Session 17: Social Constructivism-Much appreciated!

Throughout this course we have encountered a copious amount of concepts such as anarchy, security, states, survival, domestic situations and many other along the same lines. Realism instilled its core concepts in our minds and has been the dominant paradigm over the course of this course on International Relations. Along with Realism, recently, Liberalism and Marxism also made their short appearances to further reinforce the importance of states and structure influencing the field of International Relations. Throughout history, Realism and Liberalism seem to be the principal theories fighting to prove their might in the field and to solidify their standing by explaining the international arena through their own lens. Recently, call it a revelation or a breath of fresh air, a new school of thought has emerged and it is slowly gaining prominence which is Social Constructivism. While both Realists and Liberals take a more materialistic approach to understand and explain things, Social Constructivists rely on the ideational aspects of things and believe that the primary aspects of International Relations are socially constructed i.e. through social activities and interaction.

John Gerard Ruggie in his article, “What Makes the World Hang Together? Neo-utilitarianism and Social Constructivist Challenge” does an exemplary job of meticulously explaining and putting forward the basic notions of the theory of Social Constructivism. In this short and precise piece of writing, Ruggie takes the readers on a journey through the concept of Social Constructivism, from its start to presently. Ruggie initially explains the classical roots of the concept, and describes how Durkheim initially shed light on the role of ideational factors in social life and how ideas that exist within the individuals, become a cause of change in the system. From Durkheim, he moves to Weber and describes how significant the role of ideas is to his Social Science.  From the classical roots, Ruggie moves to the emergence of Social Constructivism and describes how even though Neo Realism and Neo Liberal Institutionalism are drawn directly from Micro Economics, this theory is not directly “imported” from any other aspect even though it might be influenced by some. Social Constructivism gained prominence after the limitations and flaws of the conventional theories become more evident. Ruggie then goes on to discuss the concepts of interests and identities and draws a parallel between the Neo Liberals and the Neo Realists and the Constructivists. This is followed by ideational causation and how Realists and Liberals don’t give importance to ideas as compared to Constructivists. Other topics that he mentions are collective intentionality, constitutive rules, transformation and the question of agency.

Ruggie also describes three variants of Social Constructivism. The first being the “neo classical constructivism,” which focuses more on a pragmatic epistemology, the second being the “post modernist constructivism”, which regards no neutral view point to asses the validity of analytical knowledge claims and then there is a third variant, which takes some factors from both the previous variants and combines it. Having mentioned all these things however, Ruggie also describes how Social Constructivism lacks “rigor and specification” and how it remains inadequate to efficaciously identify its own conditions through which “explanatory features can take effect.” What really stands out about this article is that Ruggie did not write it to sing praises of Social Constructivism, but rather it is an introduction and a summary on what one can expect to see through the lens of this school of thought. Another thing, about this piece of writing which left me somewhat rapt was that Ruggie concludes this reading by suggesting ways by which both neo-utilitarians and social constructivists can improve their theories and how he makes it clear that even though they might not merge at some point in time, both can give constant competition to each other for efficient functioning.

For me this introduction to Social Constructivism was delightful. I am sick of Realism and its core features getting repeated again and again. Even Liberalism is too idealistic for my liking. Both these leading theories ignore the essence of human beings, which is social interaction and human consciousness. I’m a firm believer of the viewpoint that almost every action and every situation is socially constructed, thus whatever happens in the international arena is also socially and historically constructed and it’s not only on the basis of human nature or anarchy or domestic actions that International Relations function. Other conventional theories seem reductionist in nature as they give a very over simplified view of things, comparatively, Social Constructivism seems more detailed due to its focus on minute humanistic details. Identities, norms, aspirations and ideologies also play an efficacious part in decision-making. Its about due time that human beings are given their due and they are given the importance they deserve, when it comes to international relations and through this theory of social constructivism, humans are getting that due.