Lesson 9. Chapter 9, Methodological Debates: Post-Positivist Approaches
For dictionary reference visit: www.oup.com/elt/OALD
Critical Theory. Postmodernism. Constructivism
pp 248 - 259
Task 1. According to the text, is it True or False?
Critical Theory
1. This methodological approach is mainly development of realist thought and could be described as neo-Marxism.
2. It was developed by a small group of Austrian scholars many of whom were living in exile in the United Kingdom.
3. In IR critical theory is closely linked to Marxist IPE.
4. Critical theorists reject basic postulates of positivism: an objective external reality; the subject-object distinction; and value-free social science.
5. According to critical theorists, there is no world politics or global economics which operates in accordance with immutable social law.
6. The social world is a construction of time and place: the international system is a specific construction of the most powerful states.
7. Everything that is sociological, including international relations, is changeable and thus historical.
8. Since world politics are constructed rather than discovered, there is no fundamental distinction between subject (the analyst) and object(the focus of
analysis)
9. For critical theorists knowledge is not and cannot be neutral either morally or politically or ideologically.
10 Knowledge is never biased because it is produced from the social prospective of the analyst.
Task 2. Match the definition with the word:
A. inclination
1. that cannot be changed; that will never change
UNCHANGEABLE:
B. disdain
2 a feeling that makes you want to do sth;
C. incredulous
3. the feeling that sb/sth is not good enough to deserve your respect or attention
CONTEMPT
D. partisan
4. (formal) that has been admitted or stated in public
E. avowed
5. adj. (often disapproving) showing too much support for one person, group or idea, especially without considering it
F. demystify
carefully
ONE-SIDED; a person who strongly supports a particular leader, group or idea
FOLLOWER;
G. epitome
6. to make sth easier to understand and less complicated by explaining it in a clear and simple way;
H. cast
7. to make light, a shadow, etc. appear in a particular place;
I. arrogance
8. a perfect example of sth
EMBODIMENT;
J. conceit
9. the behaviour of a person when they feel that they are more important than other people, so that they are rude to them or do
K.immutable
not consider them;
10. adj. not willing or not able to believe sth; showing an inability to believe sth;
11. (disapproving) too much pride in yourself and what you do;
Textbook: Introduction to International Relations. R. Jackson&G. Sorensen
Exercises: Tatjana Kouts: k_tatjana@hotmail.com
Lesson 9. Chapter 9, Methodological Debates: Post-Positivist Approaches
For dictionary reference visit: www.oup.com/elt/OALD
Critical Theory. Postmodernism. Constructivism
pp 248 - 259
Task 3. Make possible questions to the sentences:
1. Positivists methodologies in IR provoked post-positivist reactions including critical theory, postmodernism, constructivism, and normative theory.
2. Post – positivism is a broad church.
3. All these methodological approaches are elaborate and complicated and each one displays internal disagreements among its advocates.
4. Robert Cox expressed a view that all IR theories are biased in a frequently quoted remark: “Theory is always for someone and for some purpose”.
5. Cox draws a distinction between positivist or problem-solving knowledge and critical or “emancipator” knowledge.
6. According to Robert Cox critical theory contains an element of historical utopianism.
7. Critical theory is not confined to an examination of states and the state system but focuses more widely on power and domination in the world
generally.
8. Critical theorists seek knowledge for political purpose: to liberate humanity from the oppressive structures of the world politics and world economics
which are controlled by hegemonic powers, particularly the capitalist United States.
9. Critical theorists thus believe that theoretical debates are basically political debates.
10. Like the inner-war idealists, critical theorists are trying to bring about the social and political revolution that their ideology proclaims.
Task 4. Fill in the gaps with a suitable phrase:
1. Critical theorists seek to ……. the political interests that different IR theories and theorists serve.
2. But even more than that: they seek to use their knowledge ….. what they believe is …… end of all knowledge:
the great goal of …… from global social structures which until now have privileged a relatively small minority of
the world’s population at the expense of majority.
3. ….. can thus be understood as explicitly and avowedly revolutionary: it seeks to …… the existing world political
and economic system.
4. The value of any theory would be based on …….: does it shed light on the world, increase our rational
knowledge of it, and …… demystify it?
Task 5. Answer the questions: p 250 - 252
1 What is postmodernism?
2. Who is a leading postmodernism theorist?
3. What do postmodernists seek to make scholars aware of?
4. What is the most important conceptual prison?
5. What and who are postmodernists critical of?
6. How do postmodernists see neorealism?
Textbook: Introduction to International Relations. R. Jackson&G. Sorensen
Exercises: Tatjana Kouts: k_tatjana@hotmail.com
* to advance*
*human emancipation*
*Critical IR theory*
*the ultimate*
* political values*
* ultimately*
*identify*
*overthrow*
Lesson 9. Chapter 9, Methodological Debates: Post-Positivist Approaches
Critical Theory. Postmodernism. Constructivism
pp 248 - 259
7. What do postmodernists reject?
8. What believes are intellectual illusions?
9. What is the contribution of postmodernist IR methodology?
For dictionary reference visit: www.oup.com/elt/OALD
Task 6. Put the words in the right order and read the sentences
1. including Every decides theory, neorealism, for counts itself what as ‘facts’.
2. is Empirical myth. theory
3. everything involving In other there is reality; human beings is no objective subjective. words,
4. power Knowledge and are related. intimately
Task 7. Match the parts of the sentences:
1.Postmodernists are deconstructivists who
2.The main target of postmodernist
3. Postmodernist critiques of neorealism target
4. Poring cold water on academic or scientific
5. If every account of the social world is arbitrary and biased,
6. A more worrying problem is that postmodernism can
7. A world exclusively of contingency and chance,
……pretensions can be a good thing.
……rather than choice and reason, may cease to be either
intelligible or meaningful.
……deconstruction in IR is neorealism.
……the anarchical structure and ahistorical bias of the theory.
……then postmodernism cannot be spared: its critique can be
turned upon itself.
……speak of theories as ‘narratives’ or ‘metanarratives’
……deteriorate into nihilism – i.e. negativism for its own sake.
Task 8. Read pp 253 -259 and write a summary about Constructivism.
Textbook: Introduction to International Relations. R. Jackson&G. Sorensen
Exercises: Tatjana Kouts: k_tatjana@hotmail.com