Stretching the IR theoretical spectrum on Irish neutrality: a critical social constructivist framework

In a 2006 International Political Science Review article, entitled "Choosing to Go It Alone: Irish Neutrality in Theoretical and Comparative Perspective," Neal G. Jesse argues that Irish neutrality is best understood through a neoliberal rather than a neorealist international relations theory framework. This article posits an alternative "critical social constructivist" framework for understanding Irish neutrality. The first part of the article considers the differences between neoliberalism and social constructivism and argues why critical social constructivism's emphasis on beliefs, identity, and the agency of the public in foreign policy are key factors explaining Irish neutrality today. Using public opinion data, the second part of the article tests whether national identity, independence, ethnocentrism, attitudes to Northern Ireland, and efficacy are factors driving public support for Irish neutrality. The results show that public attitudes to Irish neutrality are structured along the dimensions of independence and identity, indicating empirical support for a critical social constructivist framework of understanding of Irish neutrality

Framing Robert W. Cox, Framing International Relations

In the recent years, R.W. Cox has distanced himself from some genealogical connections made by his followers in regard to what he meant in his famous 1981 article. Was he mischaracterized, framed? This paper focuses on how Cox has been 'framed', a concept elaborated and used across social sciences in different contexts. Here, it is used to look at different mechanisms by which ideas, such as those of Cox, can be connected, 'framed' to other ideas, not only to advance knowledge but to strengthen individual careers, to strengthen and construct approaches and disciplines. Framing highlights and creates a space but also constrains and obscures. Cox deserves to be seen outside any frames other than the one he creates for himself, one which is changing and developing as does the real world, not captive to any approach, paradigm, discipline, or any other frame

What constructivism?

Since its first appearance in International Relations studies some three decades ago, constructivism has reached considerable popularity: not just in the US (where it is the third of the three US IR mainstream approaches alongside neorealism and neoliberalism) but across the world in the now globalized IR discipline. This global “turn to constructivism” makes it difficult to orient oneself among many versions of constructivism, positivist, and nonpositivist, particularly when efforts are made to use constructivism as an analytical tool for some of the most challenging issues the world faces. The essay questions the utility of constructivism for the regional studies, particularly the Middle East, although only two versions of constructivism and its main protagonists, one positivist, the other nonpositivist, are examined. Making an excursion to the theory of knowledge, this essay makes a case for creating another form of constructivism, not just non- or post-positivist but also post-secular, to embrace the complexity of the Middle East as a layered mosaic in which not only states and non-state bodies but also civilizational, ethnic, and religion-based factors play a crucial role

R. Scott Appleby: From a Footnote to a Distinguished Scholar Award Winner

This essay is a reminder of the briar path towards recognition of religion as an essential factor in International Relations (IR) and in its major academic organization, the International Studies Association (ISA). To positivists in IR, religion stands in sharp contrast to reason and is not to be taken seriously. A significant review article published in World Politics in 2008 is cited here as an example. It refers to the work of R. Scott Appleby and others as literature "in the public sphere"-which is "outside of the concerns of political science" and "not of interest"-and thus it is only mentioned in a footnote. In 2019 the ISA's Religion and International Relations Section gave its Distinguished Scholar Award to Professor Appleby, which is in part a statement of a recommitment to keep challenging this attitude