scholarly journals Queer Youth on the Move: Gentrification and the International in Beijing

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 54-75
Author(s):  
Thomas Elias Siddall
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Research Program ◽  
Social Spaces ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Queer Youth ◽  
Queer Communities ◽  
Queer Spaces ◽  
Theory Research ◽  
Autobiographical Study

This article presents an autobiographical study of shifting queer formations in northeastern Beijing where the author participated in clubbing rituals and lived amongst members of Beijing’s queer communities. This resulted in a study of globalization and the Chinese state’s gentrification tactics which co-opt transgressive energy to infiltrate and dominate local queer spaces. Local and migrant queer bodies are using transnational means and techniques in claiming autonomy while continuously forming social spaces that subvert central power structures through affective power. These reterritorializations are then subject to global LGBT discourse, which uses gentrification of space as a form of constituting proper behaviour. Gentrification, as an international process, demands subversive energy and action in response, which ultimately defines queer youth as worthy of autonomy. These findings have research possibilities in developing Sino-queer migration within a post-positivist international relations and multiplex theory research program.

scholarly journals Imperial dialectics and epistemic mapping: From decolonisation to anti-Eurocentric IR

2019 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 419-442 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Murray
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Knowledge Production ◽  
Frantz Fanon ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Du Bois ◽  
Social Inquiry ◽  
Cultural Foundations ◽  
The World ◽  
Human Capability

What would it mean to construct a post-imperial discipline rather than a ‘post-Western’ one? ‘Post-imperial’ means addressing the ways in which colonial empires divided the world into separate realms of human capability and thought. The binary categories of Western and Eastern, or Western and non-Western, represent one such way of dividing the world according to an imperial imaginary. Rather than merely excluding, these divisions created justifications for local universalisms and power structures. Yet, many anti-Eurocentric scholars now make use of these categories in order to argue for fixed epistemic differences between Western and non-Western populations. Accordingly, I critique the imperial division of the world by drawing on the intellectual trajectories of two thinkers who struggled against empire in the 20th century: WEB Du Bois and Frantz Fanon. Du Bois and Fanon were both aware of how ethnic and cultural foundations for politics could reproduce imperial order, and, therefore, offer potential alternatives to Western/non-Western ontologies. This includes recognising that representations of difference are processual, determined by strategic necessity, and subject to incentives to represent difference within hierarchical institutions. This article builds on recent studies in International Relations and other disciplines to think through the legacies of empire in knowledge production, and to push towards more historical and relational approaches to world political and social inquiry.

Power Transition Theory and the Essence of Revisionism

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan M. DiCicco
Keyword(s):  
Research Program ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Transition Theory ◽  
Critical Examination ◽  
Power Transition ◽  
Power Transition Theory ◽  
The Status ◽  
Thucydides Trap ◽  
Distribution Of Power ◽  
Theory Research

Power transition theory and Graham Allison’s Thucydides Trap Project are discussed in tandem with two complementary aims: to highlight theoretical and empirical contributions of the power transition research program, and to provide critical perspective on the Thucydides Trap Project. Conventional-wisdom approaches of this sort are distinguished from power transition theory, the empirical international relations theory proposed by A. F. K. Organski and further articulated and tested by generations of scholars. The theory’s central elements—national power, stages of power transition, shifts in the distribution of power, international order and the status quo—are identified and discussed, with a focus on key variables used to explain war and peace among contending states. A comparative, critical examination of the Thucydides Trap Project is used as a lens for spotlighting key empirical contributions of the power transition theory research tradition and the value of adhering to norms of scientific rigor. Opportunities for further growth and development are noted, with special attention afforded to essential features of the power transition theory research program, including the study of (1) the timing and initiation of war; (2) rising powers’ dissatisfaction with the status quo, and a possible distinction between dissatisfaction and revisionism; and (3) reducing the risk of violent, revisionist challenges.

Poststructuralism and Security

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lene Hansen
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
International Relations ◽  
War On Terror ◽  
September 11 ◽  
Security Studies ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Important Work ◽  
Important Challenge ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
War Discourse

Poststructuralism is an International Relations (IR) theory that entered the domain of Security Studies during the Second Cold War. During this period, poststructuralists engaged with power, security, the militarization of the superpower relationship, and the dangers that the nuclear condition was believed to entail. Poststructuralism’s concern with power, structures, and the disciplining effects of knowledge seemed to resonate well with the main themes of classical realist Security Studies. At the same time, the discursive ontology and epistemology of poststructuralism set it apart not only from Strategic Studies, but from traditional peace researchers who insisted on “real world” material referents and objective conceptions of security. The unexpected end of the Cold War brought challenges as well as opportunities for poststructuralism. The most important challenge that arose was whether states needed enemies. The terrorist attacks of September 11 and “The War on Terror” also had a profound impact on poststructuralist discourse. First, poststructuralists held that “terrorism” and “terrorists” had no objective, material referent, but were signs that constituted a radical Other. They viewed the actions on September 11 as “terror,” “acts of war,” and “orchestrated,” rather than “accidents” committed by a few individuals. The construction of “terrorists” as “irrational” intersected with poststructuralist deconstructions of rational–irrational dichotomies that had also been central to Cold War discourse. These responses to “the War on Terror” demonstrated that poststructuralist theory still informs important work in Security Studies and that there are also crucial intersections between poststructuralism and other approaches in IR.

Hierarchy and International Relations: Theory and Evidence

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
David A. Lake
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Research Program ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
Defense Spending ◽  
Empirical Relationships ◽  
The Right

The literature on international hierarchy is emerging as a progressive research program. This new theory of international relations is generating novel propositions that are being empirically confirmed. Some propositions, like the hierarchical peace, provide new explanations for previously identified phenomena. Other propositions on defense spending, crisis joining,e trade, and civil wars and repression establish new empirical relationships that—if they are not actually inconsistent with existing theories—were not previously identified. If the measure of progress is the uncovering of new facts, the new hierarchy studies are clearly moving in the right direction. Further progress requires more and better measures of hierarchy and continued testing of propositions derived from the theory.

The emergence and evolution of International Relations studies in postcolonial South Korea

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Jungmin Seo ◽  
Young Chul Cho
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
South Korea ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Colonial Mentality ◽  
South Korean ◽  
Current State ◽  
Japanese Colonial ◽  
Colonial Legacies

Abstract This study investigates how International Relations (IR) as an academic discipline emerged and evolved in South Korea, focusing on the country's peculiar colonial and postcolonial experiences. In the process, it examines why South Korean IR has been so state-centric and positivist (American-centric), while also disclosing the ways in which international history has shaped the current state of IR in South Korea, institutionally and intellectually. It is argued that IR intellectuals in South Korea have largely reflected the political arrangement of their time, rather than demonstrate academic independence or leadership for its government and/or civil society, as they have navigated difficult power structures in world politics. Related to this, it reveals South Korean IR's twisted postcoloniality, which is the absence – or weakness – of non-Western Japanese colonial legacies in its knowledge production/system, while its embracing the West/America as an ideal and better model of modernity for South Korea's security and development. It also reveals that South Korean IR's recent quest for building a Korean School of IR to overcome its Western dependency appears to be in operation within a colonial mentality towards mainstream American IR.

scholarly journals Theories of international regimes

1987 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
pp. 491-517 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephan Haggard ◽  
Beth A. Simmons
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Research Program ◽  
Critical Review ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
International Regimes ◽  
Major Focus ◽  
Systemic Theory ◽  
Major Shortcoming ◽  
Game Theoretic ◽  
Over Time

Over the last decade, international regimes have become a major focus of empirical research and theoretical debate within international relations. This article provides a critical review of this literature. We survey contending definitions of regimes and suggest dimensions along which regimes vary over time or across cases; these dimensions might be used to operationalize “regime change.” We then examine four approaches to regime analysis: structural, game-theoretic, functional, and cognitive. We conclude that the major shortcoming of the regimes literature is its failure to incorporate domestic politics adequately. We suggest a research program that begins with the central insights of the interdependence literature which have been ignored in the effort to construct “systemic” theory.

The search for dialogue as a hindrance to understanding: practices as inter-paradigmatic research program

2014 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erik Ringmar
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Research Program ◽  
Theoretical Basis ◽  
Recent Article

In a recent article Emanuel Adler and Vincent Pouliot argued that attention to ‘practices’ could help IR scholars overcome ontological gaps and provide a new basis, on which the discipline could be established. Four such dichotomies are particularly salient: between the material and the meaningful, the rational and the practical, between agencies and structures, and between the forces of stability and of change. By failing to provide a theoretical basis for a synthesis, however, this project will fail. What a ‘practice’ is, and how ontological gaps should be understood, cannot be determined outside of the context of a theory. The article reviews theoretical attempts to deal with the dichotomies Adler and Pouliot identified and investigates the role of practices in the study of international relations.

The Constructive Turn in International Relations Theory

1998 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 324-348 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey T. Checkel
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Social Structure ◽  
Research Program ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
Methodological Individualism ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
Substantive Theory ◽  
Change Over Time ◽  
Productive Research ◽  
Over Time

In recent years, constructivist thinking about global politics has brought a breath of fresh auto international relations. By exploring questions of identity and interest, constructivist scholars have articulated an important corrective to the methodological individualism and materialism that have come to dominate much of IR. As the books under review indicate, constructivism has also succeeded in demonstrating its empirical value—documenting a new and important causal role for norms and social structure in global politics. Theoretically, however, the approach remains underspecified. In particular, constructivists typically fail to explain the origins of such structures, how they change over time, how their effects vary cross nationally, or the mechanisms through which they constitute states and individuals. Missing is the substantive theory and attention to agency that will provide answers to such puzzles, as well as ensure the development of a productive research program.

A Realist critique of the English School

2003 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 427-441 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dale Copeland
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Society ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
English School ◽  
Ir Theory ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Realist Theory ◽  
The Past ◽  
Middle Way ◽  
Material Power

Over the past decade, the English School of International Relations (IR) has made a remarkable resurgence. Countless articles and papers have been written on the School. Some of these works have been critical, but most have applauded the School's efforts to provide a fruitful ‘middle way’ for IR theory, one that avoids the extremes of either an unnecessarily pessimistic realism or a naively optimistic idealism. At the heart of this via media is the idea that, in many periods of history, states exist within an international society of shared rules and norms that conditions their behaviour in ways that could not be predicted by looking at material power structures alone. I f the English School (ES) is correct that states often follow these rules and norms even when their power positions and security interests dictate alternative policies, then American realist theory – a theory that focuses on power and security drives as primary causal forces in global politics – has been dealt a potentially serious blow.

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