Studying IR Through Culture and Emotion Flashcards
How do emotions influence IR at collective and individual levels? Give examples
Emotions can be influential at collective levels as the actions of a state can be reflecting national mood and feeling eg. post 9/11 WoT, Japanese and German post-war guilt
Individual emotions can also be influential in guiding actions of states as leaders play important role eg. Putin’s war, Hussein etc.
What is the Neorealist perspective on the study of emotions in IR?
Neorealist thought dominates IR, believing that states are rational actors whose behaviours can be assessed scientifically. Emotions are immaterial, balances of power and capabilities are the most important things to assess instead.
What are agents in IR? What do Neorealists believe about their power?
Agents are actors in a system, in IR’s case the international system. Neorealists believe that these agents have limited power, instead being controlled largely by the system.
What is affect?
Affect is an instinctive, unconscious and natural response to a situation. It occurs beyond emotions.
How does affect differ from an emotion?
Affects occur unconsciously, whereas emotions are considered and aware responses to an event or situation.
How can emotions be shared?
Emotions can be shared when they are forged by collective experiences that impact a group.
What challenges exist in studying emotions in IR?
It is complicated to quantify and reason about emotions when so much of IR is a rational, positivist discipline. They can also be seen as independent variables (what we change) and dependent variables (what we observe), as well as normative structures.
Why is culture significant to the study of IR? Give examples
Culture is significant to the study of IR because it allows us to understand the values that people have and how these values shape the decisions taken by agents. Difference in cultural values between West and non-West. West values individual liberties and freedoms, whereas non-West is more authoritarian in many ways.
What challenges face the West in its attempts to understand the impact of culture on IR?
The West largely has a form of tunnel vision in its study of cultures, seeing the whole world through its own cultural paradigm rather than other cultures. Sees the world how it wishes it to be, not as it is.
What are the 3 ways in which emotions can become shared by people to be collective emotions?
Emotions can either CONVERGE on groups naturally, gradually building up into a cohesive emotional feeling OR be involuntarily spread through CONTAGION OR be imposed through social structures or governments to create compliance (GOVERNANCE)
What are affective dispositions? What is their importance to state behaviour according to Eznack?
Affective dispositions are longer term expressions of emotion that are influenced by emotional reactions. Affective dispositions impact how states behave towards each other, with a more positive affective disposition likely to cause more genial relations and reactions towards another state.
What example is given of where strong affective dispositions limit the anger expressed by one state towards another? What example is there of negative dispositions leading to strong anger being expressed?
Strong affective dispositions limited the American anger towards the UK for their military intervention in Egypt during the Suez crisis, although this anger was still displayed. However, this restraint was not shown by the US when the USSR invaded Afghanistan in 1979 against the US’s wishes.
What is image theory? How does this link to Constructivist thinking?
Image theory believes states have particular assessments (images) of other states, and will behave differently depending on whether that image is one of an ally or an enemy. This links to Constructivist thought, that believes states behave towards each other on the basis of the identities they each hold.
How does Jonathan Mercer argue that emotions are fundamentally rational in IR - linking to the rational actor paradigm yet disagreeing with what Realists believe?
Emotions are in fact what guides us towards our self-interest, and rationality is the pursuit of our interests. Therefore, why is it seen as an error or aberration by Realists that people will follow their emotions in IR?
How do Janis and Mann see emotions interfering with rational thought in IR?
Janis and Mann believe that emotions create mistakes when acted upon in IR - hence they are not fitting within the ‘rational actor’ paradigm of IR scholarship.
