The reading for August 30- "The Dialectics of World Order: Notes for a Future Archaeologist of International Savoir Faire" by Hayward R. Alker, Jr. and Thomas J. Biersteker was an interesting piece that left me with several significant impressions. I felt that the article provided a good overview of the three major schools of thought in the study and understanding of IR. This discussion was rather cursory, but the triad diagram and Table 1 which described the nine combinations helped paint a clear picture of the differences between various approaches.
At first I was skeptical about the treatment of Waltz's work and the study of course reading lists, however Alker and Biersteker made a very important point- that it is necessary to study all three traditions in order to fully understand the arguments and counterarguments that are constantly adding to and changing the theories of IR. In a previous course I took on North-South relations, I witnessed the importance of reading those works by non-Americans (or even non-"First World" scholars) especially when it comes to theories that regard economic interactions and systems. The historical and cultural context in which the work is written plays an important role in the contributions the work makes toward the ongoing debates and arguments over how the international system is structured and how it ought to be structured. While this article was written in the 1980s, it seems that the idea of openness to theory development is important. We need to remember that theory is organic and ever changing, but learn from the past traditions as everything seems to build on each other whether as reactions or as clarifications.
This is my first blog post, I'm classifying it as my substantive post for this week, however it contains my reactions and impressions of the text. I'm not sure still of what should be in this post, so please give me feedback.
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2 comments:
KH: Just to clarify, the substantive post should focus on the content of the assigned readings but it should contain your own reflections and arguments. The dialog post will also include your reflections but draw on class discussions, lecture, blog posts by others, etc - in other words, the "dialog" portion of the course. Hope that helps.
To respond to your post, here's a question that popped into my head. What happens when "First-World" and "non-First World" ways of making sense of these things collide? Does it help our understanding or hinder it? How so?
I believe that when first-world and non-first world ways of doing things collide, it gives the opportunity to help make sense of things, because there is something to compare our differences with, therefore there is a formation of identity. This doesn't necessarily mean that when they collide there is a better understanding of one another, however, because we could easily make different become the enemy, and collision could initiate conflict.
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