Realism has a long history of being debated and is often referred to as part of the ''first great debate” within international politics. Realism is seen as a direct response to idealism and is also heavily criticised for being overly simplistic and somewhat irrelevant to modern world politics. However, like all theories of world politics, Realism is and can be used to explain current issues within international relations and does have valid points to make about such issues in modern society. This essay will explore the key assumptions of Realism (statism, security and self-help)and put them into context of wider world politics examples to assess whether Realist values are suited to analyse contemporary politics or whether the Realist values are being challenged by new ideas and changes in the international system. There are many changes which have come about that may challenge the core values of Realism such as Globalization, a decrease in war/conflict or formations of higher bodies such as the EU.
Whilst there are several variants of Realism each with slightly different ideas, all forms of Realism share the same values of statism, survival and self help. Statism is the idea that the main actors within international relations are the sovereign states and that there is no community beyond state boarders. States are only interested in increasing their own national security and gaining power. Due to the international system being anarchic, there is no sovereign body to limit the ways in which states go about gaining power. War is therefore seen as an inevitable part of living in an anarchic world for Realists who think that war will always exist. States are primarily interested in relative gains and always want to gain more advantag...
... middle of paper ...
...Th Edition. Oxford University Press.
Burchill, S., Andrew, L., et al. 2013. Theories of international relations. 5Th Edition. Palgrave Macmillan
EU institutions and other bodies. European Union online publications. URL = http://europa.eu/about-eu/institutions-bodies/index_en.htm (last accessed 24th november 2013)
Ladyman, J., 2013. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy – Structural Realism. URL = . (last accessed 24th november, 2013)
Morgenthau, H.J, 1993. Politics among nations. 6Th Edition. New York; London: McGraw-Hill
Vera, E., 2013, A critique of realism. HubPages. URL = http://enockvera.hubpages.com/hub/A-Critique-of-Realism (last accessed 24th november, 2013)
UN at a glance. UN online publications. URL = http://www.un.org/en/aboutun/index.shtml (last accessed 24th november, 2013)
...l Realism: Theory, History, Community. Ed. Lois Parkinson Zamora and Wendy B. Faris. Durham; N.C.: Duke UP, 1995. 249-263.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Shiraev, Eric B., and Vladislav M. Zubok. International Relations. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. Silver, Larry.
Wendt, Alexander. Social theory of international politics. 9. printing. ed. Cambridge [u.a.: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2006. Print.
Mearsheimer J. J. (2010). Structural Realism. International Relations Thoeries, Discipline and Diversity (Second Edition), p.77-94
Realism is a style of writing which shows how things are in life. It showed how mostly every person thought life was just perfect. They were not seeing the
Wendt, Alexander. “Constructing International Politics.” International Security. Cambridge: President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1995. 71-81. Print.
Realism, in philosophical terms, refers to the concept that there is a reality beyond our perception. This means that how we see things and what we believe about them has no impact on the nature of said things. For example an individual may see an object as blue and another see the same object to be red, this is merely a disagreement between both parties about how they should label the colour. This wouldn’t mean that both parties are discussing different objects, this shows that no matter what individual’s beliefs or thoughts on the real world are only ever approximations and do not accurately capture reality. (O’Brien, M and Yar, M, 2008)
Neo-realism and Liberalism both provide adequate theories in explaining the causes of war, yet Neo-realist ideals on the structural level and states being unitary actors in order to build security, conclude that Neo-realist states act on behalf of their own self interest. The lack of collaboration with other states and balance of power among them presents a reasonable explanation on the causes of war.
People’s ideas and assumptions about world politics shape and construct the theories that help explain world conflicts and events. These assumptions can be classified into various known theoretical perspectives; the most dominant is political realism. Political realism is the most common theoretical approach when it is in means of foreign policy and international issues. It is known as “realpolitik” and emphasis that the most important actor in global politics is the state, which pursues self-interests, security, and growing power (Ray and Kaarbo 3). Realists generally suggest that interstate cooperation is severely limited by each state’s need to guarantee its own security in a global condition of anarchy. Political realist view international politics as a struggle for power dominated by organized violence, “All history shows that nations active in international politics are continuously preparing for, actively involved in, or recovering from organized violence in the form of war” (Kegley 94). The downside of the political realist perspective is that their emphasis on power and self-interest is their skepticism regarding the relevance of ethical norms to relations among states.
Realism is one of the important perspectives on global politics, it is a notion about the conservative society and political philosophy (Heywood 2011: 54; Shimko 2013: 36). Besides, Gilpin (1996) claims that “realism…, it is not a scientific theory that is subject to the test of falsifiability, therefore, cannot be proved and disproved.” (Frankel 1996: xiii). The components of the realist approach to international relations will be discussed.
Mingst, K. (2011). Essentials of international relations. (5th ed., p. 70). New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company.
Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau sought to create new political theories which would deal with the issues of their time. Both authors have had their works interpreted and applied to the international realm. Many international relations scholars have taken the theories developed by Hobbes and Rousseau as being indicative to the “realists” school of thought. However, an understanding of the realism school of thought will provide us with a means by which we can measure and better understand the two authors place within the paradigm. As we shall see, the theories which were developed by Hobbes and Rousseau do not make them “stone cold realists”. Rather, it will be shown that although they both advocate certain principles of realism, much of their theories are in fact antithetical to realism.
Realism is one of the oldest and most popular theories in International Relations. It offers a perspective about competition and power, and can be used to explain the actions between states. An example of realism is the U.S. reaction – or lack thereof – during the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
Dimitter, Lowell. World Politics. 1st ed. Vol. 55. New York: Johns Hopkins UP, 2002. 38-65.
The study of international relations takes a wide range of theoretical approaches. Some emerge from within the discipline itself others have been imported, in whole or in part, from disciplines such as economics or sociology. Indeed, few social scientific theories have not been applied to the study of relations amongst nations. Many theories of international relations are internally and externally contested, and few scholars believe only in one or another. In spite of this diversity, several major schools of thought are discernable, differentiated principally by the variables they emphasize on military power, material interests, or ideological beliefs. International Relations thinking have evolved in stages that are marked by specific debates between groups of scholars. The first major debate is between utopian liberalism and realism, the second debate is on method, between traditional approaches and behavioralism. The third debate is between neorealism/neoliberalism and neo-Marxism, and an emerging fourth debate is between established traditions and post-positivist alternatives (Jackson, 2007).