The Pros Of Constructivism

The constructivist turn in IR marks a shift from the material determinants of international politics to ideational factors, such as beliefs, ideas, and norms. The two dominant theoretical schools in IR, neorealism and neoliberal institutionalism (NLI), share several key assumptions regarding the anarchic nature of the international system, states are self-interested, rational actors, driven by material interests in power/survival (neorealists) or security (NLI). In addition, neorealism and NLI both rely on a rational choice framework borrowed from microeconomics that assumes cost-benefit analysis and utility maximization as the impetus behind state’s political calculus. Although conditioned by the same assumptions, neorealists and NLI reach vastly different conclusions regarding the potential for conflict and cooperation in international politics. Constructivism challenges both the materialist determinism and the ontological assumptions or “givens” of the rationalist framework that undergird neorealism and NLI, which nevertheless, dictate the theoretical framework for the majority of international …show more content…
Much like high quality case studies and other qualitative methods, constructivism is a contingent approach in that temporal and spatial variation matter. This specificity creates epistemological and methodological contrasts with the dominant theoretical approaches. Epistemologically many constructivists move from positivist precepts and observational, empirical investigations to scientific realism and post-positivist exploration of unobservable causal mechanisms. Due to the feedback mechanisms and iterativeness of constructivism, some constructivist scholars claim positivist assumptions problematic (Wendt 1987, Ruggie 1988, 1992), while other constructivist scholars operate within mainstream positivist