For these summaries, I read about institutions, constructivist view of politics, the unipolar system and how China might develop into a world power. The first article is, “The False Promise of International Institutions” by John J. Mearsheimer. The second article is, “Constructing International Politics” by Alexander Wendt. The third article is, “Unipolarity, State Behavior, And Systemic Consequences” by G. John Ikenberry, Michael Mastanduno and William C. Wohlforth. The final reading is, “After Unipolarity China’s Visions of International Order in an Era of U.S. Decline” by Randall L. Schweller and Xiaoyu Pu. The articles are related by how the international political roles play in politics. The article that I found most relevant was Schweller
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Wendt addresses four issues in his article that include assumptions, objective knowledge, explaining war and peace and policymakers responsibilities. The difference between a neorealist and constructivist is their assumptions on what structure is made of. Neorealist think it’s made from distribution of materials and constructivists believe it’s from social relationships. Social structures are shared understandings, expectations or knowledge. Social structures include gold and tanks. Constructivists only believe it’s for human actions. Social structures exist in practice. The author goes on to write about ontological and epistemological issues. Ontological issue is whether structures have an objective existence. Epistemological issue is whether we can have objective knowledge of these structures. Towards the end, he writes about the descriptive issue and explanatory issue. The descriptive issue is when states engage in practice of realpolitik versus accepting the rule of law and institutional constraints. The explanatory issue is why states engage in war or peace. The core view of structure according to a constructivist is that the crucial work is done by social factors. Overall, this article explains the constructivist view of politics. In the current world, China would be considered to have constructivism, since they have social values of how the country needs to operate. Mearsheimer can connect to this article by explaining how states only look at of wanting gains rather than looking at their opponent. This can be referred to the descriptive issue that Wendt
Wendt addresses four issues in his article that include assumptions, objective knowledge, explaining war and peace and policymakers responsibilities. The difference between a neorealist and constructivist is their assumptions on what structure is made of. Neorealist think it’s made from distribution of materials and constructivists believe it’s from social relationships. Social structures are shared understandings, expectations or knowledge. Social structures include gold and tanks. Constructivists only believe it’s for human actions. Social structures exist in practice. The author goes on to write about ontological and epistemological issues. Ontological issue is whether structures have an objective existence. Epistemological issue is whether we can have objective knowledge of these structures. Towards the end, he writes about the descriptive issue and explanatory issue. The descriptive issue is when states engage in practice of realpolitik versus accepting the rule of law and institutional constraints. The explanatory issue is why states engage in war or peace. The core view of structure according to a constructivist is that the crucial work is done by social factors. Overall, this article explains the constructivist view of politics. In the current world, China would be considered to have constructivism, since they have social values of how the country needs to operate. Mearsheimer can connect to this article by explaining how states only look at of wanting gains rather than looking at their opponent. This can be referred to the descriptive issue that Wendt