As with any academic field, International Relations has gone
through a complex evolutionary process which has included the first great
debate between the idealists and the realists in the first quarter of the
1900’s followed in the mid-20th Century by the second, where
scientific versus classical approaches took center stage. In , “The Third
Debate: On the Prospects of International Theory in a Post-Positivist Era”,
Yosef Lapid presents a third debate revolving around the crux of knowledge.
Basically Lapid argues that in the post-positivist world,
consensus and unanimity is not as necessary or important rather, the multitudes
of views and debates are actually healthy. Given this stance a rigid
overarching theory is neither required nor desirable and the pluralism espoused
in this new debate is championed by concepts such as paradigmatism,
perspectivism and relativism. Of the three, the latter two are of particular
interest because it is often the case that entire theories, such as Samuel P.
Huntington’s ‘Clash of Civilizations’ are founded on one-sided assumptions
which fail to acknowledge the other side of the argument in question. A more
holistic approach to any debate is perhaps to follow in the footsteps of
Aristotle’s timeless quote, “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to
entertain a thought without accepting it.” Meanwhile, relativism as a theory is
a proponent of diversity and flexibility which cannot be achieved if bogged
down by a desire to set everything in stone as absolute truths, a trap which
the field of International Relations can ill afford to fall into given the
sudden changes in the world order that have occurred, with the collapse of the
Soviet Union immediately springing to mind.
While Lapid manages to provide interesting food for thought,
his complex style of writing and overuse of jargon leaves much to be desired unfortunately,
eventually resulting in a piece which is very difficult to decipher.
I agree that even though he has come up with new concepts and ideas, his excessive and unnecessary use of complicated words and phrases makes it difficult to grasp some of the main ideas!
ReplyDeleteIt's good to hear that everyone had the same problem with the text. It was very difficult to fully understand Lapid's ideas. Despite the reading being short it took far longer to go over than the previous long ones.
ReplyDeleteGood post. You writing was particularly clear, which is the opposite of Lapid's writing. And this one line was a great summary: "Basically Lapid argues that in the post-positivist world, consensus and unanimity is not as necessary or important rather, the multitudes of views and debates are actually healthy."
ReplyDelete