POSC International Relations
I need an explanation for this Political Science question to help me study.
Instructions: For this assignment, write at least two paragraphs for each answer, and don’t be shy about writing a page or so each if you feel necessary. Feel free to note in one answer that you covered a point further in another answer if you did so. For example, if discussing institutions in answer two, you might find yourself writing something like, “For more on how institutions do X, see answer no. 1.”
Citations are required. Only use the reading assigned, DO NOT DO NOT use any outside sources. Also, DO NOT use the internet by any means. Please.
1) How do institutions (IGOs) help states to overcome the barriers to cooperation? How do states come to integrate conformity with institutional imperatives into their interests and everyday behavior? You answer to the first part should draw most heavily from Sterling-Folker’s essay, while the second part is addressed most directly by Ikenberry. Ideally, you will be able to use both authors to some degree in answering both parts of the question.
2) Explain why liberals believe that democracies contribute to world peace. Connect democratic peace theory with Russett’s overall analysis of how policymakers can use liberal ideas to make the world more peaceful. How much do liberals assume that their prescriptions for peace rely on states acting in a way that puts other states’ interests ahead of their own? (This entire question is based only on Russett’s chapter.)
3) Explain how Ikenberry critiques realism. Focus on the way he uses constitutionalism to critique the anarchy/hierarchy dichotomy that Waltz laid out in his theory. You should cite Waltz as part of your answer.
4) Summarize Legro’s theory of how foreign policy ideas change, and use it to explain the transition from Obama to Trump. How would Sterling-Folker account for any continuties that might exist? NOTE: This question assumes you know only the basics about US foreign policy, nothing detailed or too specific. Any student taking an upper level course in international relations can be expected to know something about how the foreign policy approaches of Obama and Trump differ. Even so, this question is asking you to explain and focus primarily on the relevant portions of the LEGRO book.
5) One early constructivist scholar argued that neorealism and neoliberalism were fundamentally the same due to their complete focus on the materialist basis of national interests, and that this limited focus biased their analyses and led them to make some erroneous arguments. (Sterling-Folker wrote about this as well, although as a neoliberal, she did not share the belief that materialist assumptions led to faulty analyses.) How do constructivists argue that states really do pursue the “national interest” but that neorealists and neoliberals are nevertheless wrong in the way they conceptualize what the national interest actually is? In other words, how do constructivists conceptualize and define the national interest while insisting that it is not logically dependent on material interests in quite the way that neorealists and neoliberals argue? Note that constructivists DO believe that material interests are and always have been central to how states think about the national interest–and this fact is not inconsistent with the premise of the question or constructivist theory. Your answer should reference Legro, Sterling-Folker, Fierke (especially), and Mearsheimer.
Texts you will need to answer these questions:
1) Robert O. Keohane, ed., Neorealism and Its Critics (Keohane)
2) Jeffrey Legro, Rethinking the World (Legro)
3) John G. Ikenberry, After Victory (Ikenberry)
4)Dunne, et. al., International Relations Theories, 4th edition (Reader)
You can get them for free here: http://gen.lib.rus.ec
After Victory (Ikenberry): http://93.174.95.29/main/595DBCF0730F3E90D8ADCC2E86C81D90
Neorealism and its Critics (Keohane): http://gen.lib.rus.ec/search.php?req=Robert+O.+Keohane%2C+ed.%2C+Neorealism+and+Its+Critics+%28Keohane%29&open=0&res=25&view=simple&phrase=1&column=def
Dunne International Relations Theories: http://93.174.95.29/main/82103931DDDFE6451D574CCFA…
Mearshimer, Sterling-Folker, Gierke and Russett are all featured in Dunne’s International Relations Theories book.
