Liberalism

Liberalism

is a political and economic doctrine that emphasizes individual autonomy, equality of opportunity, and the protection of individual rights

1. a positive view of human nature

2. IR can be cooperative: a conviction that international relations can be cooperative rather than conflictual

3. a belief in progress.

Basic assumptions of Liberalism

Modernization

What gave birth to Liberalism

Cooperation

Major concept of liberalism

belief in progress

Core liberal assumption

Machtstaat

Where realists see state first and foremost as a concentration of power

Rechtsstaat

liberals see the state as a constitutional entity

Jeremy Bentham

who coined the International law; believed that it was in rational interests of constitutional states to adhere the international law in their foreign policies

Sociological, Interdependence, Institutional, Republican

Strands of Liberalism

John Locke, Jeremy Bentham & Immanuel Kant

Who were the early thinkers of liberalism?

freedom, cooperation, peace, progress

what was the focus of the early thinkers?

there is a rule of law within the state ("Rechtstaat")

What was Locke’s contribution to Liberalism?

liberal states respect international law

What was Bentham’s contribution to Liberalism?

republics will establish perpetual peace

What was Kant’s contribution to Liberalism?

states, international institutions, transnational groups

Key Actors for liberalists

Sociological Liberalism

• A perspective that goes beyond traditional state-government interactions

• Focuses on transnational non-governmental ties or relations between (societies) people, groups, organizations from different countries.

Transnational relations

relations between people, groups, and organizations belonging to different countries

Transnationalism

‘the processes whereby international relations conducted by governments have been supplemented by relations among private individuals, groups, and societies that can and do have important consequences for the course of events

Karl Deutsch

leading figure of Transnational Relations; argued that a high degree of transnational ties between societies leads to peaceful relations that amount to more than the mere absence of war

security community

a group of people which has become ‘integrated’

integration

a sense of community without resorting to physical force

Cobweb Model of Transnational Relationships by John Burton

wherein it is composed of different groups and different types of external ties and different types of interest groups in the nation-state. Here, we do not recognize the state anymore, as we emphasis the different institutions or groups that have the same agenda as the state.

Interdependence Liberalism

Key Features:

• Transnational actors become increasingly important

• Military forces become less useful as an instrument

• Welfare becomes the primary state of concern

Interdependence

mutual dependence: peoples and governments are affected by what happens elsewhere, by the actions of their counterparts in other countries.

Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye

who coined the Complex Interdependence

Complex Interdependence

• IR is becoming more like domestic politics (involves different degrees of conflict) - in most of these conflicts military force is irrelevant

  • Therefore, power resources other than military ones are of increasing importance (ie. negotiating skills)

• More preoccupied with the ‘low politics’ of welfare (of their people) and less concerned with the ‘high politics’ of national security

• Transnational actors are increasingly important; the military is now less useful, than welfare.

• Implies a more friendly and cooperative relationship between states owing to ‘increasing fragmentation and diffusion of power in economic affairs, stemming from the growing interconnectedness of national economies’

Institutional Liberalism

• A strand of liberalism focusing on the beneficial effects of international institutions

• Believes international organizations and rule sets help promote cooperation between states

International organization and international regime

two types of international institutions

international regimes

is a set of rules which governs state action in particular areas, such as aviation or shipping

universal or regional

membership in international institutions

Republican Liberalism

A strand of liberalism focuses on the peaceful potential of liberal democracies; with republican states, there is less conflict and less wars (or none at all)

Immanuel Kant

who first articulated this ““The argument is not that democracies never go to war, rather, that democracies do not fight each other.”

Michael Doyle

Who gave the most systematic theoretical answer as to why democracies are at peace with one another?

existence of democratic norms, peaceful relations of democratic states based on common moral foundations, and peace strengthened through economic cooperation and interdependence

What are the three elements why democracies are peaceful with one another:

pacific union

a zone of peace based on the common moral foundations of all democracies

spirit of commerce

mutual and reciprocal gain for those involved in international economic cooperation and exchange

curvilinear

the relationship between autocracies, partial democracies and genuine democracies

immediate regimes, or anocracies

other terms for partial democracies

liberalism is too good to be true

reason for the neorealist critiques on liberalism

weak liberals and strong liberals

what divisions were made after the debate between liberalism and realism?

weak liberals

which liberal division accepts several realist claims including the essential point about the persistence of anarchy (and insecurity)

Strong liberals

which liberal division will not budge; claims that the world is changing in fundamental ways in line with liberal expectations

neorealist critique on sociological liberalism

Transnationalism has already existed prior to world wars, however these transnational relations hasn’t stopped violent conflicts/wars among states

neorealist critique on institutional liberalism

• While states cooperate through institutions, they still do it solely on the basis of their own decision and self-interest.

  • Institutions are not important in their own right (merely used as a theatre stage), it simply reflects the power and interests of states.

neorealist critique on interdependence liberalism

Economic interdependence is nothing new, it has been existing for so long yet it has not been able to stop violence or wars from happening.

neorealist critique on republican liberalism

Emphasis on the possibility that a liberal or democratic state will revert to authoritarianism or another form of non-democracy

The persistence and permanence of anarchy and the insecurity that it involves

common thread among the neorealist critiques