Constructivism
‘anarchy is what states make of it”[1]
Alexander Wendt, political IR theorist, is one of the core social constructivist theorists behind the observation that states
have a common interest in establishing and maintaining international order under the veil of international non-governmental organisations such as the
International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Such NGO’s can thus act as said
veil and provide coercive tactics from the society of states in question and will thus be harder to be perceived as a direct threat to sovereignty as the
legitimacy of their actions are backed by the international community.
For instance, the NATO lead intervention in
Libya can be understood using the concept of the international society. The
coalition of forces and their military intervention as sanctioned by the United
Nations Security Council, while experiencing some protest,
went mostly unabated in their mission to stabilise the nation and ensure
civilians went unharmed as Muammar Ghaddafi’s administration went to the dogs. The international society of states' actions in Libya were thus legitimised by the international community, and due to the collective agreement that intervention should be undertaken, states' cooperation on said matter became simplified. Consequently, the intervention undertaken can therefore be directly interpreted as a
collective and agreed upon attack on a nations sovereignty with hopes in
further securing energy exports, and the overall stability of the Middle East,
in so far as Libya’s position can provide.
Furthermore the coercive nature of the
International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Trade Organisation (WTO) is a
result of the international society of states economic prowess as per the
Washington Consensus and strong-arm tactics within developing nations.
Unilateral trade liberalisations and currency devaluations come at the price of
outflows of capital into the nations in question, and thus the economic opening
and exploitation by that of the western and far more wealthy counterparts can
be undertaken. For example, the power of trade sanctions and credit downgrades
imposed on Russia in response to their intimidating economic tactics towards
Ukraine can be viewed as a direct verification of the power of non-governmental
organisations such as the IMF. The $15bn (US) aid package provided by the IMF to the Ukraine, while not explicitly coming at a price,
comes with the implicit agreement that future cooperation with Ukraine and the
European Union (EU) and other western nations will culminate. Therefore, as
Alexander Wendt outlines, the powerful economic conditions in which the west
and similar wealthy states can coordinate through legitimised international
organisations remains to be amply powerful, and following the conceptions of
the constructivist’s school of thought, the international community can
increase their level of security and sovereignty through said channels without
such increase coming at the expense of the other.
In conclusion, the manner in which states can affect their neighbours, and
given that identities do remain constant as conceived by Wendt, can be exacerbated by their propensity to cooperate and coordinate coercively within the international community. The social constructivist theoretical framework provides an accurate scope in which to view the nature in which states coordinate with one another at the international level, and thus the manner in which they decide to hedge against other states in their ultimate battle for international hegemony.
[1] Wendt. 1992. Anarchy is what states make of it: The social
construction of power politics. International Organization 46 (spring):
391-425.
No comments:
Post a Comment