National identity and the limits of constructivism in international relations theory: a case study of the Suez Canal

Constructivism in most of its variants emphasises the creation of circumstances and the social construction of reality. In international relations theory (IR), it also emphasises the establishment of international regimes. The Suez Canal and its governing regime, established at a high point of European nationalism and imperialism in the nineteenth century, are explored as a test case. I argue that, while the early history of the Canal is illuminated by a constructivist approach, maintenance of the regime to govern it involved military intervention and debt restructuring. Military force, balance of power considerations and economic interests all have to be invoked to explain the later history of the Canal, that is, factors usually stressed by the realist school. A combination of realist and constructivist approaches is recommended. The paper is also critical of certain constructivist concepts of national identity.     

The Science of Empire: Darwinism,Human Diversity,and Russian Physical Anthropology

Summary : The article explores deployment of the Darwinian narrative of the “natural history of humanity” in Russian physical anthropology in the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century. It traces two narratives developed by the leading Russian school of physical anthropology: one narrative advanced a universalist vision of collective scholarly enterprise working toward clarifying the missing links in the a priori accepted developmental evolutionary model. The other constructed a new language that undermined the idea of species/subspecies/races/nations/ as stable, externally bounded, and internally homogeneous units and attempted to rationalize imperial hybridity. The article's main focus is on the latter classificatory narrative, its relational methodology, and the protostructuralist units of comparison that it produced.     

Institutions,informality, and influence: explaining nuclear cooperation in the Australia-US alliance

ABSTRACT

Nuclear cooperation has been a consistent feature of the Australia-US alliance. In the 1950s and 1960s, Canberra explored transferring US nuclear weapons to Australian forces operating in Southeast Asia. Since the 1960s, Australian governments have supported hosting joint facilities that contribute to America’s ability to execute global nuclear operations. And Australia has regularly invoked the nuclear umbrella as part of the alliance. We explain the key sources of nuclear cooperation in the alliance by leveraging realist and institutionalist theories of alliance cooperation. While realism explains limits to US nuclear commitments in the 1950s, institutional explanations are more relevant in pinpointing the sources of nuclear cooperation and in explaining why Australia has often achieved its policy preferences as the junior partner.     

坚持用唯物史观认识和把握中国国情——学习华岗史学思想的一点体会

华岗同志是一位忠诚于党的事业的革命前辈,卓越的马克思主义理论家.在思想理论战线,他所关注的领域,涉及哲学、政治学、美学、历史学诸方面.华岗的史学思想,具有鲜明的特色,至今仍有强烈的现实意义.他强调研究历史是为了推动历史、创造历史;他发扬中国史学的"求真"传统,把追求历史的真实看作是史学研究的生命;他大力提倡学术创新,认为创新是史学发展的本质要求.     

Between realism and the 'New Right': geopolitics in Germany in the 1990s

This essay explores the connections between geopolitics and political conservatism. The introductory argument is that geopolitics historically has been appealing and useful for two very different expressions of conservatism: one which aims to preserve the political geography of the existing international status quo and one which seeks to transcend it and establish a new international order. Through an examination of the 'renaissance' of a conservative geopolitics in Germany, the essay considers how this particular pattern is reproduced in the present day. Although this conservative geopolitics operates for the most part at the fringes of political discourses in Germany, it does have a more specific significance for nationalist-conservative perspectives and those of the 'New Right', both in Germany and elsewhere.     

Do Not Say That You Have Forgotten King and Father: Yunqi Zhuhong’s Chan Realism

This essay examines the late Ming-dynasty Chan master Yunqi Zhuhong’s commentary on the Brahma Net Sutra (Fanwangjing), which it takes up in order to explore his discourse concerning both Chan realism and his ensuing rejection of mainstream Chan gongan rhetoric. The Brahma Net Sutra contains a list of major and minor precepts governing proper morality for monastic and lay Buddhists. Zhuhong’s interpretation of the Twenty-First Minor Precept, which prohibits revenge, offers insight into his sense of political realism regarding the relationship between gradual teachings, provisional truths, and ultimate truth. His interpretation of the Tenth Minor Precept, which prohibits storing weapons, demonstrates his moral realism in contrast to Chan’s traditional use of pedagogical violence. Zhuhong’s realist discourse, influenced by the teachings of the Buddhist Vinaya as well as by engagement with Confucian ethics, presents an overlooked counter-narrative shift that contrasts with the emphasis on sudden enlightenment and antinomianism in Chan gongan discourse typical of the Tang and Song dynasties.     

What You See Is (Not) What You Get? The Taiwan Question,Geo‐economic Realities,and the “China Threat” Imaginary

Abstract: Despite emergent trends of geo‐economic integration between nation‐states, the role of realist‐driven geopolitical calculation appears highly enduring. This paper explores the potential contradictions between state‐centric geopolitical concerns and transnational geo‐economic formation through an exploration of China–US tensions over Taiwan, a territory of indeterminate geo‐legal status and which China regards as its own province. I consider how the Taiwan Relations Act, a domestic public law of the US that frames US–Taiwan relations and has a major influence on East Asian geopolitics, could contradict emergent “China region”, and possibly even China–US, geo‐economic integration. This is because the US‐sustained arms sales to Taiwan rest on imagining and containing China as a “threat”, while geo‐economic integration entails enrolling China as a strategic partner, if not an ally. Consequently, the Taiwan issue could stifle the enhancement of Sino‐American relations at a historical juncture when the Chinese and American economies are more intertwined than ever.     

Responsibility,Humility, and Intervention

Abstract

This paper proposes an analysis of The Responsibility to Protect that is rooted in the Christian realism of Reinhold Niebuhr. R2P rests on three central claims: sovereignty ought to be understood in terms of responsibility rather than control, the just cause criterion for war should include humanitarian protection, and rightful authority ought to be relocated to multilateral institutions. In turn, Niebuhr’s Christian realism proposes a dialectic of responsibility and humility that shapes our understanding of justice and coercion. While examining R2P through a Niebuhrian lens shows some compatibility between the two moral frameworks, it also reveals the insufficient understanding of humility with respect to human motivations and limitations that underlies R2P’s criteria.     

Green Allies: Speculative Realism,Evangelical Christianity,and Political Pluralism

This essay addresses the question of how to build political coalitions to address global warming. For speculative realists such as Levi Bryant, responding to climate change demands materialist ontologies that recognize the efficacy of things themselves, e.g. fossil fuels. And yet, I argue, Bryant does not sufficiently address the political assignment of building political coalitions with people who endorse different ontologies. To illuminate this possibility, I show how the American evangelical David Gushee arrives at similar conclusions by a different route. The essay encourages speculative realists to fold modesty into their political thinking for the sake of building coalitions with theists about matters of common concern.