ◽  
1998 ◽  
pp. 30-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Dillon
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Political Order ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Politics Of Identity ◽  
Modern Politics ◽  
Displaced People ◽  
International Power ◽  
Political Decision Making

The refugee is a scandal for philosophy in that the refugee recalls the radical instability of meaning and the incalculability of the human. The refugee is a scandal for politics also, however, in that the advent of the refugee is always a reproach to the formation of the political order subjectivity which necessarily gives rise to the refugee. The scandal is intensified for any politics of identity which presupposes that the goal of politics is the realization of sovereign identity. The principal argument, then, is that what I will call the scandal of the refugee illuminates both the fundamental ontological determinations of international politics and the character of political action, because the refugee is both a function of the intentional political destruction of the ontological horizons of people's always already heterogeneous worlds, and effects an equally fundamental deconstruction of the ontological horizons which constitute the equally heterogeneous worlds into which, as refugees, these people are precipitated. It is precisely on this concrete and corporeal site that both the ontological horizons and the allied political decision-making of modern politics are thrown into stark relief and profoundly called into question. For it is precisely here that the very actions of modern politics both create and address the incidence of its own massive and self-generated, political abjection. If that is one of the principal ends of international relations, one is forced to ask, what does it take as its beginning? If, in other words, the vernacular political architecture of modern international power commonly produces 1:115 forcibly displaced people globally, one is inclined to ask about the foundations upon which that architecture is itself based.

scholarly journals Political Authority in International Relations: Revisiting the Medieval Debate

2020 ◽  
Vol 74 (2) ◽  
pp. 222-252 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Costa Lopez
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Political Authority ◽  
The State ◽  
Modern Politics ◽  
Definition Of

AbstractIn international relations, accounts of medieval political authority are divided between those who see a heteronomous patchwork of overlapping authorities and those who claim that the era of the state started in the twelfth century. How can we overcome this divide? I argue that IR's current difficulties in grasping the nature of medieval political authority stem from shortcomings in how the notion of political authority itself has been conceptualized. Thus, rather than starting from a substantive definition of political authority, I focus on contestation over the categorization and authorization of rule, that is, on how authority is produced in historically specific ways as a result of contemporary contestation over what political authority is, who is authorized, and how rulers stand in relation to one another. This reorientation allows us to appreciate how medieval political authority emerged from the competition between four sets of ordering categories: iurisdictio, potestas, lord/vassal, and magistrate. Each one of these four categories understood authority, rulers, and the relation between rulers in different ways. The problem with existing accounts of medieval authority is that they attempt to find the single ordering principle of medieval international relations. In doing so, they not only fail to capture the features of the time but also reinforce a particular approach to political authority that is unhelpful for understanding medieval and modern politics alike.

Varieties of political rhetorical reasoning: norm types, scorekeepers, and political projects

2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 358-386
Author(s):  
Sasikumar S. Sundaram
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Political Rhetoric ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Peace Enforcement

AbstractHow does rhetoric work in the pursuit of political projects in international relations? This article analyzes how rhetoric-wielding political actors engage in reasoning to bolster their position by drawing upon norms that underwrite interactions, and audiences as scorekeepers evaluate the reasoning by making a series of inferences. I call this mechanism rhetorical reasoning. Building on the existing classification of norms in constructivist international relations (IR) and utilizing three distinct norm types – instrumental, institutional, and moral – I show the different processes through which political actors deploy rhetoric to legitimize and justify political projects and the distinct logics through which scorekeepers make inferences and evaluate the project. This article contributes to IR theories of argumentation by providing a sharp conceptualization of political rhetoric and actor–audience relationships in the game. I illustrate the mechanism of rhetorical reasoning using Brazil's UN peace enforcement operation in Haiti in 2004 to give empirical evidence for the role of institutional norm type in patterns of rhetorical reasoning and contestations in international politics. Paying attention to political rhetoric in the actor–scorekeepers' relationships in this way clarifies important issues regarding the varieties of political projects and the different role of normativity in the game.

The poverty of Grand Theory

2013 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 483-497 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chris Brown
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Current State ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Is Theory ◽  
The One ◽  
Late Modern ◽  
Made In

The editors of the special issue, in their call for papers for this special issue, expressed a degree of disquiet at the current state of International Relations theory, but the situation is both better and worse than they suggest. On the one hand, in some areas of the discipline, there has been real progress over the last decade. The producers of liberal and realist International Relations theory may not have the kind of standing in the social/human sciences as the ‘Grand Theorists’ identified by Quentin Skinner in his seminal mid-1980s’ collection, but they have a great deal to say about how the world works, and the world would have been a better place over the last decade or so if more notice had been taken of what they did say. On the other hand, the range of late modern theorists who brought some of Skinner’s Grand Theorists into the reckoning in the 1980s have, in the main, failed to deliver on the promises made in that decade. The state of International Relations theory in this neck of the woods is indeed a cause for concern; there is a pressing need for ‘critical problem-solving’ theory, that is, theory that relates directly to real-world problems but approaches them from the perspective of the underdog.

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