Wednesday, February 20, 2019

Do critical approaches Marxism, feminism, constructivism improve our understanding of international politics?

AbstractIn the contemporary era, the application of critical theoretic approaches is of signifi tint importance if one is willing to develop a more(prenominal) comprehensive understanding of worldwide governance and internationalist social intercourses. Theoretical approaches, much(prenominal) as Marxism, Constructivism and Feminism cannot alone provide such(prenominal) an understanding, but their overlap and can significantly return to our increased cognisance of world-wide inequalities and the dimensions in which they occur by placing emphasis in not lone(prenominal) on the relationship among the structure and delegation, but likewise oppugn their rattling personality and scrutinised the normative codes which guide human agency. patronage some of the limitations which the theories arouse, their complementary use can be used successfully in cab aret to gain a more critical situation on the nature of world governance.IntroductionIn the contemporary era, the appli cation of critical speculative approaches is of significant importance if one is willing to develop a more comprehensive understanding of international politics and international relations. As this shew will demonstrate, although approaches such as Marxism, Constructivism and Feminism cannot alone provide such an understanding, their complementary use can significantly contribute to our increased awareness of global inequalities and the dimensions in which they occur.MarxismThe impact of Marxist theory on the developing of critical theorising in international politics is one the significance of which can hardly be denied. Despite this, Marxist theorist impart a great deal been accused of not taking into account factors such as nationalism, as well as the balance of power among states in order to father and structure world politics (Linklater, 2013). to a greater extentover, Marxist theories in the late mid-seventies and early 1980s found it increasingly difficult to devise an analytical framework for explaining the relationship of nation-states and violence in period of increased globalisation, characterised by increased national fragmentation, as well the resurgence of crimson conflicts found on ethnicity (Giddens, 1985). This can the attributed to the inability of traditionalistic Marxist thought to transmit beyond theorising about the significance of class conflict and the importance of affectionate relations in terms of modes of proceeds. Despite this flaw, more contemporary neo-Marxist theorists have attempted to revitalise this critical approach by placing emphasis on the relationships between states, markets and the capitalist world economy in the era of globalisation (Teschke, 2003 Halliday, 1994 Rosenberg, 1994 Gamble, 1999). The application of Marxist thought has increasingly drawn attention to the fuss of global discrepancy which the capitalist system has led to (Wallerstein, 1979 Thomas, 1999 Linklater, 2013). Thus, the importance o f modes of production have successfully been utilised in order to challenge the economic discrepancy, which is characteristic of contemporary world markets and question the power relationships which exist between states on the international level. Being mainly preoccupied with material personnel casualty and distinction, however, Marxism has failed to take into account the norms and values which governance the structures of economics and politics, a question which has preoccupied constructivist theories of international relations.ConstructivismBy contrast to Marxism, Constructivism places emphasis not only on the importance of material structures, but as well as the normative dimension which is associated with it, as well the importance of identity establishment and reflexion (Price and Reus-Smit, 1998). Thus, constructivism attempts to remedy the Marxists neglect of the importance of agency and its relationship to structure in the process of devising and implementing decisions related to international politics and relations among states in the era of globalisation (Reus-Smit, 2008).Therefore, Constructivism is complimentary to some(prenominal) more traditional approaches of theorising about international politics, such as Rationalism, as well as more critical approaches such as Marxism (Reus-Smit, 2013). More importantly, the significance of human agency is not deprived from the structure which determines the manifestation of the actors interests in fact it calls for the critical evaluation of the transfer norms which are the mediator between structure and agency. This can be of goodly advantage of understanding the contemporary global inequalities which exists, between countries from the Third earth and post-industrialist Western states, as it will question not only the quick states of affairs in international politics, but likewise the moral dimensions of the reason behind it. By placing emphasis on the learning of normative frameworks which ar e used as guides and rationale for the implementation of specific decisions in relation to international politics, Constructivism can successfully scrutinise and moralise the power discrepancy among states and if used alongside neo-Marxist theories it can question twain structure and agency. What both fail to take into account, however, is that agency in the era of global inequality also has a specific dimension, a problem which is addressed by Feminism.FeminismBy contrast to both Marxism and Constructivism, feminist theories of international politics and international relations took prominence only in the early 1990s, though their impact for the development of the academic disciplines has been considerable (True, 2003). Feminism as an gifted tradition questioned the very nature of the agency which had an impact on the development of international politics and introduced in the notion of sexual activity as an verifiable category and analytical tool through which global inequali ty and mismatched power distribution could be understood (True, 2013). Thus, Feminism, alongside Constructivism could be considered as a major breakthrough as both of them questioned the more traditional discourse of power relations and moved beyond the singular taper on inter-state relations that characterised more traditional theories in the field of planetary Relations (ibid.). womens rightist thought has attracted attention to the specific dimensions of global inequality, resulting from the version of economic world markets. In fact, it has been suggested that the process of globalisation has increased the inequality between men and women worldwide, ultimately resulting in a feminisation of leanness (Chant, 2007 Chant, 2008). The increased emphasis on export and outsourcing reflecting the priorities of the global financial markets, have disproportionately affected women (Marchand and Runyan 2010). This rise in inequality and insecurity is also linked to the development of violent conflicts in states where inequality between genders is laid-back (Goldstein, 2003). On the other hand, gender equality in states is said to crop the likelihood of the use of violence in intra-state disputes (Caprioli, 2005 Caprioli and Boyer, 2001). Therefore, it could be argued that the use of more critical perspectives in theorising about international politics could significantly contribute to our understanding of global politics and could potentially results in less violent conflicts in the future if emphasis is placed on the reduction of global inequality and its gendered dimension.ConclusionAs this essay has demonstrated, the critical theories of Marxism, Constructivism and Feminism could barely our understanding of the nature of global inequalities by placing emphasis in not only on the relationship between the structure and agency, but also question their very nature and scrutinised the normative codes which guide human agency. Despite some of the limitations wh ich these theories have, their complementary use can be used successfully in order to gain a more critical perspective on the nature of world governance.BibliographyCaprioli, M. (2005). 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