scholarly journals SEARCHING FOR SCIENCE OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS: INSIGHTS FROM CRITICAL REALISM

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-151
Author(s):  
N. Yudin
Keyword(s):  
Critical Realism ◽  
International Studies ◽  
Ir Theory ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Perception Of Causality ◽  
Ir Studies ◽  
International Trends ◽  
Technical Issues ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
Quantitative And Qualitative Methods

A serious academic debate in general, let alone on theoretical and methodological issues, is rare for both Western and Russian peer-reviewed journals. In the context of discussion, launched by a polemical article by a prominent Russian IR expert Alexey Fenenko, published in 2018 in the ‘International Trends’ journal, is more important and noteworthy. Nominally both this article and the subsequent responses from Denis Degterev, Igor Istomin, Andrey Baykov and Konstantin Khudoley focused on a long-running dispute between the proponents of quantitative and qualitative methods in IR studies. However, the true essence of this discussion, as well as its implications, goes far beyond a mere technical argument about methods. The present article examines this discussion as well as developments in contemporary IR theory through the lens of critical realism (CR). The first section considers the arguments of the discussants and shows that they tend to focus on secondary, technical issues leaving out the key subject of the dispute, i.e. how should international studies be organized in order to have a right to be called a science. In order to bring this issue back into the spotlight and to provide a new perspective on the issue, the second section considers the problem field of the contemporary IR theory from the viewpoint of CR. According to critical realists all predominant approaches in the mainstream IR theory are rooted in the Humean empiricism which to a large extent explains both epistemological and practical limitations of the contemporary IR studies. As an alternative, they advance the ideas of the founder of critical realism, British philosopher R. Bhaskar. The third section examines the key epistemological and ontological provisions of CR, which include the fundamental recognition of objective reality, existing prior to and beyond human activities, reality, which is stratified and differentiated. They also entail a specific perception of causality and of possible limits of cogniscibility and predictability of social phenomena. Nonetheless the article is far from a straightforward apology of critical realism. The fourth section identifies certain weaknesses of contemporary interpretations of CR in the context of IR theory, which include a static nature of their methodology and inconsistency of their implications. The author concludes that the major contribution of CR to the IR theory lies in providing a clear path for further research – that is development of materialist theories and approaches.

Biopower and International Relations

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angélica Guerra-Barón
Keyword(s):  
World Politics ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Coherent System ◽  
International Studies ◽  
Critical Approach ◽  
Ir Studies ◽  
Structuralist Theory ◽  
Knowledge Objects ◽  
Insight Into

Michel Foucault’s critical approach to understanding power has become very influential in the study of global politics, especially in the work of (critical) IR scholars. The Foucauldian kind of power conception has influenced some IR scholars who adopt key insights from post-structuralist theory to world politics thus producing an analytical orientation, in the sense that all reality is structured first by language with discourses then creating a coherent system of knowledge, objects, and subjects. Of particular importance is Foucault’s notion of biopower, biopolitics, and technology of power. Such toolbox allows (critical) IR scholars to recur and distinguish disciplinary power, governmentality, its types (liberalism, neoliberalism), and biopolitics itself. However, few IR studies differentiate between biopower and biopolitics; yet an extensive variety of international studies issues are analyzed. Additionally, applying Foucault’s notions to global politics has been roundly criticized. This article begins with an introduction followed by a discussion of biopower and biopolitics. It continues with a discussion of the debates in the IR literature on biopower and illustrations of works of IR scholarship that draw on biopower and governmentality for insight into global politics. The article then concludes with a discussion of directions for future research.

scholarly journals Coordinated Development of Regional Complex System: A Niche-Based Study

2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 ◽  
pp. 1-8
Author(s):  
Jianling Li ◽  
Xiang Fan ◽  
Yufei Bai ◽  
Jingjing Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Ecological Niche ◽  
Social Dimension ◽  
Coordinated Development ◽  
Economic Dimension ◽  
Four Dimensions ◽  
System A ◽  
International Trends ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Status ◽  
New Perspective

Taking Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei as an example, it analyzes the comprehensive competitiveness of Beijing, Tianjin, and Hebei. It selects four dimensions: economic dimension, social dimension, environmental dimension, and technological dimension. From a new perspective, it explores the application of niche theory in regional synergy. Based on the analysis of the ecological niche, the coordination degree model of the composite system is further used to calculate the status quo of the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region from 2013 to 2019. The results show that Beijing has the highest ecological niche, followed by Tianjin, and Hebei is the weakest. In 2019, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region is at a good level of coordination, with the social subsystem having the highest order and the technological subsystem having the lowest order. Based on this, it is proposed that the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei regions should be scientifically positioned, the overall need to be aligned with international trends, and the internal planning should be integrated to further enhance the level of cooperation in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region.

scholarly journals Socialrealisme – et nyt perspektiv på viden

2017 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-52
Author(s):  
Verner Larsen
Keyword(s):  
Educational Research ◽  
Critical Realism ◽  
Social Realism ◽  
Educational Sociology ◽  
Men I ◽  
Concepts Of Knowledge ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
Basic Ideas ◽  
Analytical Tools

’Socialrealisme’ kendes bedst som en kunstnerisk udtryksform, men i denne artikel introduceres ’socialrealisme’ som en nyere uddannelsessociologisk retning. Teoretikere som Rob Moore, Karl Maton, Johan Muller, Michael. F.D. Young og John Beck har været toneangivende i udviklingen af denne tænkning, der tog sit afsæt i slutningen af 1990’erne, hvor en fælles bestræbelse og et særligt fokus har været at sætte et nyt og forstærket perspektiv på viden. Denne udviklingsretning benævnes i artiklen som social-realisme-skolen (SRS). I formuleringen af en videnskabelig position har SRS forsøgt at overkomme, hvad den kalder ’det epistemologiske dilemma’, hvilket vil sige at bryde den falske dikotomi mellem positivistiske og relativistiske positioner. SRS hævder, at især konstruktivistiske strømninger har ført til en relativisering af vidensbegrebet, der har været med til at fortrænge viden som et selvstændigt objekt i uddannelsessociologisk forskning. I artiklen præsenteres realismetænkningens grundlæggende teoretiske forankringspunkter, argumentationer og kritikker inden for det socialvidenskabelige område. Herfra redegøres for, hvordan SRS som uddannelsessociologi har udviklet og udfoldet tænkningen med særlig fokus på problematikker i vidensproduktion og reproduktion i uddannelsesverdenen. De centrale problematikker, som førende socialrealister inden for uddannelsesverdenen refererer til, såsom ’det epistemologiske dilemma’ og’ emergente egenskaber’, herunder struktur- aktørforholdet, uddybes gennem inddragelse af teoretikere, som SRS læner sig op ad, primært R. Bhaskar, J. Alexander, M. Archer og B. Bernstein. Gennem to afsluttede curriculumstudier fra uddannelsesverdenen vises, hvordan analytiske begreber grundet i SRS kan anvendes i curriculumforskningen til at fremanalysere vidensstrukturer. Afslutningsvis diskuteres også kritik af socialrealismen med henblik på at nuancere diskussionen og dermed indkredse, hvad der generelt kan være socialrealismens nye bidrag i uddannelsesforskningen. ENGELSK ABSTRACT Verner Larsen: Social realism as a new perspective on knowledge Social realism is a relatively new direction in educational sociology. Its mission has been to establish a new focus on knowledge in educational research. Social realism argues that perspectives such as constructivism have led to an over-emphasis on the concepts of ‘learning’ and ‘competence’, which in turn have obscured viewing knowledge as an independent object. According to social realists, this emphasis on concepts of learning and competence has removed focus from the development of theories and concepts of knowledge that otherwise would have been able to differentiate ‘learning’ from ‘competence’. This article presents the basic ideas of social realism, its theoretical roots, and main arguments. In order to nuance the discussion, the article also includes some criticism of social realism, thereby identifying the new contributions of social realism to educational research. It also presents some analytical tools developed on basis of social realism that can be used in educational sociology. This is done by an analysis of curriculums from two Danish professional educations. Keywords: Social realism, Critical realism, educational sociology.

scholarly journals The births of International Studies in China

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Yih-Jye Hwang
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Historical Development ◽  
World Order ◽  
Scientific Discipline ◽  
International Studies ◽  
Ir Theory ◽  
Political Studies ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Chinese School ◽  
Chinese Scholars

Abstract This article explores how International Studies as a scientific discipline emerged and developed in China, against the background of a Sinocentric world order that had predominated in East Asia for a long time. The argument of this article is threefold. First, the discipline relied heavily on historical, legal, and political studies, and placed a heavy focus on the investigation of China's integration into the Westphalian system. Second, studies of International Relations were grounded in a problem-solving approach to various issues China was facing at various times in the course of modernisation. Third, the historical development of International Studies in China has had a profound impact on the current IR scholarship in both the PRC and Taiwan, including the recent surge of attempts to establish a Chinese School of IR theory in China and the voluntary acceptance of Western IR in Taiwan. By way of conclusion, the article suggests that there is still an indigenous Chinese site of agency with regards to developing IR. This agency exists despite the fact that in the course of the disciplinary institutionalisation of IR Chinese scholars have largely absorbed Western knowledge.

scholarly journals Features of Propaganda and Manipulation in the Modern Information Space of New Media

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vladimir Lazarevich Nazarov ◽  
Egor Vitalyevich Gorbunov ◽  
Nadezhda Sergeevna Kolegova
Keyword(s):  
New Media ◽  
Social Activity ◽  
Information Environment ◽  
International Studies ◽  
Social Constructs ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Relevant Today ◽  
Effective System ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Individual

This article discusses propaganda and manipulation as social phenomena and explores the features of its manifestations in the new media. The phenomenon of propaganda has been a recurrent topic of debate in public spaces over the past decades; there are dozens of international studies on the problems of its harm and necessity. The information environment constantly raises questions about the objectivity and reliability of the data distributed by the media, and their impact on public opinion and sociopolitical events in the world. With the development of communication technologies and the advent of new media, propaganda and manipulation reach a new level, gaining tremendous opportunities for influencing the individual and society. However, there is still no effective system of interaction with similar phenomena. Under the influence of constant informational impact in society, the system of values is rapidly changing and there is a reassessment of the main social constructs. The state, the sphere of education and the social sphere are need of new approaches to interacting with information and a changing society. The aims of the study are to identify the views of Russian youth regarding the current government and its policies, as well as determine the level of radicalism and protest potential of youth. This research discusses some propaganda technologies, especially relevant today. Examples of positive and negative propaganda are highlighted. Their specificity is substantiated and specific examples of such an impact are given, which entail significant socio-political events. The results of an empirical study have revealed mechanisms of the media influence on the individuals. The study has fixed the problem of radical political views formation, under the influence of the information environment created by new media. The necessity of creating an effective system to counter these phenomena in all spheres of social activity is substantiated. The problems and the direction requiring further research are formulated. Keywords: propaganda, manipulation, new media, propaganda technologies, information environment, content, social networks, Internet

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.

La diffusione dei sistemi solari in Italia e la nascita di una cultura della sostenibilitŕ energetica. Una proposta di lettura

2009 ◽  
pp. 97-114
Author(s):  
Valerio Corradi
Keyword(s):  
Energy System ◽  
Photovoltaic System ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
The People ◽  
Current Production ◽  
History Of ◽  
Domestic Use ◽  
Consumption Energy ◽  
Technical Issues ◽  
Solar Technology

- The energy crisis is among the main challenges that people will have to solve in the next years. Unsustainability of the current production consumption energy model is evident. The spreading of solar system (for example Photovoltaic system) is among the basic social phenomena for the birth of a new energetic culture. After Germany and Spain, nowadays also in Italy there is a boom of transfer of solar technology for domestic use. This paper, after a brief history of energy system and a discussion on a few normative and technical issues, proposes a sociological interpretation of this social phenomenon. In particular it studies the social reasons for the actions of the people who choose solar technology.

Teaching International Relations Theory

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Craig Douglas Albert
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Political Economy ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
International Studies ◽  
World Systems ◽  
Ir Theory ◽  
General Introduction ◽  
World Systems Theory ◽  
Is Theory ◽  
Classical Realism

International relations (IR) theory is favorably described in almost every syllabus since 1930. The most important questions asked were: “What is theory?” and “Is there a reason for IR theory?” The most widely used texts all focus on the first question and suggest, among others, that IR theory is “a way of making the world or some part of it more intelligible or better understood.” We can gauge where the teaching of IR theory is today by analyzing a sample of syllabi from IR scholars serving on the Advisory Board of the International Studies Association’s (ISA) Compendium Project. These syllabi reveal some trends. Within the eight undergraduate syllabi, for example, a general introduction to IR theory is taught in four separate classes. Among the theories discussed in different classes are realism, classical realism, neo-realism, Marxism and neo-Marxism, world-systems theory, imperialism, constructivism, and international political economy. Novel methods for teaching IR theory include the use of films, active learning, and experiential learning. The diversity of treatments of IR theory implied by the ISA syllabi provides evidence that, with the exception of the proliferation of perspectives, relatively little has changed since the debates of the late 1930s. The discipline lacks much semblance of unity regarding whether, and how, to offer IR theory to students. Nevertheless, there have been improvements that are likely to continue in terms of the ways in which theories may be presented.

Transnational Law

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Liste
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
Legal Theory ◽  
Legal Regulation ◽  
World Society ◽  
International Studies ◽  
Ir Theory ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Political Consequences ◽  
Legal Studies ◽  
Transnational Law

Transnational law (TL) reacts to normative demands in world society and thus covers normative worlds beyond both domestic and international realms. Inasmuch as domestic law structures relations among actors within the confines of a territorial state, and international law structures relations among states, TL can be understood to structure relations “across” states and state jurisdictions, thus transcending some of the normative confines just mentioned. The study of TL thus reacts to some conceptual challenges to a sociopolitical constellation in which the common distinctions between the “domestic” and the “international,” as well as between “public” and “private” forms of regulation, are put into question and can no longer be trusted as effective thinking tools. Although work in international studies (broadly conceived) has long challenged the narrow conceptions of interstate politics and accounted for the varieties of themes in globalization, a vibrant body of work on TL now available in the fields of international legal studies (ILS) but also legal studies more broadly (e.g., in the field of law and society studies) has not yet found much replication in international relations (IR) theory. However, since TL can be said to correspond to transnational relations as introduced to IR theory mainly from the 1970s onward, theoretical and empirical engagement with TL will find an indeed rich conceptual context in international studies, the latter understood as an interdisciplinary scholarly endeavor. It needs to be noted, however, that for disciplinary fields using the term “international” as a significant part of their identity, thinking the “transnational” is a double-edged sword. Inasmuch as the meaning and relevance of the term “international” are put into question, disciplines risk putting into question their own relevance. However, facing globalization and the putative complexity of new constellations of actors and processes, international studies did indeed engage in some discussion on alternative framings of its main subject—with the “world,” the “global,” and last but not least the “transnational” as promising candidates. At the same time, while international law has become a hot topic in IR, this has not yet led to much acknowledgment of the role that transnational law plays in what is perhaps a newly emerging political constellation. Although work on transnational actors and networks of governance, as well as on the emergence of private authority beyond the state, has indeed touched on issues for which legal regulation is of a remarkable relevance, this has not stimulated much engagement with how TL is discussed in legal studies. Thus understood, for IR there is still much to be explored in the legal study’s work on TL, including transnational legal process, transnational legal theory, or transnational legal pluralism. Vice versa, legal studies could benefit from work in a tradition of political science, especially with regard to an understanding of the political consequences of a transnationalization of law and global normative order more generally. The aim of this article is to provide an overview of work on TL, though by inviting an interdisciplinary account of literature. The featured books and articles include work on TL in legal studies, as well as those publications in IR, which may provide the grounds for a soon-to-be lively discussion on TL and the role it plays in world society. Furthermore, the overview also entails work in fields such as sociology, anthropology, and geography, which have already explored TL as a rich phenomenon.

scholarly journals On Assemblages and Things: Fluidity, Stability, Causation Stories, and Formation Stories

2019 ◽  
Vol 37 (4) ◽  
pp. 401-424
Author(s):  
Timothy Rutzou ◽  
Dave Elder-Vass
Keyword(s):  
Recent Work ◽  
Empirical Analysis ◽  
High Frequency ◽  
Critical Realism ◽  
Social Ontology ◽  
High Frequency Trading ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Assemblage Theory ◽  
New Synthesis ◽  
Trading Firm

This article conducts a dialogue and creates a new synthesis between two of the most influential ontological discourses in the field of sociology: assemblage theory and critical realism. The former proposes a focus on difference, fluidity, and process, the latter a focus on stability and structure. Drawing on and assessing the work of Deleuze, DeLanda, and Bhaskar, we argue that social ontology must overcome the tendency to bifurcate between these two poles and instead develop an ontology more suited to explaining complex social phenomena by accommodating elements of both traditions. Going beyond DeLanda’s recent work, we argue that a concept of causal types must be used alongside a typology of structures to give us an ontology that can sustain sociology’s need for both formation stories and causation stories. We illustrate the necessity and value of our proposed synthesis by discussing MacKenzie’s recent empirical analysis of a high-frequency trading firm.

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