International Relations Theories and Concepts Flashcards

Vocabulary flashcards covering international relations theories, key scholars, system structures, foreign policy doctrines, and state behaviors.

IR (Capitalized)

The theoretical study and academic framework of international relations, including realism, liberalism, and constructivism.

ir (Lowercase)

The practice and real-world interactions between specific states, such as the political relationship between Iran and the United States.

Human Nature Realism

A branch of classical realism stating that politics has objective laws rooted in human nature, characterized by an inherent lust for power.

Hans Morgenthau

A key human nature realist who wrote 'Politics Among Nations' in 1948 and argued that utopian ideals lead states into disaster.

Machiavelli

A political philosopher who wrote 'The Prince' in 1513 and introduced the concept that the ends justify the means for rulers maintaining power.

Anarchy

The absence of an overarching central authority above states to protect them from one another; the core structural force driving state behavior in structural realism.

Kenneth Waltz

A leading structural realist who wrote 'Man, the State, and War' and 'Theory of International Politics', arguing that structural anarchy drives states to seek security.

Realism Comparison Framework

A comparative categorization of Realism types: Human Nature (driven by lust for power), Structural Defensive (driven by anarchy to maintain the status quo), and Structural Offensive (driven by anarchy to gain maximal power).

Survival

The paramount and foremost goal of any nation state according to realist theory.

Thucydides

An early realist historian who chronicled the Peloponnesian War, highlighting power and fear as primary motivators of state actions.

Relative Gains

A calculation where states focus primarily on the comparative size of their benefits relative to other states when facing dilemmas of cooperation.

Absolute Gains

A calculation focusing on a state's total, independent benefit from cooperation, regardless of the gains accrued by other states.

Power

A state's overall capability in international politics, defined as the combination of actual power and latent power.

Bipolar System

An international system dominated by two equal powers (such as during the Cold War), which realists consider the most stable system structure.

Unbalanced Multipolar System

An international system containing three or more unequal great powers, which creates the least stability and generates the most conflict (e.g., WWI, WWII).

Hegemony

A state so powerful that it dominates all other states in a system; being the sole power guarantees its survival.

Monroe Doctrine

A U.S. foreign policy doctrine banning European wars, new European colonization in the Western Hemisphere, and alliances between Western Hemisphere states and European powers.

Roosevelt Corollary

An extension to the Monroe Doctrine asserting that the United States has the right to act as an international police power in Latin America.

Stopping Power of Water

The physical limit and military difficulty that large bodies of water impose on a state's ability to project power overseas.

Offshore Balancer

A strategic posture of remaining geographically unattached to foreign regions while acting to prevent any single power from conquering those regions.

Buckpassing

A strategy in which a state attempts to shift the burden of deterring or fighting an aggressive state onto another third-party power.

Balancing

A strategy in which a state assumes direct responsibility for preventing an aggressor state from altering the balance of power.

Bandwagoning

A strategy where a weaker state aligns itself with a stronger, aggressive power to avoid becoming a target.

Offensive Realism

A realist theory associated with John Miersheimer asserting that anarchy drives states to maximize power ('all you can eat') because conquest can pay dividends and ensure ultimate security.

Defensive Realism

A realist theory asserting that expanding power beyond a certain point is dangerous, conquest fails, and states should focus on maintaining the status quo.

Kant's Three Definitive Articles

Immanuel Kant's foundational prerequisites for achieving perpetual peace: democracy, international institutions, and economic openness.

Democratic Peace Theory

The theory asserting that democratic states rarely go to war with one another due to shared democratic norms, transparency, and internal institutional constraints.

International Institution

An organization with shared rules and legitimacy that helps states cooperate by mitigating anarchy, lengthening time horizons, creating reciprocity norms, and reducing opportunity costs.

How do international institutions help states cooperate? How do they help to mitigate the impact of anarchy?

They have greater legitimacy, shared rules, pushing back time horizons, creating norms of reciprocity, issue linkage, reduction of opportunity costs, reputational effects for cheating

In looking at the modern day liberal (or neoliberal) version of the Kantian triangle, what did we mean by ‘feedback loops’?

self-reinforcing mechanisms that link democratic governance, economic interdependence, and international institutions to promote peace and stability among states.

international institutions contribute to democracy

International organizations have greater legitimacy in promoting democracy than do individual states; International organizations often make democratic-like requirements as a condition for business, such as with the World Bank; United Nations explicitly promotes democracy in war-torn states (providing alternate means of political competition)

Peace helps encourage democracy

Peace can strengthen democratic institutions. Peace can indirectly promote democracy through creating the atmosphere where economic openness can occur (prosperity).

Alternate Hypothesis: Peace and Democracy; Democracies are likely to win wars, weeding out autocratic governments. Therefore, the more war that takes place, the more likely democracy will spread. 

Democracy helps encourage economic interconnectedness

Finding: Democracies are more likely to trade with one another than other pairs of states.

Why?: Democracies are likely to be at peace (not going to worry about

relative gains). The absolute gains achieved in trading with other democracies

increase security vis-à-vis third parties. Investors in democracies feel more confident that their

investments are secure when trading in other democracies

What do we mean when talking about iterations of the game? In most game theoretic scenarios, as the iterations of the game increase, what impact does this have on the likelihood of cooperation?

Iterations of the game refer to repeated encounters of players within a strategic framework, allowing them to adjust their strategies based on past outcomes. As iterations increase, the likelihood of cooperation tends to rise because players can develop trust, recognize the benefits of mutual cooperation, and establish long-term strategies over time.

According to game theory, which situations, economic or security, are most prone to cooperation?

economic

How do real life bargaining scenarios differ than game theoretic scenarios?

throughout history has this happened?

Actors are not always fully aware of their interests. Also, interests

may sometimes be formed endogenously in the process of inter-

state bargaining.

• Inter-state bargaining often consists of many states, not the two-

sided world presented in theoretical game constructs.

• Negotiations often revolve around efforts to come up with

agreements that will be acceptable to participants. Negotiators

often do not not have fixed negotiation curves, but, instead, act to

produce mutually beneficial deals.

• Negotiators face a veil of uncertainty. They can never be sure of

their own position; hence negotiators in international politics try

to reach agreements that can be deemed as being fair.

IMF

international money fund - to ensure stability of global finances

world bank

reduce global poverty

GATT

general agreement on tariffs and trade (manufactured goods)

NATO

North atlantic treaty organizatioin - military alliance

OECD

organization for economic co-operation and development

G-7

informal intergovernmenal group forum of 7 states of the worlds leading advanced economies

characterize U.S. trade policy. What did we mean when we said that the U.S. had a three-pronged trade strategy?