International Relations Exam 2 Study

The State, The Nation, and Nationalism

The State vs the nation

• State: Has complete authority within boundaries

• Sovereignty: Supreme authority within the territory

  • Limitations: When there are border disputes, territorial integrity is a gray space

• Nation-state: Citizens have a similar national identity

  • Japan, China, Somalia

  • Most states are multinational

Nationalism

• Cuba: Castrow overthrew US-backed corrupt dictator. Nationalization of sugar plantations, telephone, cars

• Mexico: Inclusive nationalism since 1910. Belonging to the patria (fatherland), everyone has a right to education, working rights, public control of resources

Conflicts and war

• Causes: Human nature, internal structure of states, structure of the international system

• Types:

  • Hegemonic: Shifting the distribution of power

  • Total war: Any sacrifice necessary

  • Limited war: No interest in taking another state

  • Civil war

  • Guerilla warfare: Hit and run

  • Preventative war: One state learns by spies that another state is trying to attack them. Strike first, eliminate threat

  • Preemptive war: Like preventative but attack a certain location where threat is believed to be

• The Just War Doctrine:

  • War is a last resort and can only be waged to correct a wrong, restore justice, or defend political stability

  • Civilians can never be targets

  • There must be a reasonable chance of success

• The Fourteen Points: Woodrow Wilson’s response to Lenin

  • The first five points focus on an “open world”

  • The next eight points focus on self-determination for Europe’s national minorities

  • The last point focuses on a “general association of nations” so all states have equal vote in an international assembly

    • Led to The Treaty of Versailles (which heavily punished Germany)

  The Cold War

• ICP- International Communist Party- World Communism

• Russia was not invited to The Treaty of Versailles

  • Then post WW2, there was disagreement on how to unify Germany

• 1949: Mao has victory in China, it is now the largest communist state

• Sputnik: (1957) Russia launches Sputnik 1 + 2. The first artificial Earth satellites

  • Explorer 1 + 2: (1958) The US’s responses to Sputnik

• Cuban Missile Crisis: (1962) US imposes arms blockade in Cuba after finding offensive missile sites.

  • This was the closest point to nuclear warfare. SU and US begin negotiations of reducing strategic arms

    • SALT 1: (1969) Lead to the Anti-ballistic missile

    • START: (2011) Reduced offensive weapons

Impact

• The Cold War led to a bipolar international structure

• 3rd world countries could play off superpowers because superpowers needed support

  • Non-aligned movement: Improving developing countries, decolonization

• Superpower proxy wars in Asia, Africa

• The Soviet Union collapsed leading to a unipolar world

National Security

Definition and Scope

• In recent times, security has broadened from focusing on military to health, economics, environmental, food, and cybersecurity

• It is deepening from the state to the individual

  Theorizing national security

• Realism: External threats

  • The fundamental interest of states is security

  • Statism: States are central actors

  • Survival: The central policy goal

  • Self-help: Take necessary steps to ensure survivial

  • Security dilemma: Building defense in one state is threatening to another

• Liberalism: A collective and common security. You need to work with the enemy

  • Develop international rules and cooperative institutions

  • R2P

• Constructivism: Security and threats are social constructs

  • Norms (what’s deemed appropriate for policy) control international politics

  • Security communities: Transnational values and collective security interests (ex: EU, NATO)

• Feminist theory: Security is emancipation from dominaiton

  • Create a more just and less violent society

  • Also looks at unequal reprecussions of environmental, poverty, and structural violence issues

Fundamental elements of national security

• Socio-political stability: Achieving peace among all citizens regardless of race, ethnicity, social status, etc.

  • Common values allow for common identity and nationalism

  • Without socio-political stability, national security is threatened

• Territorial integrity: Ensuring a national territory has effective control by a government and state

  • Needs a strong and well-equipped military

• Economic solidarity and strength: Ensures a strong livelihood for all individuals

  International Terrorism

• Terrorism: Premeditated violence (or threat of violence) against a government or their citizens to achieve political ends

  • Typically considered a method of last resort

• Collective responsibility: Terrorists argue civilians who die are paying the price for being on the side causing injustice

• The first case of modern terrorism was the assassination of Tsar Alexander II in 1881

  • Look below

    

• Suicide terrorism: Began with Hezbollah in 1983

  • Major psychological impact on enemy

  • Easy and inexpensive

  • Destructive in terms of numbers killed and property is destroyed

  • Self-sacrifice has a legitimating effect on a cause

  • Eternal life

Strategies for countering terrorism

• Realists: Define terrorism as non-state actors engage in intimidation, pose assymetrical threats (weak entity attempting gains over a stronger one)

  • Realists will monitor and prevent terrorism with preemptive strategies. They will use punishment, confiscation, and pressure

• Liberalists: State we must understand terrorism and its roots. We need to distinguish terrorism from legitimate struggles for freedom

  • Liberalists will monitor by condemnation, policy change, improving social/economic conditions, and educational campaigns

• Constructivists: State terrorism is based on perception and counterterrorism is a construct. They seek to understand motivations, identities, and ideas

  • Constructivists believe we can shape ideas of the terrorists

Diplomacy and foreign policy

• Foreign policy is strategies a state utilizes when interacting with others (focusing on defense, security, economics, etc.) while diplomacy means being diplomatic while working on the foreign policy

• The greatest priority of the state is to exist

• Bilateral diplomacy: Conduct of interactions between two states

  • Old diplomacy- before WW2

• Multilateral diplomacy: Interactions between 3+ parties with intergovernmental organizations

  • IGOs (EU, UN, NATO)

  • INGOs (Doctors w/out borders, Green Peace, WHO)

  Factors influencing foreign policy making

• Global-level factors: How interdependent we are with other countries

• State-level factors: Geographic location, natural resources, military, etc.

• Individual-level factors: Role of political/governmental leaders (personalities, beliefs)

  Explaining foreign policy

• Rational actor model: Each country is a unitary actor

  • There is a head of state responsible for foreign policy

  • Foreign policy decisions are based on the head of state’s capacity to execute them

• Organizational Perspective/Process Model: Organizations view foreign policy issues as opportunities or threats to their mission

• Political perspective/bureaucratic policy model: All decisions by leaders are political in nature

  • All decisions spur from bargaining, arguing, compromising

• Individual perspective: Decision makers differ in their style and perspective

  • Active presidents are energetic and ready to take responsibility

  • Passive presidents are cautious and avoid controversy

  • Nationalists

  • Militarists

  • Bunker mentality: Being affected by paranoia (Nixon wiretapped opponents- Watergate)

  Conclusions

• There is no rationality in FP decision-making

• Bounded rationality: We assume we have all the advice needed to make the best decisions possible

• Satisficing behavior: Satisfactory and sufficient. Doing the bare minimum to succeed

International law

• International law: Rules and principles dictating the relationship between international actors and individuals/groups during peace and conflict

• Major branches:

  • Human rights law

  • Criminal law

  • Dipomatic law

  • Environmental law

  • The Law of Treaties

  • The Law of the Sea

  • International Trade Law

  • International Space Law

• The 5 subjects

  • States

  • Individuals

  • Public international organizations (UN, EU, NATO)

  • Transnational corporations (McDonalds, Toyota)

  • Entities (Palestine, Vatican City)

  Sources of international law

  

• Treaties: Legally binding contracts signed bewteen states. Can be particiular, general, bilateral, multilateral

• Customary rules: International customs accepted as law. Binding on states

• General principle of law: Logical responses by subjects that come from judicial reasoning, based on what has already been decided in international law

• Judicial decision: Decisions of international courts and tribunals (tribunals work on specific areas of law and are temporary)

• Peremptory norms: Principles that are accepted and recognized by states as norms

• Resolutions of international organizations: A source of international law with respect to matters in question

• Non-binding standards: (Soft law). Expression of intent by international communities

  Why states obey international law

• Most states follow international law even though there is no central enforcement

• Self-interest: States benefit from living in a world with order

• Punishment: Other members of the internal system may punish them

• Reputation: Every state wants to be seen as legitimate and trustworthy

International Relations

• IGOs: International Organizations

• PIOs: Public International Organizations (World Bank, UNiCEF)

• INGOs: International Nongovernmental Organizations (Doctors w/out Borders)

• MNCs: Multinational Corporations (McDonald’s, Toyota)

  Preamble to UN Charter

• The people of the UN will

  • Save future generations from war

  • Reaffirm prioritization of human rights and social progress

  • Respect obligations of treaties

  Purposes of the United Nations

• The League of Nations failed to prevent WW2 so it is picking up from there- maintain peace and security

  Organs of the United Nations

• General assembly

  • Meets once per year to deliberate on the UN’s budget

  • Elects non-permanent members of the Security Council and Secretary General

  • Makes recommendations on principles of cooperation

  • Considers reports from the Security Council

• Security Council

  • 5 permanent members (US, UK, France, China, Russia) and 10 rotating members

  • Maintain international peace and security, investigate disputes

  • Determine the weight of a threat

  • Call on members to use economics to settle disputes and not force

  • Recommend appointment of Secretary General

• Economic and Social Council

  • 54 members, elected by the General Assembly

  • Discusses economics and social rights

  • Promotes nation development

• Trusteeship council (no longer exists)

  • Ensured that trust territories (territories of Germany, Italy, Japan) were regulated in the best interest of their people

• International Court of Justice

  • 15 justices appointed by the General Assembly and Security Council

  • Makes binding decisions on international law, hears disputes brought up by states

• Secretariat

  • The executive arm of the UN

  • The main source of economic and political development

  • Appoints heads of peacekeeping functions

  • Headed by the Secretary General

  Notable UN Achievements

• Has protected the world from another hegemonic war

• Has saved the pyramids and other World Heritage Sites

• Has destroyed smallpox with WHO

• Works to protect the ozone

  UN Major Failures

• Rwanda genocide (1994): The UN knew about an impending genocide but failed to stop it

• Srebrenica (1995): A massacre of 8000+ Bosnian Muslim men by the Serbs

• Iraq oil for food program: If Iraq gave oil, the UN was supposed to channel money to them for food and medicine but a lot of it went through private pockets

• Rape and child sex abuse in Congo (2005): Peacekeepers did not protect women and young girls. They even contributed to the issue

• Spreading cholera in Haiti (2010): Nepali peacekeepers caused 700,000 to be infected and 8000 to die

The North vs. South → Poverty, Inequality, Development

Global North vs Global South

• Term is inaccurate because it homologizes all northern countries as developed and all southern ones as underdeveloped

• Modernization theory: All societies go through a process of development from traditional to modernity

  • Enhancement of GNP (Gross National Product) is the best method for development

• Dependency theory: Under-development does not come from a continuing “traditional society’ but the expansion of capitalism and exploitation

  • Capitalism makes peripheral countires look feudal (outdated)

• Within the periphery there’s a core and within the core there’s a periphery

  Washington Consensus

• Washington Consensus: A macro-level economic and political restructuring for economic growth. Sovereign debt repayment, addressing poverty

• SAPs (Structural Adjustment Policy).

  • Privitization

  • Liberalization

  • Deregulation

  • Cutback on social spending

• Post-Washington Consensus: A shift from macro-level processes of development to addressing specific lived experiences of the poor

  • MDGs (Millenium Development Goals): [2000-2015]. 8 goals to reduce poverty but there was uneven progress between countries

  • SDGs (Sustainable Developmental Goals): [2016-2030]. 16 goals to reduce poverty, emphasizing same-pace development

  • Advocation for MDGs/SDGs

    • Development by modernization

    • Private rights and free market

    • Capitalism is the engine of economic development

  • Criticism of MDGs/SDGs

    • Entrench global poverty and inequality

    • Developing a country means those living there need to be relocated

    • Even if a country develops, only the wealthy will be benefited

Globalization

What is globalization?

• Three main factors:

  • Religion: Globalization of christianity began with conversion of Emperor Constantine (313 AD)

  • Economy and empire: Voyages of exploration, industrialization, colonialism

  • Technology: Explosion of the information superhighway

• Three perspectives of globalization:

  • Hyperglobalists: Globalization is real, current, and the result of technology

    • Positive outlook

  • Skepticals: Globalization doesn’t exist, this is capitalism per usual

  • Transformationalists: Globalization is real but is not current. It is a long-term development of human activities and ideas

• Global Economic Institutions are the World Bank and GATT. They bring globalization

• Global university: United Nations University in Tokyo

  • It is a global thinktank

    Trajectories, impacts, and perils of globalization

• Political trajectory: Democratization, good governance, protection of human rights

  • Impact:

    • Legitamizing voices of political dissent

    • Elevating society’s role in politics

    • Limited mandate (term limits) means the beginning of the end of dictatorship

• Economic trajectory: (The Washington Consensus)- liberalizing pricing and market systems

  • Impact:

    • Expansion of the private sector

    • Heightened cost of living

    • Decrease in employment

    • Cuts in education

• Cultural trajectory: Transmit values and ideas around the world

  • Impact:

    • Hybridization: Cultural mixing across continents

    • Homogenization: Reconfiguring world culture into one blend

    • Hegemonization: One dominating culture around the world

Humanitarianism

What is humanitarian intervention?

• Protect and assist individuals in war/conflict zones by relief, rescue, and reconstruction

• It exists in two forms:

  • Armed: (Controversial). Justified when a state abuses sovereignty for brutal and cruel treatment of citizens

    • Paternalism in intervention undermines claims of justified interventioin

  • By international organizations: More benign

• Self-interested intervention is considered realist while R2P is considered idealist

  • Therefore, the governent uses R2P as an excuse to act in self interest

• Henry Dunant: A swiss businessman who was horrified by WW2 made Red Cross (an NGO)

  • NGOs include: Red Cross, InterAction, International Council for Voluntary Action

    • There are 37,000 NGOs for humanitarian work

• Cosmopolitanism: Equal human worth

  Why the proliferation of humanitarian organizations?

• There is a growing willingness and ability to help others at risk

  • Technology gives us more resources

  • More relief organizations

• Dangers are getting worse, so we need more relief workers in war zones where

  • Access is difficult

  • Relief workers are seen by enemies as a threat or people who be captured

  The R2P

• Setup by the Security Council

  • Kofi Annan- UN Secretary General (2000). Detailed how to intervene

• Comes from the international community’s failure to respond to tragedies like the 1994 Rwandan genocide

• The Canadian Government set up the International Comission on Intervention and State Sovereignty in September 2000

• Criteria for protection

  • Just cause

  • Right intention

  • Final resort

  • Legitimate mandate (must be a UN mandate)

• Three pillars suggested to turn the concept of implementing the R2P into reality:

  • A state has the R2P citizens from genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity

  • The international community has the responsibility to assist the state in fulfilling primary responsibility (listed above)

  • The international community must intervene within a state by economic sanctions (military as last resort) if the state purposefully fails to fulfill primary responsibility

Human Rights

The concept of human rights

• Equal and inalienable rights for all

• Human rights norms create a relationship between individuals and states

• Rights come from religion, the nature of the human being, and the nature of society

  Philosophical roots of human rights (universalist)

• Human rights derive from our essence as human beings

  • They can be applied in any geographical location

• Every individual can use nature, God, and their own reason to prove these rights are part of our essence

• Human rights surpass the legal system

• Humans are the only animals endowed with rationality

  Realist/positivist perception of human rights

• Human rights are necessasry but may vary from culture to culture

• Human rights reflct the value system of a particular society in a particular moment in history

• There is no emphasis on indivudalism

  • Rights of a community come before rights of the individual

  • Human rights will improve as a country develops

A state has a responsibility to protect its population from genocide, war
crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing.
2. The international community has a responsibility to assist the state to fulfill its
primary responsibility.
3. If the state manifestly fails to protect its citizens from the four above mass
atrocities and peaceful measures have failed, the international community has
the responsibility to intervene through coercive measures such as economic
sanctions with military intervention as a last resort.