Constructivism

Question 1

What does constructivisim say about the international system?

Answer 1

things we consider as fundamental truths about the international system have been constructed over time

Question 2

human interaction is shaped by _________ not just material ones

Answer 2

ideational factors

Question 3

ideational factors become _______ over time within society

Answer 3

concretized

Question 4

once ideational factors become concretized what happens?

Answer 4

they are collectively held and people begin to take them to be objective truths

Question 5

What does constructivism say about realities?

Answer 5

they are constructed

Question 6

Where does constructivism draw insights from?

Answer 6

draws insights from sociology and psychology, not economics

Question 7

T or F: anarchy is not constructed

Answer 7

false

Question 8

What are some examples of constructed realities?

Answer 8

-money, sovereignty, rights

Question 9

What does the idea of a constructed reality mean?

Answer 9

means that they have no material reality but exist because people believe they exist and act accordingly

Question 10

Collective understandings have ________

Answer 10

causal power

Question 11

What does having causal power mean for collective understanding?

Answer 11

it means that they can shape IR outcomes

-this can cause us to overlook the fact that theu have no existence

Question 12

constructivism is a general theory of _________

Answer 12

social life and social change

Question 13

In addition to being a general theory, what other kind of theory is constructivism?

Answer 13

a critical theory

Question 14

What does constructivism seek to explain/reveal?

Answer 14

how IR has been shaped by things we take for granted have actually been developed

Question 15

Constructivists argue that norms play a key role in __________

Answer 15

shaping our perceptions and behaviours

Question 16

What are norms shaped by?

Answer 16

powerful social, political, and cultural actors

Question 17

T or F: norms evolve over time

Answer 17

true

Question 18

Desscribe human rights as a norm generally

Answer 18

• relatively new in human history
• 1948 Universal Declaration of human Rights laid out a set of definitions of rights
• rights of ethnic, racial, religious minorities, women, children are increasingly respected
• idea of rights has become more powerful and more widely-shared

Question 19

Who works to reshape existing norms?

Answer 19

“norm entrepreneurs”

Question 20

describe slavery as a norm

Answer 20

• African slavery was an important component of European colonial economies
• Britain abolished slavery in 1833, US abolished slavery in 1865, Brazil abolished in 1888: the norms started to change
• quasi-slavery persisted in colonial Africa well into the 20th century
• today, racial and ethical ideas that supported slavery are widely repudiated
• racism has morphed to take other forms
• this is an example of norms changing drastically and influencing international and domestic politics overtime

Question 21

describe women’s suffrage as a norm

Answer 21

• 1893: New Zealand grants women full voting rights
• 2005: Kuwait grants women limited voting rights
• ideas that we have come to take for granted have been the results of long struggle
• norms were spread
• outliers are shamed

Question 22

Who is the constructivist scholar we studied?

Answer 22

Wendt

Question 23

How is Knowledge constituted?

Answer 23

• post-modernists have argued that what we consider to be knowledge is shaped by “truth claims” made by powerful actors
• “history is written by the victors”–this shapes what we know
• power relations are reflected, enacted, and reified

Question 24

define structure

Answer 24

the configuration of the global system, anarchy, distribution of power

Question 25

define process

Answer 25

interaction and learning between and within states that gradually gives rise to new modes of behaviour, new norms

Question 26

define exogenous

Answer 26

defined by outside

Question 27

define endogenous

Answer 27

defined from within

Question 28

identity and interest are _______

Answer 28

fluid, dynamic, and endogenous

Question 29

for constructivists, identities and collective cognitions are ___________

Answer 29

“mutually constitutive”

Question 30

Institutions as “structures” built of _________

Answer 30

identities and interests

Question 31

actors are socialized to participate in ______ and to buy into ________

Answer 31

institutions and buy into a collective knowledge

Question 32

institutions “do not exist ______________”

Answer 32

apart from actors’ ideas about how the world works

Question 33

“self-help” world due to ______, not structure

Answer 33

process

Question 34

self-help and power politics are ________, not essential features of anarchy

Answer 34

institutions

Question 35

interstate relations are intersubjectively constituted, which means they are _________

Answer 35

based on conceptions of self and other

Question 36

where does identity always exist?

Answer 36

within a specific, socially-constructed world?

Question 37

state behaviour is what?

Answer 37

social interaction

Question 38

anarchy is a what process?

Answer 38

interactive process between two subjects

Question 39

What is an example of intersubjectivity between states?

Answer 39

states act defensivley, prepare for the worst, distrust each other

• other states then conform to these assumptions
• these interactions create a self-fulfilling prophecy

Question 40

Is identity fixed?

Answer 40

no, it’s defined in relation to others and historically contingent

Question 41

Identity is ________

Answer 41

mutually constituted

Question 42

what is an example of identity being intersubective?

Answer 42

during the Cold War, to be American was not to be soviet, to be capitalist meant to not be communist, to be democratic meant to not be authoritarian

Question 43

states identities and interests are _______

Answer 43

endogenous, as they are shaped through interaction

Question 44

is constructivism a bottom-up or top-down view?

Answer 44

bottom-up

Question 45

constructivists argue that states can create community by ______

Answer 45

uniting around common goals and interests

Question 46

What do realists argue about community?

Answer 46

that states will form coalitions or alliances out of convenience and that true “community” is impossible