Terrorism Discussion, Week 13, Dialog

I feel that the discussion on Tuesday, while good, strayed off topic. The intent was to see how the world has changed after the attacks on 9-11, but the class got caught up on pointing out each others misuse of words. The focus should not have been whether or not drunk driving kills more people than the war in Iraq, but rather why we are targeted. We are targeted, because of our presence in the Middle East. I was hoping to have a discussion about if by responding to their hatred of our troops by sending more troops is really the best solution.

I realize our country holds the stance of not negotiating with terrorists, but I feel that doing the oppose of what they want is just going to strengthen their cause. For instance, if there is someone in Iraq who wasn't convinced that our presence in the Middle East was a negative thing but then they see US troops increase and their lives get worse, it isn't unreasonable for them to begin to protest our involvement, not matter what our intension really are. This isn't to say that the troops aren't there because they believe they are helping these people, the point is that the people don't think they are.


This next paragraph is in reference to the post I commented on earlier titled "Physical Victory is Better and Concessions." If the United States was capable of setting up a democracy in Iraq (as they say they can) I don't see how the Iraqi people could possibly accept this as a trustworthy government. Any country would be uneasy about a government facilitated by a major power, especially one that has been under the rule of major powers for a large period of its history (first the Ottoman empire, then the British). Their fear of being manipulated by another major power, let alone perhaps the first hegemony, is real and I don't see how it can be overcome in this situation.

"The Discreet Charms of Indian Terrorism" Week 13 Substantive

The author talks of a "Gandhian vision" which focuses on "politics as a dialogical encounter which, set within that moral univese, can reduce the area of human violence." (11)

Though I feel that Gandhi's view is respectable, I do not feel that it fits within the international system today. I feel politics post 9-11 have become more of a catalyst for violence than a reducer. Terrorists today use politics in what is called "spoiling" meaning they purposely target citizens in democratic countries, knowing that they will respond by electing leaders who will use violence in response. These leaders attack the areas with the terrorists, and end up killing citizens. These areas then allow terrorists to promote, in this case, anti-American sentiment and allows terrorist organizations to gather support for their cause.
There is also the case of corrupt leadership or promoting violence to ensure personal goals, such as oil revenues, rather than for diplomatic or humanitarian purposes. For this reason, I believe the war on terror has made politics a catalyst of violence.

Global Babble - Substantive Week 10

Janet Abu-Loghod talks about how wide the concept of globalization is, and uses the concept of a "two-way street," meaning that not only is the west influencing the rest of the world, but the rest of the world is influencing the west. Though I always considered globalization as a mostly American influence on the rest of the world, thinking about it in terms of how Americans are affected makes perfect sense. Just like developing countries today, the United States formed its values and customs based off of what they saw worked for other countries. Developing countries see that America is successful, and therefore want to replicate its culture. The main difference in my mind is that this change occured several generations ago. The interesting thing about the United States is how influenced it has always been by other cultures. For instance, some argue that prohibition was originally intended to target the Germans, who the United States was at war with. Whether or not Americans adopted German culture doesn't necessarily determine whether globalization took affect. In other words, when the United States actively made policy against what German culture was, globalization had influenced policy.

Class Discussion - Globalization, week 10, reflective

After our class discussion today, I am torn about my opinion regarding globalization. I agree that the uniqueness of culture suffers from the spread of globalization, but I'm not entirely convinced this is a bad thing. On one hand, I am certainly against the United States pushing its culture into others, but on the other hand these markets are readly accepting American culture, or at least its influence. There are definatly groups that feel strongly against American influence within their country, but is it something that America should try to stop? If these people are allowed to have their own culture and ideas are they not also just as free to adopt the culture of others? I'm not trying to say that the United States has a superior culture, but we should look at the possible advantages of having a global culture. Perhaps if we all have some sense of a shared culture and understanding, it would be difficult to go into conflict looking at the enemy as being the "other." Also, as someone mentioned in class, it would be in theory more difficult to ignore problems such as the conflict in Darfur if we look at everyone as apart of our group. Perhaps the rise of globalization could be the remedy to the massive amount of conflict caused by nationalism.

Poverty Discussion, Response, Week 9

I came out of our discussion last class having a very different viewpoint than when I entered. Like most people, I am of course in favor of helping out those who are less fortunate around the world. I hadn't given much though before last class though about the idea of benefiting from donating to charity, via rock concerts or wrist bands. Having worked at a bicycle shop, I would frequently see customers pass up the opportunity to donate to cancer when we didn't have the livestrong bracelets available. At my high school, I would constantly be asked when my store was getting bracelets in, yet not one person would ever just put money in for the cause the bracelets were raising money for. This could be thought of in two different ways. My initial reaction was that the money for the bracelets could be counted as additional money for cancer that never would've been donated without the bracelets. My reaction yesterday was sorrow for the very fact that people no longer donate to help others, but rather to help themselves.

"The Beautiful, Expanding Future of Poverty" Week 9 Substantive

Nandy's "The Beautiful, Expanding Future of Poverty," while convincing, was demoralizing. Nandy talks about how in democratic states, the poor are often forgotten about, because the average person is well off and doesn't need to deal with it. Though I'm sure that I am also oblivious to the poverty in the United States, I'm still convinced that there is significantly less poverty in democratic states than in other places. It is better to have the majority of the people be well off than to have a few number of people make money and the rest live in poverty. That being said, I feel there is still significant room for improvement within the United States. Our problems with poverty probably can't be fixed with policy change, as to my knowledge there has never been a country with no poverty. At the same time, improving disaster relief response, and creating job programs can certainly help.

Gender Discussion, Reflection, Week 8

The class discussion today made me think about what qualifies as success in feminism. After one student pointed out that we shouldn't be looking at success as political success I felt much better about feminism within the United States. It's true, the most influencial people in my life have not been political leaders. Political leaders hav ebeen influencial on my society, my rules, and my culture but not on my individual life. The most influencial people in my life have been my parents, neighbors, and teachers. For the purpose of following the same discussion, I will accept that our society sees raising children and teaching as feminist roles. Regardless of whether or not these roles were filled by men or women, it has been the "feminist" roles that have been most important to my life.

Enloe, Week 8 Substantive

"Most militarizing states need women to seek to be patriots, yet need them to do so
without stepping over the bounds of ‘proper’ femininity, since that would then
dispirit a lot of men, who would feel that their own masculine turf is being chal-
lenged. In a patriarchal state, a woman, thus, can aspire to be a ‘patriotic mother’
but not a ‘patriotic citizen’. On the other hand, we have now increasing historical
documentation of women who have challenged this orthodox, gendered idea of
patriotism. These are women, for example, who have sought to be voters in the
name of patriotism." - enloe interview

For some reason, I am always quick to critique the feminist view point. I don't see it as a way of thinking that works universally but rather needs to develop (or not) based upon each country. To me, the development of feminism is very much like the development of democracy. In both, I hold favorable viewpoints and believe that my life was made better by both; however, I feel very strongly that both democracy and feminism will fail unless voluntarely adopted by the nation or state. If forced, I feel both will fail horrible and probably lead to backwards thinking. I am inherently against feminists, though I am very much in favor of feminism. That being said, I feel Enloe's approach is too aggressive. Feminism can't just appear out of every circumstance, but rather the country has to be in a place where it can be accepted. This tends to occur, as far as I have found, when states are in need of labor. Think of the feminist movement in the United States. Women did obtain rights because they finally wore down the government. They have rights because the country needed them during World War II, which allowed women to see what it would be like to have rights, job, etc. Maybe the fact that militarizing states require women to be patriots at all is a step in the right direction.

Faults of Feminism

During class today we discussed what issues feminism had overlooked. I feel that feminism has overlooked a series of issues, so many in fact that feminism has no arguement at all against other IR theory. My main problem with feminism is that it doesn't put the issues into context. Feminists argues around the issue of male dominance in politics. While I won't deny that men play a stronger role in world politics, I disagree with feminists that it has to do with any sort of system or stigma keeping women down. I feel that from what I know of the feminist arguement, it is very much focused on the US prospective of politics. Many Asian countries have had female leaders, as well as central American and Argentina. Women have rule some of the most powerful countries like England, Germany and Russia, and even several countries in the middle east. The issue isn't that women can't gain these positions, but rather than they maybe aren't qualified yet. Those who have benefited from equal rights and education are not necessarily the generations that are ruling right now, or are among the first. After a few generations of women with the same educational opportunties as men, I think we will see a shift in US politics. Most of all, however, it is important to remember than most countries in the world have already made this shift.

Constructivism in the "real world"

Alexander's article stated that once formed, "any social system confronts each of its members as an objective social fact that reinforces certain behaviors and discourages others."
This sort of social interaction is well shown in the movie "Mean Girls." Mean Girls is based of the social heirarchy of a high school in middle America. If realism was correct, every member of the school would be at war with one another, and social groups would be formed based off the idea that students need one another for social survival. From the constructivist viewpoint, the only characters who are actually in conflict within the movie are those who have a historical background of conflict, such as Regina and Janice. Janice and Regina both met Cady, and neither immediatly approaches her as a threat until their interactions justify so. Cady's interactions with Regina discourages her to be the same person she entered the school as and encourages behavior that Regina finds appealing, such as dressing alike or saying certain phrases. Cady as a character is constantly changing based upon her reactions with her "allies."

Constructivist

Constructivism seems much more complete that the other theories. It takes into account historical background, and the idea that as circumstances and relationships change, actions and systems will also change. It explains why not all states are agressive, and not all states are looking to destroy the world. Constructivism is the first theory so far that adjusts for the unique relationships that certain countries have with one another. There are some points in Constructivism, however, that don't fully explain why states act the way they do in every circumstance. For instance, on pg. 25 of the Alexander article, he states that states can affor to rely on outside recognition for security and less on nationalist ways, such as military power. Though the author addresses Hitler and Napoleon as exceptions, he doesn't explain the extreme individuals who are in power. State relationships in the past may not be relavent in the situation where a new leader takes power who disagreed with the practices in the past. When extremists take power, do states assume the worst as realists argues or treat the state the same as they always have, as constructivists argue?

For some reason last week the blog wouldn't let me log in (talked to Professor Pervez earlier) so this post is for last week, as well as the next post.

Regional Integration - Haas

After reading Haas' article, I am less convinced about the plausability of regional integration. Haas argues that, among other things, a common market is the strongest thing leading to regional integration. This arguement has far too many variables to taken as fact. It goes off of the basis of absolute advantage, rather than comparative. A common market assumes that each state is producing the product they have the best comparative advantage in. What if one state has a stronger comparative advantage than others? For instance, if France makes 10x their cost on wine, while Germany only makes 4x their cost on beer. If Germany is thinking of comparative advantage, they dont' want an integration with france, because France will benefit more.

The greatest problem with this theory is the lack of acknowledgement for cultural identity and nationalism. Nationalism is a much stronger force than just who a country identifies with. Nationalism causes not just wars, but genocides. Though Haas does say that Nationalism is an issue, he doesn't give it the credit it deserves. Nationalism is the issue that has stopped regional integration since the formation of states. There is no reason why it wouldn't be a crippling issue in the future. Sure, states are more dependent on their economics and have a more common basis of life due to Globalization, but that doens't mean citizens dont' feel a sense of supremacy or cultural pride that they would be willing to overthrow a government that agreed to regional integration. Though Regional Integration is an interesting theory to discuss, it in its entirety is not plausable.

Kay's Neoliberal Theory

From Kay's perspective, it seems that institutions are great for the states involved, but extremely dangerous to those who aren't involved. For instance, NATO. Turkey avoided any sort of attack for their human rights violations, bceause of their involvement in NATO, while Serbia was bombed, killing many innocent citizens. Democracies don't attack each other, it seems, because they are so busy attacking nondemocracies. Though Kay argues that NATO's actions in this instance actually increased their security costs, it could be argued that Turkey's security costs were much lower than if they would've had to face NATO or the UN. The scariest part about not being in an international alliance is that there are no rules. NATO violated Article 1 of its own accord in order to do what the countries felt like doing. This is great for anyone in the alliance, but very alarming to a nation outside of NATO. By not following their own rules, they give the impression that any misstep could lead to an invasion or attack. There is also the option that whenever a country doesn't feel like dealing with the aftermath of war, they can defect, which is what the US did in this situation. Neoliberalism is right in that alliances and international institutions are beneficial to those involved, but it fails to look at the global effect they have on those who aren't in a particular alliance.

The limits of physical superiority, Week 2, Reflective

In class on Thursday we discussed how from the Realist prospective, a state only faces consequences if they lose militarily. This means, in theory, that the supreme military power has no limitations. This is a very simplistic viewpoint.
Sometimes having a superior military is irrelevant to home field advantage. For example, the United States military was undeniably superior to the Vietnamese, especially since Vietnam was such a divided, broken country. Granted, other countries helped Vietnam, but as far as military power, the United States was far superior. The strongest, most militarized countries have still met limitations. Napoleon and Hitler had military strength second to none, not even met by alliances of the other great powers of the time. Both believed the realist thought that military power surpasses all other strength. Both met their downfall from having this viewpoint. There much more to a countries strength than just the military. Alliances, economic ability, morale, and timing all play important roles in the security of a nation.

The Importance of the Behavioral Approach week 1 Substantive

“We believe that most American general theory courses do not do justice to the world-wide variety of substantively and politically significant approaches to international relations.”

Though I'm not arguing that a more worldly view would benefit American students, I’m not sure that its necessary. It has to be taken into account when taking courses at an American University that American viewpoints will be most predominant, especially when professors tend to use their own literature as study materials. Professors must take the effort to find material from reliable sources written in English, instead of using previous assignments. As most professors in the United States are American, it can be inferred that they also have only studied the behavioral viewpoint. With limited time and resources to teach, it is not surprising that they tend to lean towards the neo-realist behavioral study, which is to “develop and test general theories of war and conflict” (130).

Though the other studies are important for a student to learn, neo-realism is currently the most relevant to a student trying to prepare for a career in International Relations. The 21st century has thus far been focused on warfare, therefore studying war and conflict is more important than, for example, Classical Marxism. Since this article was published in 1984, it gives too much credit to learning dialectical approches, and implies that it should be given equal time with behavorial and traditional approaches. Traditional approaches are important from a historical viewpoint, as well as looking towards international cooperation, and American professors are correct in giving it 20% of their attention. Dialectical, however, has phased out significantly since this article was written. Marxism doesn't influence the world the way it did in 1984. Globalization has made behavorial approaches the most important of the three studies. The 21st century has shown more and more interdependence among countries, while warfare becomes more and more common, therefore American professors are correct in focusing most of their resources on teaching behavioral studies.