Constructivism Lecture §

Class: IS405 Created Time: November 22, 2021 7:06 AM Database: Class Notes Database Last Edited Time: December 1, 2021 6:52 PM Type: Lecture

• Constructivism is about reality being subjective

  • Change: what you see can change
  • Alexander Wendt: “anarchy can go away if people stop believing in it”
  • You don’t know what something means until you put it in a social context

• Realist sees everything around us are reality and cannot be changed

  • logic of consequence: realist VS logic of appropriateness: constructivist

• Constructivism assumptions

  • People & states are social beings which give meaning to the environment they populate

    • behaviors, concepts, and beliefs determine what something means

  • Social Construction: the process of creating objects so their shape and form is imbued with social values, norms, and assumptions rather than being the product of purely individual thought or meaning

    “Man makes history, although not always to his liking”

    • Karl Marx
    • The agents in the society all contribute to create and change the social construction that governs their behavior, but no one individual can change social structures without everyone doing the same.
    • Mutual Constitution: State’s interest determines state’s action and interactions that shapes their identity therefore affecting the state’s interest in return

• Anarchy is what states perceive it to be

  • IRTs doesn’t dispute on what anarchy is, but they dispute over how anarchy affects the world

  💡 Gorbachev believed war isn’t productive or useful which determined his actions in the Cold War

  • was there a norm that pushes Gorbachev to do so? How does constructivism explain Gorbachev’s decision?

• Criticisms on constructivism

  • It doesn’t give precise predictions like traditional IRTs like Realism
  • Norms of rule of international laws are overlooked but the abusers don’t get punished
    • Explanation: allies of abusers do not comply and lose trust in them later down the line. No material lost, but lost good identity.
  • Power of norm isn’t as powerful as material power

Extra §

• Standford Prison Experiment: if you put random people in a artificial society. They will assume the roles assigned to them, even if it’s not real