Theory Matters Flashcards
who created the trichotomy of IPE theory
gilpin
explain trichotomy
- Three ideologies- positioned as equal, but competing views
* Self-contained, coherent approaches/explanations
what are the three ideologies from GIlpin
realism
liberalism
constructivism
what is realism also known as
statism, mercantilism
what is liberalism also known as
institutionalism
what is constructivism also known as
CRITCAL IPE , marxism, feminism, world systems theory and dependant theory, gramscian theory
what are the 3 critiques of the trichotomy
- Problematic ‘presentism’: Gilpin selected only ideas that dominant + influential during 70s
- Reproduces IR’s ills: Eurocentrism of IR theory (lacked representation in theory), and IR’s foundations in scholars’ attempts to maintain imperialist hierarchy
- Highly reductionist: ignores nuances + interpretations, how ideas changed over time
what is the main actor in statism
state
explain statism
- Anarchical environment: duty of each state to protect own state
- Policy made to support and maintain power- devising strategies to enhance short term economic bargaining power
- How one state seeks to impose national interest at expense of another (through bargaining- i.e. can be then applied to bargaining situations involving international trade, FDI, cross- border production
why did statism emerge
Emerged in the context of the expansion of European empires
• Friedrich LIst
• Overlooks List’s concern with balancing short- and long-term goals in economic planning
o National economy interest shaped by strategies, which are weighed up of long term
planning and short term gain
o Balanced through trade offs
o Employed through some protectionist policies-
limitations of statism (3)
• Short term focus (overlooking Lists’ long term),
o how economic planning coordinated and managed over time in accordance to different competing interests within a country
• Narrow focus on states as unit of actor, reductionist
• Methological nationalism- coherent states that stand over societies and act on them
o However states cant be assumed to have single national interest
o Governments have limitation as to the public support over certain policies
main actor of liberalism
individuals
- rational utility maximizing actors- through markets individuals maximize gains of society
o Pursuit of self interest through interest
o // removes constraints that don’t allow individuals to maximize interests (reduce state intervention)
why did liberalism emerge
as a critique of statist policies in the late 1800s, arguing that goal of self-sufficiency through empire had detrimental effects
• Argues states can cooperate for mutual gain (not entirely self-pleasing purposes)
• War emphasizes these ideas
o Design institutions that facilitate cooperation and remove statist policy
o Bretton woods
o Rolling back of government regulations
explain smiths input (and what was ignored) in liberalism theory
• Smith: ‘invisible hand’ = directive for contemporary economic governance
• but Smith not simply arguing for the transfer of authority from the state to the market
o But governments indispensable in running of markets – i.e. outlawing certain market-bound behaviours bc of their antisocial consequences
• Was not against gov but against corruption of gov
• ‘virtue of self command’
o Specialisation of labour has social benefits i.e. dividing production
• Need to act in socially acceptable ways + understand hardhip of others
• Cost- limit mental stimulation repeating task
Limitations
limitations of liberalism
- Ahistorical - always been markets but Global market is recent and not considered
- History of Political conflict that shape how markets form and function not considered
- Reductionist approach
main actors in critical ipe
Not discrete actors like states or individuals, more focus on class
why did critical IPE emerge
as a critique of Smith,
- Argues capitalist system structured around employers being able to extract more economic value out of their employees’ labour than what employers compensate employees for in wages (surplus value extraction)
explain what marx thought structure of production creates
production creates two classes: the owners of the means of production, the bourgeoisie (benefit through surplus value extraction), and the workers who sell their labour power to the bourgeoisie - proletariat (suffer through surplus value extraction)
limitations of critical IPE
- Neglects forms of social dominations that don’t rise from class structure- gender, racism
- Over emphasise coherence of class dominance: Not fractures within, but focuses on as dominant and clearly articulated interests
- Economic determinism- capital and class= central, obscure role of human agency
Explain world systems theory and dependancy theory
• Focus on development of some countries and persistent of poverty in others
o Consequences of early development
o Historical has shaped trajectory of both colonized and poor (exploitive relationships and their relevance of European empire in todays)
explain grampian theory
• Relative durability and legitimacy of capitalist system despite clear inequality
o How ideas and values of minority that’s benefiting from system become hegemonic
o Argued political dynamics of state were crucial in reproduction of system
o Class conflict important but capitalist continued to reproduce itself bc of political compromises bw different socialist interest
• Rise of social democracy = class compromise
o Need to redistribute gains for system to continue and become more equitable
what is feminist gpe
• GPE deeply implicated in daily life – linking the macro-structural with the micro-personal
o Experiences operate along class, gender and racial line
o Framework explicitly centred on human and social + no ‘economic’ value is socially untied or ‘gender neutral’
o Argues assumed ‘rationality’ and ‘gender neutrality’ of economic discourse is form of male-as-norm androcentricity
• Conventional IPE ‘retain a serious blind spot’ by continuing to focus on abstract entities such as states and firms, and ignores activities and fates of social groups, non-elite actors, and workers
example of feminist IPE
Southeast Asia
o Seems a success story of liberal ‘free’ market + impact of FDI
o Ignores gendered underpinnings of their economic growth in which multinationals deliberately construct and legitimizes gendered and racist inequalities (+ then benefit from them)
o Exploiting gendered divisions of labor in order to mobilize a supply of low cost female labor to work as productive operatives
• // not just economic presence but social
explain rational choice theory
approached based on assumptions of the utility-maximising behaviour
- Hyper rationalist- given policy type will always be selected because it reflects the generic enactment of self interest
- Trichotomy // pro-market ideology rational choice theory
- Feminist economics= direct opposite to rational choice approach // not easy incorporation into textbook GPE
