CHAPTER-ONE

1.UNDERSTANDING INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS (IRs)
1.1. International Relations
• Also dubbed; Global Politics, World Politics,
International Politics.
• International relation is a relations between different
actors in the world
much more than relations among nation states
Includes international organization and groups.
at various levels, above and below the level of the
nation states.
1.2. Subject Matter of IRs
more difficult arriving at universally acceptable
definition of the subject.
Owing to transition following emerging
realities in the international system.
New possibilities are emerging everywhere,
some good and some bad.
Some attempts;
Trevor Taylor (1979) defines IRs as "a discipline
which tries to explain political activities across
state boundaries".
Ola Joseph (1999), “IRs is the study of all forms
of interactions that exist between members of
separate entities or nations within the
international system".
Seymon Brown (1988) define IRs as "the
investigating the patterns of action and reactions
among sovereign states as represented by their
governing elites."
 Some other scholars define IRs as the subject that
deals with those relations among nations, which
involve power status since they see power is the
key in international politics.
1.3. Issues that Studied by IR?
•Recently, some of the issues that preoccupy the
disciples are the following:
i) Dominant actors – traditionally this was the
sovereign state but the list now includes;
 transnational corporations (TNCs),
 international organizations,
 INGOs such as
 Amnesty International,
 new social movements like
international terrorist organizations.
 Empirical issues:-
distribution of military power,
arms control and crisis management,
globalization, global inequality,
identity politics and national fragmentation,
universal human rights culture,
migrations issues and the plight of forcefully
displaced peoples(IDPs and refugees),
gender issues, environmental conservation,
transnational crime and the global drugs trade.
 Ethical issues –
o just war- Proportionality (More Good than Evil
Results)
o the rights and wrongs of humanitarian
intervention,
o case for and against the global redistribution of
power and wealth.
o duties to nature to future generations
o respect for cultural differences and so forth.
1.4. Foundation of IR as a Field of Study
• Although historians, political philosophers have written
about international politics for many centuries, the formal
recognition of a separate discipline of IRs is usually
thought to have occurred at the end of the WWI with the
establishment of a Chair of IRs at the University of
Wales.
• IRs were studied before 1919, but there was no discipline
as such. Its subject matter was shared by a number of
older disciplines, including law, philosophy, economics,
politics and diplomatic history.
• Other Chairs followed in Britain and the United States.
• The intellectual question was the puzzle of how and why
the war began.
• The first scholars in the field were generally
agreed that the following three questions should
guide their new field of inquiry:
What were the main causes of the WWI, and
what was the old order that led national
governments into a war which resulted in
misery for millions?
What were the main lessons that could be
learned from the WWI?
On what basis could a new international order
be created?
1.5. Brief Sketch on Evolution of IRs.
• It is important to understand history in order to
understand global politics.
• Thus, understanding the history of international relations
can likely give us some insights about what to expect in
the future.
Precursor to Modern State System
• Of special importance for IR is the classical period of
Greek city states around 400 B.C., which exemplified
some of the fundamental principles of interstate power
politics.
• Thucydides classical account of the Peloponnesian
Wars b/n Athens and Sparta
• waged war against each other, formed
alliances, bargained over peace treaties, and
established trading relationships.
• By that time states were carrying out trade
relations and warfare with each other from
Mediterranean through India to East Asia.
• Much of this area came under Greek
influence with the conquest of Alexander the
Great(around 300 B.C), then under Roman
Empire(around A.D. 1), and then an Arab
empire((630–1258 C.E.).
Emergence of Modern State and the Contemporary
International System
•It was when the authority of the Catholic Church
questioned, that irs in Europe began to transform.
•Results;
ocity-states of northern Italy break from the
governance of the Catholic Church.
oItalian city-states such as Venice, Florence, and
Milan, established independent from papal authority,
governing their own internal and external affairs
without interference from a higher authority.
o Renaissance of the 15th and 16th centuries
reintroduced to Europe the classic Greek and
Roman concepts of justice, rights, and law.
o Protestant Reformation that challenged Catholic
authority.
• which brought to begun Thirty Years War
(1618-1648).
• There were several fluid alliances and treaties
during the war. Overall it is largely
considered as a struggle of German France,
Sweden, Denmark, England Protestant
against the power of the Holy Roman Empire
o Treaty of Westphalia(1668)
• Thirty Years’ War that is a devastating conflict that
set the stage for the birth of the modern state and
the contemporary international system.
• It was during this period that the modern
international system was created,
• Result of Peace of Westphalia:
 dividing line between a medieval Europe and a
modern Europe where states became recognized
as sovereign.
 The historical beginning of the modern
international system is usually identified with the
Peace of Westphalia.
 world as a system of nations that interact
according to a set of well-defined and long-
established rules. They call this system the
interstate system(The rules of the system govern
how nations treat each other).
It gave rise to some general ideas as the
condemnation of war and need for a new and
better order. These ideas later found resonance
in platforms like the League of Nations and the
United Nations.
• The age of imperialism brings thus, by the end of
the nineteenth century, European politics was
becoming global politics.
Why we study/worry about IRs?
 CHAPTER-TWO
CLASSICAL AND MODERN THEORIES
OF IRs
Introduction
Theories/ Paradigms-different set of assumptions
• Understanding theoretical perspectives in world politics is important for two
main reasons.
i) They are lens to look something;
o When you read about current events or the history of international
relations, Knowing what lens you are using and what alternative lens may
be available will help you better understand how you are interpreting the
facts and how facts may be seen in different ways.
ii) Allow to analyze global politics in the future;
o have the capability of analyzing international relations that have yet to
take place because new issues and events are always arising.. Thus, the
theoretical perspectives provide more long-lasting analytical tools.
• The prominent theories are realism, liberalism, neo-
Marxism, constructivism, and feminist perspectives.
• Each perspective has a different focus. It is not the case
that one perspective is clearly “right” and the other is
clearly “wrong”; all have something to contribute to our
understanding of world politics.
• One perspective, however, may be more appropriate than
others for certain parts of international relations or better
at explaining certain events.
• For instance liberalism they are good at explaining
non-state actors in international relations. Realism,
they are better at explaining war experience of the
world.
• Theories of international politics provide answers
of the following basic questions:
Why do actors do what they do in international
politics?
Who are the main actors in international politics?
What are the underlying factors that govern
relationships in global politics?
How have international relations changed or stayed
the same over the centuries?
What accounts for conflict and cooperation in
international politics?
 Classical Realism and Liberalism
Classical Realism
• They stress human nature as the factors that
shapes the world politics.
• They are pessimist about human nature in that
political struggle among humans is inevitable b/se
people have an inherent dark side.
• They trace their intellectual heritage to such
political philosophers as Thomas Hobbes(1588-
1679) who believed that human possess an
inherent urge to dominate.
• conflict and war are rooted in human nature.
• Thus, they see international politics as a perpetual
struggle for power/domination. The central
argument rests on the assumption that international
politics is driven by an endless struggle for power
which has its root in human nature.
It is human nature that explains why international
politics is necessarily power politics.
• Justice, law, and society have either no place or are
circumscribed.
• highly pessimistic with regard to the possibility of
any transformation of world politics.
• Machiavelli, Harry Carr , Hans. Morgenthau
were the most famous high priest of realism.
Neo Realism/Structural Realism
• While Neo-realists continue to acknowledge the
central importance of power, they tend to explain
events in terms of the structure of the international
system rather than the goals and make-up of
individual states.
• Unlike the classical Realists who trace the causes
of war to the innate human nature, the Neo realists
tend to explain international conflict within the
framework of the anarchic structure of the
international system.
• Structural Realism is most often associated with
Kenneth Waltz's landmark book, Theory of
International Politics(1979).
• Waltz's Structural Realism has had a major impact on
scholars in international relations. Waltz's popularity
emanates from his ringing assertion that the structure
of the international system decisively shapes the
behavior of the states.
• Anarchy-absence of a higher power over and
above the sovereign nation-states to ensure peace
among them is often viewed as synonymous to a
“state of war”. Or there is no overarching central
authority to enforce rules and norms or protect
the interests of the larger global community.
• According to Waltz: anarchy prevents states from
entering into co-operative agreements to end the
state of war.
• The structure of the international system is a major
determinant of state behavior
• nation-states as the principal actors in world
politics as they are answerable to no higher
political authority in the international system.
states are the basic actors in the international
system by arguing that the behavior of other
actors is conditioned and delimited by state
decisions and state power.
Though neo-realists recognize that international
democratic structures and liberal economics are
imperative to peace, security is stem from balancing
strategies based on sound military capabilities.
• State act to preserve in a balance of power in
the system.
State can balance its power in two ways;
i)Increasing their own power to the extent
ii) Alliance

• “Might makes right”- Balance of power for

self-help
• Classical Liberalism
• Liberal tradition generally takes a positive view of
human nature.
Liberals reject the notion that humans are
inherently political predators. Instead, humans
and their states are capable of achieving more
cooperative, less conflictual relations.
Liberals reject the Realist notion that war is the
natural condition of world politics.
• They trace their intellectual lineage writers of 18 th
century enlightenment and rationalism, such as the
French philosopher Montesquieu and the German
philosopher Immanuel Kant, argued that
individuals, and states as well, are not inherently
evil and can learn to live peacefully if good social
institutions are created around them.
In Kant’s word, peace can be perpetual. The law
of nature dictates harmony and cooperation
between people. War is therefore unnatural,
irrational, an artificial contrivance and not a
product of human nature.
 • warfare is the result of human folly or the
defective political systems of individual states.
• For liberals such as Schumpeter, war was the
product of the aggressive instincts of
unrepresentative elites.
• For liberals, thus, peace is the normal state of
affairs.
• Strong correlation among democracy and world
peace;
Thus, Liberals have a belief in progress and the perfectibility
of the human condition. Through their faith in the power of
human reason and the capacity of human beings to realize
their inner potential, they remain confident that the stain of
war can be removed from human experience
Neo Liberalism/Liberal Institutionalism
• Accept world is anarchic
Like neorealist, ascribe the world conflict largely to the
competition among sovereign states in anarchical
world system.
Realist view the world as a dangerous political
jungle filled with predators. Liberals also agree
that the jungle exist, but they believe can
construct a good zoo that can learn to live in
peace.
• Like all liberals, neoliberals believe that humans
can cooperate in order to achieve mutual benefits.
• Since they believe anarchic system hinder
cooperation, they further think that the
best way to achieve cooperation is to
build effective institutional organizations.
• Anarchy is mitigated by institutional
cooperation which brings higher level of
regularity and predictability in
international system.
• Institutions having the role of encouraging
cooperative habits, monitoring compliance
and sanctioning defectors.
• Think inside out looking
The projection of liberal-democratic principles to the
international realm is said to provide the best prospect
for a peaceful world order because ‘a world made up of
liberal democracies … should have much less incentive
for war, since all nations would reciprocally recognise
one another’s legitimacy’ (Fukuyama 1992: xx).
This approach is rejected by neo-realists who claim
that the moral aspirations of states are thwarted by the
absence of an overarching authority which regulates
their behavior towards each other.
• Whereas realism stresses great continuity in
international relations across the centuries,
contemporary liberalism sees great changes.
In particular, states and societies became so
interdependent by the second half of the twentieth
century that, according to liberalism, the way they
relate to each other changed in fundamental ways.
• They belief that the struggle for power could be
tamed by international law and the idea that the
pursuit of self interest could be replaced by the
shared objective of promoting security for all.
• “Right makes right”-cooperation is the right thing
to do so.
• Right-proper conduct, morally good, justice