Do critical approaches Marxism, feminism, constructivism improve our understanding of international politics?

AbstractIn the present-day(a) eon, the occupation of critical theoretical approaches is of signifi puket splendour if one is willing to develop a more(prenominal) comprehensive arrest of valet de chambre(prenominal) politics and transnational dealings. Theoretical approaches, such as Marxism, Constructivism and feminist movement can non but provide such an understanding, but their convergence and can significantly contribute to our increase awareness of globular inequalities and the dimensions in which they occur by placing ferocity in not only on the kind mingled with the structure and substance, but also capitulum their very nature and scrutinised the normative codes which guide human mode. disrespect some of the limitations which the theories have, their complementary use can be used successfully in order to agnise a more critical stead on the nature of world governance.IntroductionIn the contemporary era, the application of critical theoretical approaches i s of significant splendour if one is willing to develop a more comprehensive understanding of international politics and international relations. As this essay will demonstrate, although approaches such as Marxism, Constructivism and Feminism cannot alone provide such an understanding, their complementary use can significantly contribute to our increased awareness of global inequalities and the dimensions in which they occur.MarxismThe impact of bolshy theory on the development of critical theorising in international politics is one the significance of which can hardly be denied. Despite this, Marxist idealogue have often been accused of not taking into account factors such as nationalism, as well up as the balance of power among states in order to sustain and structure world politics (Linklater, 2013). Moreover, Marxist theories in the late 1970s and early 1980s found it increasingly difficult to devise an uninflected framework for explaining the relationship of nation-states and violence in period of increased globalisation, characterised by increased national fragmentation, as well the resurgence of violent conflicts based on ethnicity (Giddens, 1985). This can the attributed to the inability of traditional Marxist pattern to move beyond theorising closely the significance of class conflict and the importance of social relations in terms of modes of production. Despite this flaw, more contemporary neo-Marxist theorists have attempted to revitalise this critical approach by placing emphasis on the relationships between states, markets and the capitalist world economy in the era of globalisation (Teschke, 2003 Halliday, 1994 Rosenberg, 1994 Gamble, 1999). The application of Marxist thought has increasingly drawn attention to the problem of global unlikeness which the capitalist governance has led to (Wallerstein, 1979 Thomas, 1999 Linklater, 2013). Thus, the importance of modes of production have successfully been utilised in order to challenge the economical discrepancy, which is characteristic of contemporary world markets and question the power relationships which exist between states on the international level. existence mainly preoccupied with material deprivation and inequality, however, Marxism has failed to take into account the norms and values which governance the structures of economics and politics, a question which has preoccupied constructivist theories of international relations.ConstructivismBy contrast to Marxism, Constructivism places emphasis not only on the importance of material structures, but as well as the normative dimension which is associated with it, as well the importance of identity formation and manifestation (Price and Reus-Smit, 1998). Thus, constructivism attempts to remedy the Marxists neglect of the importance of agency and its relationship to structure in the process of devising and implementing decisions related to international politics and relations among states in the era of globalisat ion (Reus-Smit, 2008).Therefore, Constructivism is complimentary to both more traditional approaches of theorising about international politics, such as Rationalism, as well as more critical approaches such as Marxism (Reus-Smit, 2013). More importantly, the significance of human agency is not deprived from the structure which determines the manifestation of the actors interests in fact it calls for the critical military rank of the institutionalised norms which are the mediator between structure and agency. This can be of considerable advantage of understanding the contemporary global inequalities which exists, between countries from the Third World and post-industrialist Western states, as it will question not only the existing states of affairs in international politics, but also the moral dimensions of the reasoning rotter it. By placing emphasis on the development of normative frameworks which are used as guides and rationale for the execution of instrument of specific decis ions in relation to international politics, Constructivism can successfully scrutinise and moralise the power inequality among states and if used alongside neo-Marxist theories it can question both structure and agency. What both fail to take into account, however, is that agency in the era of global inequality also has a specific dimension, a problem which is communicate by Feminism.FeminismBy contrast to both Marxism and Constructivism, feminist theories of international politics and international relations took prominence only in the early 1990s, though their impact for the development of the academic disciplines has been considerable (True, 2003). Feminism as an intellectual tradition questioned the very nature of the agency which had an impact on the development of international politics and introduced in the notion of gender as an empirical category and analytical tool by dint of which global inequality and unequal power distribution could be understood (True, 2013). Thus, F eminism, alongside Constructivism could be considered as a major breakthrough as both of them questioned the more traditional discourse of power relations and moved beyond the singular focus on inter-state relations that characterised more traditional theories in the study of International Relations (ibid.). Feminist thought has attracted attention to the specific dimensions of global inequality, resulting from the transformation of economic world markets. In fact, it has been suggested that the process of globalisation has increased the inequality between men and women worldwide, ultimately resulting in a feminisation of poverty (Chant, 2007 Chant, 2008). The increased emphasis on export and outsourcing reflecting the priorities of the global financial markets, have disproportionately affected women (Marchand and Runyan 2010). This rise in inequality and insecurity is also linked to the development of violent conflicts in states where inequality between genders is high (Goldstein, 2003). On the other hand, gender equality in states is said to deoxidize the likelihood of the use of violence in intra-state disputes (Caprioli, 2005 Caprioli and Boyer, 2001). Therefore, it could be argued that the use of more critical perspectives in theorising about international politics could significantly contribute to our understanding of global politics and could potentially results in less(prenominal) violent conflicts in the future if emphasis is placed on the reduction of global inequality and its gendered dimension. remnantAs this essay has demonstrated, the critical theories of Marxism, Constructivism and Feminism could further our understanding of the nature of global inequalities by placing emphasis in not only on the relationship between the structure and agency, but also question their very nature and scrutinised the normative codes which guide human agency. Despite some of the limitations which these theories have, their complementary use can be used successfull y in order to gain a more critical perspective on the nature of world governance.BibliographyCaprioli, M. (2005). 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