IRO - Actors in world politics

Actors in world politics
awp.presenterswall.nl

Test – December 23rd
 Multiple choice questions
 Half lecture/half readings
- First hour – theories/concepts/one-way lecture
- Second hour – discussing of the chapters the transnational studies
reader
 Apply knowledge from the readings to new cases
 Questions about the documentary

Lecture 1 – International, global, and transnational

Dimensions of globalization
 People (migration trends increase)
 Capital (enhancement of trade between states)
 Politics (emergence of terrorist attacks against states)
 Culture (film broadcast Internationally)

Processes of globalization
 Deterritorialisation (the process through which geographical territory
becomes less of a constraint on social interactions)
 Interdependence (the process through which security and force matter
less and countries are connected by multiple social and political
relationships - Keohane and Nye)
 Time-space compression (the set of processes that cause the relative
distances between places, as measured in terms of travel time for
example, to contract, ef_f_ectively making such places grow “closer” -
David Harvey).

Theorizing globalisation
The International Relations approach to Globalization:
 The world is divided in domestic/international
 States are the main actors of IR
 Other actors exist but they are neglected;

The globalist approaches
 World divides are flattened;
 Undifferentiated investment surface;
 Decreased relevance of states

The transnational critique
 Relations develop between states and non-state actors
 States adapt to globalization: transgovernmentalism (Anne-Marie
Slaughter)
 A problem of conceptualization
 NGOs, migration flows, terrorist groups, etc. change the course of
international politics;

, Transnational approach to globalism
In opposition to the realist premise that states are unitary actors in world
politics, scholars, such as Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane, see the world
as state-centred but believe that transnational relations increase the
sensitivity of societies to one another and thereby alter relationships
between governments.

Transnational interactions: movement of tangible or intangible items
across state boundaries when at least one actor is not an agent of a
government or an intergovernmental organization.

Effects on interstate politics
 Attitude changes (face-to-face interactions between citizens of different
states and the myths,
symbols and norms
promoted by
transnational
organisations may alter
actor’s perceptions of
reality)
 International pluralism
(linking of transnational
structures with the same
interests)
 Constrains on states
trough dependence and interdependence
(international transportation and finance influence states policies
 Increases in the ability of certain governments to influence others
(trough key positions in transnational corporations)
 Autonomous actors with private foreign policies that affects state’s
policies (by deliberately opposing to government policies or facilitating
good relations between states)

According to this approach, world politics can’t be described solely by the
relations between states
> Instead politics is assessed between actors that consciously employ
material and symbolic resources to induce other actors to behave
differently than they would otherwise behave.
> The state-centric paradigm is inadequate and will progressively become
more inadequate in the future.

This transnational view of world politics also involves
“Territorial trap”, John Agnew:
 States do not have exclusive power (over their territory)
 Domestic and foreign realms are not separate, but networked
(transnational organizations find common interests between
themselves – Snowden Leakes led other hackers to survey other
political leaders)
 Boundaries of the state are not the not the boundaries of society;