Realism, Neoliberalism and Constructivism

The realism
For the realists, such as Hans Morgenthau, think the international system is anarchy. It’s a self-help system, in which states must not expect others to secure their own national interests. There is no institution upon the nation states. How do the realists explain the existence of the international organizations? They consider them to be a forum. The actors in the international politics are still the nation states.
The realists also assume that the national interests are generic and easily-defined. The ultimate goal is to preserve the political autonomy. Beyond this, the national interests are interpreted differently, mainly from an objective stance and from a subjective stance. From an objective stance, the national interests really exist like the common sense. From a subjective standpoint, national interests can be defined by the conduct of the states; hence, it would be more empirical. Personally speaking, I analogized the objective national interests to the natural law and the subjective stance to the custom law.
Another assumption of the realism is that the nation states struggle for power and peace. Power has several characteristics. First, power is easy to define. Second, power is a means as well as an end. Neo-liberalists view the security as the end and power as the means.
They view the international mechanism in a more limited way. States make an alliance when they have a specific and common enemy. For example, the creation of the NATO is to stop the Soviet Union.
The neo-liberalism
The liberalism comprises a very broad range of braches, from the Wilsonian idealism to neo-liberal theory and the democratic peace.
Led by Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye, the neo-liberalism embraces many aspects proposed by the neo-realists. However, unlike the relative gains by the neo-realists, they focus more on the absolute gains. Therefore, they see more chances to cooperate. Moreover, the neo-liberalists believe in the international institutions. States might cooperate out of their own interests. They can exert the hegemony within the institutions because institutions reflect the national interests when created.
Once created, the international organizations take their own existence, and the organizations may change their mandates and have their own interests. States don’t try to abolish the old ones and create a whole new afterwards because of five reasons. First, they have to pay a heavy transaction cost to create a new agency. Second, the states stay in the institutions to keep their reputation. Third, they can reiterate their interests through the institutions. Fourth, the international mechanism provides the nation states the linkage. The institutions facilitate the process of negotiating a multilateral treaty. Finally, the institutions can also provide information about other countries.
The constructivism
Constructivism consist a bridge between the realism and the liberalism; it provides an alternative view. One of the assumptions of the constructivism is that identities, norms, and culture play important roles in world politics. States still have their self-interests. Identities and interests of states are not simply structurally determined, but are rather produced by interactions, institutions, norms, cultures. It is process, not anarchy, which determines the manner in which states interact.
Moreover, the rules, norms and international institutions don’t have an implication to the nation states when they are only rules. They are perceived by the states and then developed into implicit rules to influence the behavior of the states. Thus, the beliefs and other norms are also possible to change.
Power, as the norms, needs to be established. A nation state can have the real power when this state can establish its credibility and the others perceive its practice and recognize its power. Constructivists accept the anarchy is a fact. Martha Finnemore assumes that even anarchy is a social context. Cooperation is possible in the international system, but the identities are the determinants of the success of the initial cooperation. They also believe both in hard power and soft power; they think that these two kinds of power are essential in an attempt to understand the world politics.
The application to the burning house
There are several scenarios fitting in to the realist scenario. The scenario 7, when no one takes the lead, it means that everyone in the house has to figure way out on his own. It will produce the anarchy. That’s the reality of world politics: when there is a disaster or threat, a person/nation has no one to rely on; he has to escape from the fire on his own. In scenario 1, when the fire is intense and one can see no one in the smoke, the resident would logically do his best to get out of the house because the survival is the person’s utmost interests. As he can see no one, he can not rely on his friends in the house, which means that he should not rely on the alliances. The tallest occupants can escape from the windows in the 8th situation. It means the “capabilities” matter. In this case, the end is to escape from the burning house, and the means thus would be the advantage of height.
The 13th scenario, at the first sight, should be perfectly explained by the realism because that person should know that saving his own life is more important than saving the paper. However, if in this situation, the student values this paper highly and this paper will have such a big impact on his grades, then these values will change his behavior. He will re-shape his interests and decide to save himself as well as the paper. This will be the constructivist view. Then, if after the house has been burnt down, the students want the professor to extend the deadline because they all lost their paper, the students can voice their interests through a new student association to conduct the multilateral action. The association one created will continue to function after the original mission because students will find it serves their interests to act in a group and also the association will establish its legitimacy. This would be the neo-liberalist approach.
In the 12th scenario, someone inside the house set the fire means that this person wants to break the status quo of the power distribution right now in the house. This person wants to break the balance of power and then ascend to a better position (probably a bigger room or a friendlier roommate) through the chaos. However, through constructivism, this occupant also wants to have a favorable distribution of power. If they perceive their interests would be preserved and not jeopardized by the demand of the person, they would probably change the norms or the mechanism. However, if they don’t feel this occupant’s deeds would be a threat, they won’t change their own behavior, which might lead to another conflict.
The third scenario is the neo-liberalist manners. People group together in advance in order to face an uncertain threat and to achieve the common good. It’s not the ad hoc coalition as the realist might prefer but a more organized mechanism, which is collective security. The 11th scenario can also be interpreted in several ways. The fire department is located just two blocks away and is renowned for its excellent response time. The most popular explanation would be the institutional explanation. The establishment of the fire department is due to the collective security. To the neo-liberalism, the collective security is established in order to respond to a future threat. They also believe that the fire department will achieve the common good. But from a realist point of view, there are three problems when we make alliances to respond to long term threats: bandwagoning, chainganging and freeridership. One way to stop this situation is to establish a K-group, a critical mass, to provide the services. Thus, the voluntary firefighters are the K-group members to avoid the free-rider behavior. According to the constructivism, what we think about the fire department is determined by the past experience. Since its past performance is good, residents in the house would probably slow down the evacuation since the fire department is near to the house and they trust this institution.