Lecture 9: Structure and Agency in IR

Question 1

What is International Relations?

Answer 1

~ social science
~ subdiscipline of political science
~ focused on explaining and understanding: the relations between states in the international system, the cross-border movements of people, money, goods and services, violence, ideas, and norms, how asymmetries of power between and among states and non-state actors that determine who gets what and under what conditions

Question 2

Why do explanations matter in IR?

Answer 2

We want to generate accurate and useful knowledge of the world, and explanations we give have real-world consequences

Question 3

DN model

Answer 3

Social laws are very different to observe in practice, so the DN model is uncommon in practice (at least how Hempel envisions it)
~ search/desire for generalizable explanation still governs much of IR research

Question 4

Teleological/functional explanation

Answer 4

Sometimes used, but functional explanations of things are often rejected as “just-so” stories
~ ex. institutions

Question 5

Probabilistic explanation

Answer 5

Used, but with the goal of causal inference

Question 6

Causal explanation

Answer 6

Most common?
~ interventionist account of causation is implicit in statistical modeling and comparative methods of causal inference
~ many calls for explanation to include “mechanisms” (inferring causation is not enough, must be observed directly)

Question 7

Non-causal explanation

Answer 7

Past: interpretation and explanation taken to be different things
Today: more open to the idea that an interpretation can be an explanation and that all explanations are also (one of multiple possible) interpretations

Question 8

What kinds of structures has IR as a field historically emphasized?

Answer 8

~ the structure of the international system described in terms of the distribution of power among states (neorealism/anarchy, world systems theory/hierarchy divided along the lines of economic class)
~ institutions (routinized patterns of interaction among units)
~ economic structures/class (whose income derives from capital v. labor)
~ norms (what is it appropriate to do?)
~ identities (how does an “us” define themselves, especially in relation to a “them”)
~ ideologies (white supremacy, patriarchy, colonialism, etc.)