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1) 1st question: Why should we care about history when studying international issues today?

Please substantiate your claims with concrete examples. (2 pages) (4777/4800 characters)

The caring, or importance, of history when studying international issues, is predominantly a question of

theoretical approach in the field of IR.

Any encounter between IR as a social science and history will have to start from the

assumption that there is no universal covering law that explains international conduct

across the centuries, as there is no one explanatory theory of history… Yet no

transhistorical theory of general crisis can be superimposed upon the historical evidence.

On the contrary, the conditions, general course, and outcomes of these crisis can only be

established through historical inquiry. History is not teleological, but it is retrospectively

intelligible (Teschke, 2003, p. 7).

This is how Teschke opens his introduction chapter, the core theoretical argument, in his theoretical

attack on realism in The Myths of 16481. One can easily translate general crisis into international

issues. He argues that in order to gain an understanding of international issues it is very important to

carry along a historical inquiry. Teschke originates from the new Marxist tradition of IR, also known as

historical materialism (Hobden & Jones, 2011, p. 143). Originating from the Marxist tradition of IR,

Teschke follows a theoretical approach which is very much holistic, which Hobden and Jones describes

in the course book:

… the social world should be analysed as totally. The academic division of the social

world into different areas of enquiry – history, philosophy, economics, political science,

sociology, international relations etc. is both arbitrary and unhelpful. (Hobden & Jones,

2011, p. 133)

This seems to be a very comprehensive approach, which requires vast amount of analysis, but it is

hardly questionable that to get a total understanding of international issues needs a complete analysis.

Taking a point of departure in the historical materialism approach for legitimizing the importance of

1 Teschke analysis that there has happen an over-glorification of the Treaties of Westphalia by most International

Relations theorist as the step into modernization, whereas he argues that it was the development into to the absolutist states and not to the capitalist state (which came with the industrial revolution).

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history in IR, should though also include that the uppermost important feature of this approach is the

recognition that the economic development is effectively the motor of history (Hobden & Jones, 2011, p.

133) . Developing these Marxist ideas, Gramsci came up with the concept of the historical bloc, that

describes the relationship between the socio-economic relations (base structure) and political and

cultural practices (superstructure). The theory of historical bloc transcends into the concept of

hegemony, which describes the function of power and how domination surpasses the sovereignty of

others being it states or civil society (Hobden & Jones, 2011, p. 138). Being able to use this kind of

analysis tool requires a deep historical insight.

This goes very much along with the idea that ‘it is always the winner who writes the history’. Taking

the approach of post structuralism (Foucault) may help us understand the hypothesis. History, in the

simplest form, is the study of the past. Nevertheless, what is in the past does not always stay in the past.

This past is transformed into the discourse of the present. This transformation demands an interpreter,

one with the tools to make this translation prevailing; the tool is simply the power to represent, the

power to be heard. Discourse combined with the concept of genealogy defined as a ‘history of the

present’ Foucault constructs his concept of power. Power is the intertwined relationship between

knowledge and the production of truth (Hansen, 2011, p. 171). Thereby will the “documented history”

always represent a biased view, and therefore will history become questionable? One IR theory that

addresses this issue more concretely is Post-colonialism, which would often approach history in

international issues with quite some skepticism, since history often tends to be very Eurocentric.

Making this theoretical justification more and very shortly, practical I will lastly introduce of the

international issues of the coursebook, namely humanitarian intervention (chapter 31), using the case of

the humanitarian intervention by NATO in Libya in the spring 2011. This case illustrate It was an

intervention based on the IR theory of liberalism justified through Responsibility to Protect.

Gramscian scholars would argue that it was American hegemony that historically repeated itself, which

decided the intervention, whereas post-structuralist would argue that it was media discourse that

created the intervention, probably based on some “truths” produced by the people in power. Liberalist

would draw on fears of historical popular known genocides, legitimizing to act immediately without

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the consent of the Security Council, and realist would be able to change the balance of power, by

removing “the evil dictator” (Gadhafi), but contradictory disrespecting sovereignty.

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2) 2nd question: To what extent does Realism provide a satisfactory understanding of International

Politics today? Please substantiate your claims with concrete examples. (2 pages) (4772/4800

characters)

I will now continue where I left the last question namely with realism. Being the most popular theory

of IR many scholars have attack realism, and I have decided to bring a quote from Robert Cox to set

the frame going along with the ideas of Foucault presented in the last question:

Knowledge, in other words, cannot be timeless and objective in the sense that some

contemporary realist, for example, would like to claim (Hobden & Jones, 2011, p. 138)

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Theory is always for some one, and for some purpose (Cox, 1981, p. 128)

Somehow, it seems that I have made a hypothesis of questioning realism ability to provide a

satisfactory understanding of IR. But for this small criticism to have any validity, it would be in it is

right order to provide a description of what realism is, and a concrete example of why I question the

satisfactory understanding of IR by Realism, continuing the same example of the last question: the

humanitarian intervention in Libya.

What is realism?

Realism holds the state above all else, seeing the state as the most important actor whose main goal is

survival in an anarchic international system. States are also seen as rational unitary actors; which means

that it is their goal to rationally pursue issues that pertain to self-interest. (Dunne & Schmidt, 2011, pp.

86-87). One of the main features of realism is the balance of power. Various meanings have been

applied to this concept, but the most common one is connected to the survival of one state or a group of

states being suppressed by a hegemonic state or a coalition of states. The balance of power claims that

weaker and suppressed states will join together in trying to checking (balancing) out the power relation

(Dunne & Schmidt, 2011, p. 88). I will now shortly try to implement these ideas and question whether

this gives satisfying scope on the humanitarian intervention in Libya.

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According to realism, it is possible for the international community to have been interested in Libya for

political and security reasons, since states are primarily interested in survival and motivated by self-

interest. If we applied this realist view to the humanitarian intervention, we would see that it was

possible for outside states to have interests in Libya’s wealth, oil sources, and a particular interest in

overthrowing an unstable dictator, and installing a western friendly regime. It seems unlikely that an

international political group (United Nations, through the resolution 1973, later becoming a NATO

operation) and the International Criminal Court to be convinced to intervene in a country purely based

on facts that could not and obviously were not verified. It seems more logical to assume that Libya was

invaded for reasons that, although would be ethically unjustifiable, satisfied self-interests for the

countries involved in the intervention.

A liberalist would reject this notion, and argue that it has absolutely nothing to do with self-interest of

the coalition that intervened; instead it was solely on humanitarian reason through the Responsibility to

Protect (RtoP) doctrine. This will stand as an open question to the fulfillment of realism as an IR

theory.

To give a more fulfilling picture of the intervention, I would like to draw on some further theories. As

introduced in the last question a Gramscian interpretation of the humanitarian intervention would put

its focus on the hegemony taking place. Gadhafi could be viewed as threat to the Western hegemony

having the US being the main dominator, for constantly challenging neo-imperialism, and demanding a

more balanced power structure in the international community. Foucault would likely wise reject the

notion of self-interest being the sole and would rather say that the intervention came out of the media

discourse produced, during the conflict. This combined with the understanding of how Gramscian

views the production of media, as being a result of hegemony, would end in a claim that realism

represents an over-simplification of international politics by focusing its energy on balancing of power,

self-interest and sovereignty. One point I would like to introduce as well as questioning the satisfaction

of realism in international politics is the civil society, unfortunately I am a bit shorthanded on

characters.

In my point of view realism represents a theory that had its golden days during the cold war in the

bipolar world, but due to globalization, and the impact of civil society it can only produce simple

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explanation of the motivations that moves international politics. But it is still a valid theory if one

wants to produce a simplified understanding of international politics, after all states are the last

decision maker in the anarchical international community.

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3) 3rd question: Why did the Arab Spring happen? Please discuss the usefulness (merits and

drawbacks) of at least one of the disciplinary approaches introduced in the course book (history,

geography, anthropology, economics, political science) when trying to answer this question. (2

pages) (4553/4800 characters)

I have already drawn a bit on one of the events of the Arab spring namely the Libyan conflict and

humanitarian intervention. Libya was only one out of several conflicts. The Arab Spring was a mass

demonstration in multiple states in the beginning of 2011 which included Tunisia, Egypt, Morocco,

Algeria, Yemen, Bahrain, Syria, and Libya. The Tunisia demonstrations, which marked the beginning

of the mass demonstrations, succeeded in ousting Tunisian president Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali who was

replaced by an interim government. Cairo, Egypt became a greatly publicized demonstration which was

based in Tahrir square and led to the resignation of Hosni Mubarak and Egypt’s first democratic

election (Dalacoura, 2012, pp. 63-65). Uprisings happened in some Arab states in 2011, and not in

others, so therefore the whole idea of an Arab spring is questionable.

I have decided to use the social constructivism theory combined with some ideas of economics and

political science with the focus on civil society, to gain a greater understanding of why this happen.

This is based on the interpretation that the protests happen as a domino effect, spreading over the

MENA countries2. By domino effect I suggest that the Arab spring was a series of interconnected yet

diverse events.

First of all it is important to recognize that in order to obtain a qualified answer one needs to look at

each uprising in the various countries respectively, which is not possible within the limits of this

assignment. Therefore I need to overgeneralize to give any kind of answer.

One of the common denominators are that that countries were the protest took place were that of

authorian regimes, which served the interest of the few. By the interest of the few being the ruling

class, it did not lead to much progress of the rest of society. Therefore did the socio-economic

conditions being for example high unemployment and high inequality spark some sort of social

consciousness, which were present in all the Arab spring countries. This social consciousness

2 MENA: Middle East and North Africa representing a mere precise geographical understanding, instead of the Arab

spring which represents the generalized identity of the people participating in the protests.

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combined with the two first overthrowing’s of dictators in Tunisia and Egypt sparked the motivation of

success in the fight against the established authorian regimes in power. This was a part of constructing

a common identity across the countries for the protestors.

The western world has tried to identify this common identity as a young online connected social media

generation (facebook, twitter etc.), but research done by University of Cambridge have rejected this as

myth, stating that it was far more across generations, especially +35 of age (Rangwala, 2011). In my

scope this indicates that there has arisen some kind of class consciousness that has been converted into

social media revolutions so it suited the western media better. One can expect that this mass protest

movement brought some kind of fear to the established regimes in the west, and they afraid that this

consciousness of class should spread to their domestic fronts. Somehow this also happen, if onne wants

to argue that there was some kind of inspiration going from “the Arab spring”, to creating los

Indignados in Spain and the Occupy Movement in the US.

The very confusing ideas I have presented so far, and that a generalization is very hard to do other than

authorian regimes and socio-econom ic relations is supported by Dalacoura:

Ultimately, we may have to accept that the rebellions were spontaneous popular events whose

immediate causes and timing will never be explained fully and satisfactorily even with

hindsight (and certainly could not have been predicted beforehand). Thinking along the lines of

the ‘butterfly effect’, to borrow a term from a very different field, can help us see that the

extraordinary dimensions that collective protests assumed in some countries in 2011 may have

been the result of a series of events whose connections and causal mechanisms will remain

unfathomable (2012, p. 69).

Additionally, it is important to recognize that even though the protest were spontaneous they came out

of a lot of years of struggling and fighting, so it would make sense if one wants to investigate this

further, to look at the historical events building up to the Arab spring. Lastly, I will lake to frame the

whole assignment in a quote by Marx from his opening speech for the Working Men’s International

Association in 1864 where he pointed out that: “History had ‘taught the working classes the duty to

master [for] themselves the mysteries of international politics’” (Hobden & Jones, 2011, p. 133).

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Works Cited Cox, R., 1981. Social forces, States and World Orders: Beyond International Relations Theory. Millenium, 10(2),

pp. 126-155.

Dalacoura, K., 2012. The 2011 uprisings in the Arab Middle East: political change and geopolitical implications.

International Affairs, 88(1), pp. 63-79.

Dunne, T. & Schmidt, B. C., 2011. Realism. In: J. Baylis, S. Smith & P. Owens, eds. The Globalization of World

Politics: An Introduction to International Relations. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 84-100.

Hansen, L., 2011. Poststructuralism. In: J. Baylis, S. Smith & P. Owens, eds. The Globalization of World Politics:

An introduction to international relations. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 166-180.

Hobden, S. & Jones, R. W., 2011. Marxist theories of international relations. In: J. Baylis, S. Smith & P. Owens,

eds. The Globalization of World Politics: An introduction to international relations. New York: Oxford University

Press, pp. 130-146.

Rangwala, G., 2011. The myth of the arab spring - University of Cambridge. [Online]

Available at: http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/the-myth-of-the-arab-spring

[Accessed 22 November 2013].

Teschke, B., 2003. The Myth of 1648: Class, Geopolitics, and the Making of Modern International Relations.

London: Verso.