Rapid rise of Constructivism - Essay Example

Rise of Constructivism and its Relevance in the International Relations Introduction: The International Relations is one of the much debated andexercised arena within the domain of modern socio-political discourse as it has been witnessed by scholars, statesmen and common people that unless adequate developments can be initiated in this field, securing a better existence for the humankind might not be guaranteed. With the progress of human civilization, besides changes in socio-cultural outlook of common people towards their existence, the wide domain of international politics did undergo certain crucial changes that introduced radical change of approach regarding one nation’s approach to others, in terms of business, political relations and socio-economic activities. A chronological observation since the early part of evolution of the international law and germination of international relations would reveal the fact that the superior nations of the world have always attempted to receive a greater hold of the international political cosmos, mainly with the intention of gathering as much power as possible. During early days of modern international relations, the world followed multipolar political structure. Inception of the 20th century international politics observed a slow but gradual decline of power among powerful nations across the globe in the context of reflecting their respective approach towards colonialism; an overview of the entire international political scenario provides a picture where several nations have already emerged as potential rulers of the entire globe. Each of those powers, separately, produced their respective claims in the context of governing international politics, argued in favor of their respective status of regarding control of international trade, business affairs and in every such situation that prevented each of those powerful nations to attain their benefits to the best extent possible, they adopted quite an uncompromising approach to solve the issue. Clearly, emergence of the several powers within the domain of international political scenario, especially during the pre-World War II period resulted in continuous conflict of power and multipolar standard was followed till the end of Great War II. However, conflict of power and multipolar political structure gradually reveled only two powers, namely the United States and Soviet Union that were capacitated to continue their influence over international politics, irrespective of the cultural, political and economic crisis that they encountered during the World War II: “In the multipolar era, twelve great powers appeared on the scene at one time or another. At the beginning of World War II, seven remained; at its conclusion, two. Always before, as some states sank, others rose to take their place. World War II broke the pattern; for the first time in a world of sovereign state, bipolarity prevailed” (Waltz, 1994, p. 148). This overview was important in context of this discussion as it indicates the main reason behind asserting such a great deal of importance over Constructivism in the context of solving the problems of international relations. The politics of power has always played an important part in the international relations scenario. Aftermath the World War II, the United States and Soviet Union emerged as two most powerful nations in the international political scenario. Despite the fact that there was no explicit waging of war between these two superpowers, however, there was a tremendous undercurrent of political tension out the struggle to prove their respective supremacy in the international scenario, resulting in the Cold War; consequently, the power struggle also impacted international political stability especially among the developing nations. However, decline of the Soviet authority in the global political scenario not only ended Cold War but also established the United States as the supreme position, which according to the current observation is known as unipolarity. However, the shift of international political structure from multipolarity to bipolarity to unipolarity has resulted in political confusion across the globe and also affected the process of developing international relations considerably. The constructivist theoretical approach, as it has been opined by political scientists, is mainly aimed at “the relationship between agents and structures” and also has the capacity to address the issues “regarding the rise of sovereignty and the impact of human rights on states” (Barnett, p. 162), consequently it also has the capacity to initiate adequate steps so that the factor of developing international relations receives highest priority and important factors like national sovereignty as well as people’s rights are not disturbed. Constructivism: International Politics and its Growing Significance Aftermath the world emerged from the ashes of destruction of the Second World War, in order to give new hope to the entire humankind and with the benevolent intention of not to allow such disastrous incident plague human civilization again, several initiatives were taken, namely: formation of the United Nations, protection of human rights and adopting higher sensitivity to any such international affairs that might lead to a situation of war. Consequently, adoption of proper theoretical approach was also realized so that the principles of international relations can be oriented in accordance to the social harmony and human rights. Thus, “After World War II, realism became the dominant theory of international relations” (Reus-Smit, p. 213). Despite the fact that a number of arguments evolved against such theoretical approach regarding improvement of international relations over the foundation of realism, political scholars, during that point of time, could not find any other positive approach that would explain the flaws within the system. Realism failed to solve the problems associated with balance of power entirely and during 60s political turmoil, generated from the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union, clearly pointed out this aspect. Compared to this theoretical approach, Constructivism proved to be more advanced and situation oriented. Besides focusing over the essential aspects of realism, it also incorporated within its scope Idealism that is serious consideration of the “role of ideas in world politics”, and “holism or structuralism” (Barnett, p. 163). While the ideals of realism help in pointing out the actual situation of international political standards, ideas of political philosophy and structuralist interpretations help in the development of an empathetic mentality and also enhances the scope of orientation according to the changing situations. As it has been mentioned earlier that shift in the structure of international power politics resulted in considerable impact over international politics, its stability and improvement in the scenario of international relations, keeping harmony with that argument, and with adequate proof derived from the ongoing political situation across the globe, it can be said though unipolarity has been adopted by the international politics, however, the issues of international relations aimed at attaining international political stability, have not properly been addressed. The United States, being at the top of unipolar political structure, automatically receives the autonomous decision making power to exaggerate its arbitrary foreign policies in a biased manner. Thus, the balance of power has not been maintained, consequently, resulting in international disturbances such as frequent warfare, terrorist aggression and communal violence. Concentration of power in the hands of United States as well as its supporters has enhanced to such an extent that scope of political bias has enhanced and instead of adopting a tolerant attitude, line of discrimination between enmity and friendliness has become more poignant: “States act differently toward enemies than they do toward their friends because enemies are threatening and friends are not. Anarchy and the distribution of power are insufficient to tell us which is which. U.S. military power has a different significance for Canada than for Cuba, despite their similar "structural" positions, just as British missiles have a different significance for the United States than do Soviet missiles” (Wendt, 1992, p. 397). Thus, in order to harmonize such differences, political disputes and impediments to the development of international relations, sticking to any particular international political structure will not improve the situation. The international political arena can be viewed as a vast stage, where the nations are actors, searching for every possible means to acquire and enhance their respective political identity that would be “relatively stable, role-specific understandings and expectations about self” (Wendt, 1992, p. 398). However, quest for attaining such political identity can only be fulfilled by participating in … collective meanings” that “constitute structures which organize our actions” (Wendt, 1992, p. 398). States also retain their individual identities in the same way as that of an individual. In the process of searching for its political identity a state takes form of an institution, constructs its social and political norms by depending on its interests and knowledge gained during the process of such identity development. In the post Cold War era, collective knowledge helped both USA and Soviet Union to realize that quest to receive higher power than the other in the global politics is not helping either of them to prosper but the main obstacle in refining their mutual relationship was the institution of self-help that is “one of the various structures of identity and interest that may exist under anarchy” (Wendt, 1992, p. 399). Thus, self-help in need of respective prosperity and ensuring security from being evaded by other states led nations to an individualistic system, consecutively, cleared path for respective competition as individually each of the nations was thinking to retain highest rate of political benefit and the goal of “cooperative security system,” which voiced on behalf of sharing mutual responsibility in case of violating national security of one nation by the other, was largely been ignored (Wendt, 1992, p. 400-402). During the post Cold War period, end of political tension between the USA and Soviet Union provided great aspiration to the world that finally desired peace can be obtained. Quite on contrary, adoption of such individualized identity factor and emphasis over securing respective national territory and encouraging zero tolerance mentality regarding breach of individualized security policy directed the entire world to a situation of greater crisis. The end of Cold War was marked with apparent non-enmity between Soviet Union and USA but they never came under any explicit political mutuality term, suggesting that they would be friends and will strive for prosperity with mutual effort. Clearly, encouragement of individualized approach divided the entire global political structure in two halves: namely, supporters of Soviet Union and supporters of USA; each of the parties survived under the fear of being predated by the other. While the nations struggled for attaining respective identity and inter subjectivity, remaining under shadow of either USA or the Soviet Union, deprived them from fulfilling such desire. Such deprivation and political tumult that nations encountered during this period, are major reasons behind radical rise of constructivism as the most powerful political theory. Compared to the individualized approach, Constructivism “…would concentrate on how the expectations produced by behavior affect identities and interests. The process of creating institutions is one of internalizing new understandings of self and other, of acquiring new role identities, not just of creating external constraints on the behavior of exogenously constituted actors” (Wendt, 1992, p. 417). Constructivism, thus, acts as a bridge between the rationalist interpretations of international politics and poststructuralist perspective about international power system. During era of Cold War in 60s, it was clearly realized that distribution of power in terms of its desired expectation has remained unfulfilled. During the 80s, when the world was running under the high risk of witnessing a nuclear war (Fierke, p. 178), it was re-realized that the time has come to sort out a proper theoretical approach that would address the dispute regarding distribution of power and constructivism was the most positive solution to initiate the betterment of international relations: “Constructivism … has occupied a ‘middle ground’ between rationalist and poststructuralist approaches to IR” (Fierke, p. 183). However, the importance of four factors cannot be dined that accelerated the rise of constructivism as the most effective theoretical approach in handing the issues of international relations. First, initiative of the realists to reassert the realist rational; Second, end of the Cold War resulted in the decline of neo-realist and neo-liberal interpretations; Third, introduction of the new generation of political scholars, who wanted to find solution to the problems of international relations with assimilation of different theoretical approach and Fourth, repeated failure of the rationalist analysis to bring forth the expected results” (Reus-Smit, p. 219-220). Conclusion: While concluding, it can be said that distributing and balance of power has remained an issue of immense importance since the early days of modern political situation. Despite the fact that several political rational and structures have been adopted, however, none has been able to provide with the expected result in the context of bridging the gaps of international relations. The Constructivist approach has been more successful compared to the earlier ones as it encompasses various theoretical approaches within its scope and also provides sufficient opportunity to adopt flexible approaches in the when it comes to addressing the issue of international stability as well as betterment of international relations. Though the international political system is showing an inclination to shift toward the bipolar global political structure and there the risk of political instability, generated out of misdistribution of power is also quite prominent, Constructivist approach attempts to fill the gaps in the distribution of power and also provides the optimism for better international relations among nations. References Barnett, M. (). “Social Constructivism”. From the Study Material. Fierke, K.M. (). “Constructivism”. From the Study Material. Reus-Smit, C. (). “Constructivism”. From the Study Material. Waltz, K. N. (1994.) “The Emerging Structure of International Politics”. The international system after the collapse of the east-west order. Boston: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. Wendt, A. (1992). “Anarchy is what states make of it: the social construction of power politics”. International Organization, Vol. 46, No. 2 (Spring, 1992), pp. 391-425. Read More