New York: Columbia University Press. The inescapable tension between general rules and specific actions ceaselessly casts up disputes which in turn generate arguments, which then reshape both rules and conduct. The logical chain from general norms to contestation is not long. Cooperation and Conflict, 54(1), 2543. This means that the absence of a central power over states produces a world of perpetual insecurity, or Hobbesian state of nature (see Realist International Relations Theory and The Military by Schmidt in this volume), with conflict and violence a constant possibility. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Prominent in this part of the literature was Finnemore and Sikkinks (1998) development of the norm life cycle whereby normative entrepreneurs (see also Nadelmann 1990) work to persuade states of the appropriateness of a new norm and serve as a catalyst for a cascade of new normative understandings. Tun, H. (2005). e. In international relations, constructivism is a social theory that asserts that significant aspects of international relations are shaped by ideational factors. Introduction: Ideational AlliesPsychology, Constructivism, and International Relations . While arguments remain about constructivisms ontological commitments and efforts to build a bridge between rationalist and reflectivist approaches, its relevance for military studies can be widely seen in terms of how it can broaden thinking about how to see and respond to other actors in terms of security and cooperation. In the attempt to understand when and where norms are likely to be efficacious, these authors stake out a position on the reasoning aboutreasoning through norms spectrum. Constructivists are often too fast and loose with the use of the term norm without a concomitant discussion of what the community of norm acceptors looks like and by what criteria we can identify a community of norm acceptors. Yet, the analytic choices made had consequences for how norms were understood and these initial conditions significantly shaped both constructivist analysis and the kind of critiques of norms research that subsequently emerged. New York: M. E. Sharpe. Discourse has power because language can shape how we view phenomena simple acts such as defining a conflict as one of terrorism, for example, then calls into effect a range of policy options associated with countering terrorism. Risse (2000) extended March and Olsens (1998) discussion of the relationship between the logics of consequences and appropriateness to a tripartite linking of three logics. European Journal of International Relations, 5(4), 435450. ), Handbook of military sciences (pp. (Ed.). Clearly this is a continuum because if agents were truly independent from or entirely dependent upon social structures, we would not be talking about constructivism. The constructivist focus on norms is important for understanding teleological aspects of its idea of international relations that ideas can change world politics (Hopf 1998). While constructivism has made significant inroads into IR theorizing, it does not mean that it is unproblematic or immune from criticism. Nonetheless, constructivist approaches to identity, norms, and ideas about the world and its social relations can impact understandings of what it means to be secure. This logic structured seminal empirical work that endeavored to show how ideational and normative factors could explain puzzles in world politics (e.g., Klotz 1995; Finnemore 1996). But some states refuse to do this, even if it is in their material interests to do so (see the example of neutral states in this chapter). One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman. Security institutions as agents of socialization? Contestation over variants of universal participation then had significant impact on the evolution of the universal participation norm and climate governance outcomes. They are thus animated entities that strengthen, weaken, and evolve. Global Affairs, 4, (45), 355362. Cooperation and Conflict, 49(4), 519535. Another topic that requires further consideration in future research is the relationship between intersubjective and subjective reality. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a single article for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice). John Dewey (1933/1998) is often cited as the philosophical founder of this approach. What was it all about after all? I also explored the growing body of constructivist . Essentialism believes that our identities are linked to a fixed, universal, innate 'essence'. The first is endogenous contestation actors that accept a general norm and are constituted by it nevertheless have different understandings of it or operationalize its strictures differently, leading to disputes and change in the meaning of the norm from within. The main two paradigms is the Realists and the Liberalist school of thoughts. Despite their position of material weakness, the Melians argued that freedom and justice are more important. International Organization, 48(2), 185214. Fierke, K. M., & Jrgensen, K. E. Ontological security in international relations. Social norms were conceived as aspects of social structure that emerged from the actions and beliefs of actors in specific communities and in turn norms shaped those actions and beliefs by constituting actors identities and interests. This was seen as a backward step and a challenge to the taboo norm that had developed over preceding decades. As states interact with other actors in the international system, their ideas and identity can change over time, which can produce a more dynamic understanding of international relations. Wiener (2004:198) warns us that studying norms as causes for behavior leaves situations of conflicting or changing meanings of norms analytically underestimated. Certainly norms exhibit stability, as they are recognizable by the common expectations that they structure but, paradoxically, norms are also in a constant state of dynamism and flux. The traditional theories (Idealism and Realism) had diverted all focus to state and Power. To gain acceptance and make the case that constructivist ideas mattered empirically, constructivists endeavored to demonstrate how their ideational perspective could provide superior understanding and explanation of political phenomena. In both cases, compliance with an international norm behaving in a way that matches the behavioral strictures of the norm is expressly theorized and variation in compliance is explained not by pitting constructivist and rationalist/materialist variables, but by examining processes by which domestic actors interpret and manipulate international and local norms. While constructivists know that social norms are always being reconstituted in the dynamic interplay of agents and social structures known as mutual constitution, social norms do elicit common behavioral expectations such that they are recognizable as relatively stable shared ideas. (1999). As Johnston (2001:494) clarifies, socialization is aimed at creating membership in a society where the intersubjective understandings of the society become taken for granted. These studies generally began from the perspective of a single, established norm and posited mechanisms (arguing, bargaining, persuading, and learning) for how the community of norm acceptors could be enlarged (Acharya 2004). To construct something is an act which brings into being a subject or object that otherwise would not exist. Critical methodology and constructivism. International Relations from a Social Perspective. Some constructivists stress reflection and consider that agents are able to reason about the various pulls on their possible behavior (either solely normative/ideational pulls or those in addition to material/strategic pulls). The dominant focus of traditional theories on state and distribution of . Constructivism in international relations: The politics of reality. Main Theorists. Focusing on these elements of normative dynamics led to progress in how constructivists understood conformance with normative strictures, the spread of existing norms, and the emergence of new norms. forthcoming). Rationalist critiques relate to constructivist methodology and epistemological claims. The compliance literature is most often concerned with the actions of actors (Japan in the Cortell and Davis piece or the Southeast Asian nations in Acharyas work) who have yet to accept or internalize international norms (financial liberalization and cooperative security/humanitarian intervention). It has major implications for an understanding of knowledge, including scientific knowledge, and how to achieve it. Roennfeldt, C. F. (2022). Issues such as those discussed immediately above raise the third criticism about constructivism, that "a weak or at least a controversial epistemology has become the basis for a strong pedagogic policy" (Phillips 1995, p. 11)).The primary influence underpinning much of the theoretical commitments of constructivist pedagogy was a highly influential paper written by Posner et al. An unnecessary war. ), Handbook of military sciences (pp. Constructivism, which reached the shores of IR in the 1980s, describes the dynamic, contingent and culturally based condition of the social world. All of this came about through processes of socialization and persuasion, where interested groups such as NGOs, epistemic communities, and other actors not only successfully changed the norm around the treatment of civilians and combatants in warfare but instigated this norm as part of identity, and how states define right behavior. A similar concern motivated Risse (2000) to draw on Habermass work with communicative action and propose a new behavioral logic that would inject agency and more purposive reflection into the process of social construction. There is considerable confusion in the field on what precisely constitutes social constructivism and what distinguishes it from other approaches to international relations.1 As a result, it has become fairly common to introduce constructivism as yet another substantive theory of international rela- This aspect of the literature is more focused on how actors understand the norms that constitute them and alternatively consider how actors that reason through norms can contest and reconstruct the norms that bind communities together. This chapter will concentrate on some of the main elements that have relevance for military studies. In military exercises with other nations, states share practices and ideas and in doing so, learn from each other. The images or other third party material in this chapter are included in the chapter's Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. Initial constructivist norm studies thus tended to focus on how behavior in a community coalesces around a norm or is reconstituted when a norm emerges. The rest of this section explores this distinction in greater detail, discussing the behavioral logics at the foundation of the about/through spectrum before examining the recent compliance and contestation literatures that are developing new ideas about norm dynamics. (2005). Structures and agents influence each other. Klotz (1995), for instance, chronicled how the anti-apartheid norm shaped the expectations and actions of the US towards South Africa in the 1980s. Post modernism is relatively new in international relations. Social Constructivism Summary Notes. Hagstrm, L., & Gustafsson, K. (2015). As Luke Glanville illustrates, while there were favorable conditions to ensure a successful R2P intervention (Gadaffi had made clear threats that evoked calls for genocide, the League of Arab States wanted international action and Libya had few allies), [E]ven those states that refused to endorse the resort to military forcerecognized the weight of the imperative to protect Libyan civilianseven if they disagreed over the means with which to do so (2016, p. 193). Yet the logic of appropriateness appears to cede the ground of purposeful, goal-oriented behavior to rationalist perspectives (whether it actually cedes this ground is an additional, and crucial question). Krahmann, E. (2018). 124). In P. J. Katzenstein (Ed. Constructivist International Relations theorists tend to use concepts of socially constructed identities, ideas and norms to empirically and analytically examine . But a constructivist reading of the Melian Dialogue (Lebow 2001) shows how ideas rather than material factors played a role in the decision of the Melians, even if the outcome was grim (Agius 2006). This chapter will explore what constructivism is, and its underlying claims and key influences, while comparing its core tenets to theories such as realism (see Realist International Relations Theory and The Military by Schmidt in this volume) and liberalism (see Liberal International Relations Theory and The Military by Silverstone in this volume). (Ed.). In the context of the global war on terror, US efforts to extract intelligence from suspected terrorists led to the use of enhanced interrogation techniques which was widely seen to have abrogated or contested the global prohibition on the use of torture (Steele 2008a; see also Birdsall (2016) who argues that it worked to strengthen the anti-torture norm). (1999). Zehfuss, M. (2002). - 51.75.65.162. They (2005:25) note, As domestic actors search about for new ideas to legitimate their self-interested preferences, the norms and institutions of the international system often provide them. While Cortell and Davis do not problematize the substance of the financial liberalization norm under examination, they do attend to a neglected aspect of norm dynamics the actions of those actors who are targeted for socialization. It is especially relevant and pertinent as a tool of criticism of widely held empirical and normative theories. The international system is defined by anarchy. The nuclear taboo is another example of a regulative norm (prescribing non-use), but it was also a constitutive norm (associating the taboo with the idea that civilized nations would not resort to using nuclear weapons) (Tannenwald 1999). This recent research speaks to and is driven by broader questions of conceptualizing the relationship between actors and norms whether actors reason through or about social norms. At the other end of the spectrum are constructivists who argue that agents reason through social structures. The goal of most norms-oriented studies in the initial wave of empirical constructivist work was to explain something about how world politics functions. Actors (usually powerful ones, like leaders and influential citizens) continually shape - and sometimes reshape - the very nature of international relations through their actions and interactions. Quintessentially, Finnemore and Sikkink (1998:914) noted the highly contingent and contested nature of normative change and normative influence in their examination of the norm life cycle. 2023 Springer Nature Switzerland AG. Doing so has opened up the field to bring in different explanations of global politics that can delve deeper into how culture and identity play a role in determining state interests. Steele, B. This paper's argument begins by assuming that constructivism is a contested concept. Having made the case that norms matter and having developed a number of theoretical frameworks to show how norms emerge, spread, and influence behavior, normsoriented constructivists have begun to turn their attention to a new set of questions. Norms, identity, and national security in Germany and Japan. Mearsheimer, J. J., & Walt, S. M. (2003). Even studies of norm emergence tended to treat the norms in question as relatively static one relatively fully formed norm is replaced by a new idea that becomes a norm. van Meegdenburg, H. (2019). Instead, practices are the result of inarticulate, practical knowledge that makes what is done appear self-evident or commensenical.. International Organization, 46(2), 391425. He considers that existing norms constrain the possibilities for action, but that different understandings of those norms inevitably arise in the community of norm acceptors. Abstract Social constructivism is not among the most popular theoretical approaches used in forecasting in International Relations. Initial constructivist studies of social norms generally clustered into three areas. Within this There is an implicit equivalence made between contestation that goes on within a normative community (generated by the gap between general rules and specific situations) and contestation that occurs between different normative communities (inevitable tension between norms). Only those with equal power could make such demands, and the Athenians make good on their threat to destroy the Melians, declaring that might is right and the weak suffer what they must (Thucydides 1951, pp. Finnemore, M., & Sikkink, K. (1998). It was a tool for constructivists to show that ideas, norms, and morals mattered vis--vis rationalist variables in explanations of world political phenomena. This suggests that there is something beyond the timeless wisdom of realism that offers only a tragic view of world politics that will never change. In addition to considering how the two types of norm dynamics are related, the current norms literature brings traditional open questions in constructivism into sharp relief. The translation requires interpretation a subjective understanding of the intersubjective context to decide on a behavior. Cham: Springer. (2008b). How militaries assess and interpret threat can be related to culture, intersubjective meanings, and social networks and understandings. Constructivism considers these interactions as a sociological process in which its agents and structures are centered in a reciprocal constitution; a part of society can not be understood without the other ones. Subsequently, states do what they can to secure themselves, which often means resorting to military force. 134). Tannenwald, N. (1999). The Pacific Review, 28(1), 122. And while the focus on norms is important, there is an overwhelming tendency to examine good norms theres often the assumption that norms are good or ethical without critically analyzing what makes them good and what they mean for international change (Erskine 2012; Kowert and Legro 1996). An example of this can be seen in the case of the International Criminal Court (ICC), which was created in 2002 to hear cases of war crimes. Norms and regulatory instruments around the use of PMSCs and in what capacity they are used have emerged with the view to regulating them (Percy 2016, p. 221). The Athenians demand that neutral Melos side with them against Sparta. As political processes such as the 2008 economic crisis in Europe and Brexit show, theorising a polity. (Eds.). Instead, norms are general principles that must be translated into specific actions (Gregg 2003). Wiener (2007) has advanced what she is calling a new logic of contestedness and has explored (2004) the dynamics of interpretation and contestation in European responses to the 2003 Iraq War. But Wendt also identified a Lockean culture that demonstrated some restraint in warfare and a Kantian culture that was guided more by cooperation (Wendt 1999). 23) and recognized as a medium of exchange for goods and services. Beginning with the assumption that actors reason about social norms means considering norms to be (at least somewhat) external to actors, part of their social context, but at least potentially manipulable by actors. Norms and identity in world politics. Anarchy is not a given of the international system. Treating norms as generic has been at the foundation of the recent shift towards the study of contestation. In the other mode, actors actively consider their normative context in an attempt to reason about the best (appropriate) course of action actors reasoning about social norms. Bjrkdahl, A. In A. M. Sookermany (Ed. But the nuclear issue is also important because it shows how competing ideas about norms co-exist or contrast for example, former US President Donald Trump tried to change the norm around the use of nuclear weapons, arguing for the ability to use low yield nuclear weapons and the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review returned to the idea that nuclear superiority mattered (Tannenwald 2018). Constructing international relations: The next generation. Berger, T. U. Holding social norms relatively constant in order to do this was deemed an acceptable trade-off. Printed from Oxford Research Encyclopedias, International Studies. About us. ), The culture of national security. Adler, E., & Barnett, M. The dominant belief about identities in our societies is essentialism. Constructivism has provided a broader approach to understanding international relations and security beyond rationalist frameworks. The initial empirical norms research tended to simplify normative dynamics to facilitate analysis and dialogue with competing perspectives, treating the norms that they analyzed as relatively static entities with relatively specific meanings and strictures. Rasmussen, M. V. (2005). Wiener (2004:191, 192) notes that this behavioralist approach operates with stable norms and is best suited to inferring and predicting behavior by referring to a particular category of norms that entail standards for behavior. While these studies unveiled how the norms they examined contributed to dynamic political processes, they tended to hold the norms themselves constant. Birdsall, A. General norms must be operationalized or translated into specific actions for specific situations. Koschut, S. (2014). To be specific, I navigated core tenets of constructivism in terms of its ontology, epistemology, and methodology, respectively. The analytic focus is shifting to the targets of socialization and the dynamic and agentic process whereby actors interact with their normative context. Tannenwald, N. (2018). Even among security communities such as the Nordic states, different strategic cultures can be found because they are informed by a range of historical and cultural experiences, with different experiences of war and conflict, membership of alliances, and other factors (see special issues of Cooperation and Conflict (2005) and Global Affairs (2018) for further discussions). Melos side with them against Sparta social networks and understandings Athenians demand that neutral Melos side them! 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