International Relations discussion 2 - Essay Example

INTERNATIONAL RELATION …………………. College/ ………….. …………. Answer to question Out of the major three internationalrelation theories namely Realism, Liberalism and Radicalism, Liberalism seems to present best understandings of the international relations, because, it maintains faith in human development and it believes that democracy leads to peaceful relations. Though there are nations that seem to behave with selfish or being motivated with self interest towards using their power to dominate on others, the fact that some nations maintain stronger healthier relationship with other nations in terms of political, economic and social matters can never be ignored (Russett, Starr, and Kinsella 2009).

Realism and Radicalism seem to provide relatively less effective framework for a better understanding of international systems, because Realism perceives role of selfishness and self interested to dominate on others. As far as Radicalism or Marxism is concerned, it also keeps almost same view that people are motivated by self-interest. Answer to question- 2 Domestic factors like goals and objectives, national interest and priorities, societal influence etc play significant roles in the implementation of the foreign policy.

The objective of the foreign policy can be perceived to be a future vision. Who get involved in the foreign policy and analyzing societal influences on it are also highly important factors in determining the foreign policy. Similarly, structure of the government, mainly in relation to finding whether it maintains openness, how are the people in that country and how are the prevailing political and strategic culture also determine the foreign policy (Russett, Starr, and Kinsella 2009). Answer to question-3 Nationalism is psychological, cultural and social forces that influence the formation of a nation.

We-feeling, common territory and common economic activities are some of the major tools of nationalism. For instance, we feeling provides a feeling or identification of loyalty to a particular group of people and common territory is a territory that people live and interact in the same area as they face almost similar issues and challenges. Engaging in same kind of activities, as referred by common economic activities, also forms to be a tool of nationalism. Out of these three tools of nationalism, we-feeling seems to be most influential as it forms a nationalization in which people feel an identification to some group of people (Russett, Starr, and Kinsella 2009).

Answer to question-4 When it comes to the international political relation, the recent issues of earthquake, Tsunami and atomic explosion in Japan make it clear that countries like China and Korea should go in hand with ‘soft power’ relation with Japan. Soft power is the ability of a country to shape the preference of others. Community based policing and friendly relation making are some of the significant elements of using soft power to influence a country (Nye Jr, 2004). He (2004) also stressed that attractive personality, culture, political values, institutional relation and related policies can be considered as intangible assets that can establish preferences having moral authority to influence others.

References Nye Jr, 2004, The benefits of sot power, Harvard/ Working Knowledge, retrieved from http://hbswk.hbs.edu/archive/4290.html Russett, B, Starr, H and Kinsella, D (2009), World Politics: The Menu for Choice, Ninth revised edition, Cengage Learning