Class 11 Critical Theories of International Relations PDF

Class 11. Is theory impartial? The critical theories of International Relations Key figures: - Barry Buzan - Ann Tickner - Robyn Eckersley Concepts: - Ecocentrism - Post-positivism - Human security - Feminism in international relations...

Class 11. Is theory impartial? The critical theories of International Relations Key figures: - Barry Buzan - Ann Tickner - Robyn Eckersley Concepts: - Ecocentrism - Post-positivism - Human security - Feminism in international relations Preamble I. Ecocentrism II. Feminism III. Critical understanding of security According to critical approaches, no knowledge can be culturally, philosophically, ethically, ideologically neutral in social sciences. While positivists believe that international phenomenon can be studied in an objective manner, just as plants by biologists or mechanics by physicists, critical and radical approaches are part of post-positivism: they consider that scientific knowledge is always biased. Critical approaches insist on the gaps that exist in International Relations’ theory. Because they are biased, analysts have neglected several important issues that should be dealt with in International Relations. Radical approaches, represented by, for example, post-modernism, even think that scholars will never be able to gain any knowledge about social relations. I. Ecocentrism is part of environmental ethics. There are other trends of environmental ethics, such as anthropocentrism, depending on the unit of analysis that you consider and on the value given to the natural world. Ecocentrism is advocated by non-state actors. Some are asking for more rights to nature (for instance Earth First!). Some are asking for more less rights for Humanity (for instance the Voluntary Human Extinction Program). States are also increasingly considering ecocentrism as an important solution to the world ecological crisis. Robyn Eckersley, in her book The Green State: Rethinking Democracy and Sovereignty 2004 advocates for more democracy to tackle the ecological crisis. Green democrats highlight the many ways in which the modern environmental movement and green political parties have enriched liberal democracy. The primary goal of green democrats has been to defend supplementary rights, including new constitutional environmental rights, new forms of proxy representation for future 1  generations and nonhuman species, new legal principles such as the precautionary principle, and new treaties that promote transboundary environmental procedural rights, such as the Aarhus Convention 1998. II. Few women are present in the discipline of International Relations. See the compulsory reading for one possible feminist interpretation of international relations. III. Bary Buzan (from the Copenhagen school of International Relations), Peoples, States and Fear (1983) underlines that the Realist and Liberal traditions have overemphasized the role of States as security agents in international relations. By presenting the State as a crucial element for our security, former analysts have created a dynamic by which States are the only legitimated security agents. Yet, what Bary Buzan observes is that, due to the reification of the State as a security actor, States are today themselves performing…. insecurity politics! See the Schengen Area border in Spain, where lots of violence is occurring everyday, in the very name of States. According to Buzan, former theories are dangerous in the sense that they considered States as the solution to security issues, while States are also often part to the problem. Buzan is part to the Copenhagen School of international relations (also Ole Wæver and Jaap de Wilde) that places particular emphasis upon the social aspects of security. They proposed a new definition of security, based on the individual (not the state). They called it human security. Radical approaches, like post-modernism, go one step further by not only saying that there are gaps in the analysis of international relations, but also that the way International Relations theory has developed has had an impact on what actually happened in international relations. Moreover, they do not believed that it is possible to re-balance international relations’ analysis because scholars are themselves part to the social world. See the technical data sheet of critical theories. Glossary Positivist methodology A methodology in IR that employs most of the attitudes and assumptions of behavioralism but does so in a more sophisticated way. Positivism is a fundamentally scientific approach. Positivists believe that there can be an objective knowledge of the social and political dimensions of the world, and that this knowledge is obtainable through the careful development and testing of empirical propositions. The social scientist is no different from any other scientists in this regard. 2 Post-positivist methodology A methodology in IR developed largely in reaction to positivist claims. Post-positivism presupposes methods that acknowledge the distinctiveness of human beings as such, i.e., creatures that must live with and among each other in order to lead a human life. Post- positivist methodology rests on the proposition that people conceive, construct, and constitute the world in which they live, including the international world, which is entirely a human arrangement and nothing else. Social science is a different methodology from that of natural science. Critical theory A post-positivist approach to IR influenced by Marxist thought advanced by the Frankfurt School. Critical theory rejects three main postulates of positivism: an objective external reality, the subject/object distinction, and value-free social science. Critical theorists emphasize the fundamentally political nature of knowledge. They seek to liberate humanity from the conservative forces and ‘oppressive’ structures of hegemonic (mainly US- dominated) world politics and global economics. Critical theorists are similar to idealists in their support for progressive change and their use of theory to bring about that change. Feminism As an example of a critical approach, feminism in IR emphasizes that women are a disadvantaged group in the world, in both material terms and in terms of a value system that favors men over women. A gender-sensitive perspective on IR investigates the inferior position of women in the international political and economic system, and analyses how our current ways of thinking about IR tend to disguise as well as reproduce a gender hierarchy. 3