Week Two: What is Political Science and IR?

How do great powers aim to be the hegemon? (Mearsheimer)

• They compete for power, to maximise power and gain it at the expense of others

According to Mearsheimer, what forces states to act aggressively?

The desire to gain powerm enabled through the structure of the international system causes aggression. To stop others gainin gpower, for fear they will lose power

According to Mearsheimer, what are the flaws of the IR system that causes states to fear eachother?

1. The absence of a central authority that sits above state and can protect them from eachother

2. States always have some form of offensive capabillity

   1. States can never be certain of eachother’s intentions

Offensive realism is a theory that challenges

optimism about relations between the powers

The key arguments of offensive realism are

1. Great powers behave looking for more power at the expense of others

2. Multipolar systems are more dangerous than bipolar, and multipolar with the most hegemons are the most dangerous

In offensive realism, the fortunes of great states is determined by

the decisions and actions of those with the greatest capability

In offensive realism, the decisions and actions of those with greatest capability are determined by

the basis of relative military capability (capacity must be large enough for a war of attrition)

However, the offensive realist theory assumes that

international system strongly shapes the behaviour of states and pays little attention to individuals or domestic political considerations like ideology

→ it also has indeterminacy, in that it doesn’t answer every possible question because there can be multiple outcomes.

The main strategies used to acquire power in International Relations according to Mearsheimer:

• Blackmail and war are used to acquire power, while balancing and buck passing is used to maintain power

Balancing in IS:

The threatened state accepts the burden of deferring its adversary and commits to substantial resources to achieve that goal

Buck Passing in IS:

Tries to get another state to shoulder the butfen of deterring and defeating the threatening state

Realists (Carr, Waltz and Morgentheau) in a nutshell:

• Take issue with liberal claim of economikc interdependence enhancing prospects for peace

• Criticise liberals for holding utopian views of politics

• Bipolar states are more stable than multipolar

• Morgentheau argues that states struggle to gain power because they have a desire for it, Waltz blames the power structure.

Liberalism in a nutshell:

• Tends to be hopeful about prospects of making the world a better place and believes its possible to reduce the scourge of war

Liberalism’s 3 Central Beliefs:

1. States are the main actors in international politics (free economics)

2. Emphasise the internal characteristics of states considerably, and these differences have large impacts on state behaviour

   1. Also believe internal arrangements (democracy) are preferable to others (dictatorship)

3. They discount the significance of calculations of power for good states as other kinds of economic and political calculations matter more

Realism in a nutshell:

Creating a peaceful world is desirable, but there is no easy way to escape the harsh world of security competition and war

The three core beliefs of liberalism:

1. With a focus on great powers, states are the main actors

2. Behaviour of states is influenced by external environments, not internal characteristics. All powers act the same, so the type of government doesn’t matter.

3. Calculations about power dominate states thinking. States compete for power → war.

Constructivism largely centres around the importance of

identities

Litmus for autocracy:

When a leader:

• rejects, in words or actions, the democratic rules of the game

• Denies the legitimacy of opposition

• Tolerates or encourages violence

  • Indicates a willingness to curtail the civil liberties of opponents, including the media

Populists:

anti-establishment politicians: figures who claim to represent the ‘voice of the people’, wage war on what they view as conspirational etc

• tend to deny legitimacy of parties (undemocratic) and unpatriotic, declaring the current system hijacked by the elite.

According to Harold Lassveil, political science attempts to

systematise the study of politics, “who gets what, when and how”

Aristotle on politics:

“ Man is by nature a political animal”

Sheldon Woolin on Politics:

“The legitimised and public contestation, primarily by organised and unequal social powers, over access to the resources available to the public authorities of the collectivity”

Sheldon Woolin on the Political:

“Expression of the idea that a free society composed of diversities can nonetheless enjoy moments of commonality,when, through public deliberations, collective power is used to promote or protect the wellbeing of the collectivity”

Comparative politics seeks to understand politics through:

Contrasting political systems (one on one, or multiple)

Kenneth Waltz’ Three images features these categories:

The individual

The state (focus of comparative)

The system (realist, ‘black box’, composition doesn’t matter)

The various states of anarchy:

1. Unipolar: single hegemonic power (unstable, will always face balancing from rivals)

2. Bipolar: two superpowers sufficient to balance eachother (alledgedly most stable)

   1. Multipolar: three or more in competition, but unable to achieve dominance or superpower status (supposedly most unstable)

Liberal response to anarchy:

Facilitates cooperation (Free trade UN)

Constructivist response to anarchy:

Anarchy is what states make of it (Democracies don’t fight democracies)

Marxist response to anarchy:

Anarchy is a mask for the ordered system of capitalsm. It is the accumilation of goods that causes this.

Feminist response to anarchy:

Anarchy is a gendered concept that masks the effects of women in the international system

What is anarchy

The absence of power

Morgantheau and Mearsheimer solution to anarchy?

Self-help, survival, and establishing a balance of power. The aim of realism is stability.

Morganthau’s 6 Principles of Realism:

1. Politics governed by objective laws which have rroot in human nature

2. Key to international politics is concept of interest defined in terms of power

3. Universal moral principles do not guide state behaviour

4. Concept of interest is universal among states

5. No universal moral code exists

6. Political sphere is autonomous from other spheres of human activity.