Introduction: How to Explain State Behaviour in International Relations?

How can we understand and conceptualise processes, actions, outputs and outcomes within international relations (IR)? Two paradigms have dominated how scholars have approached this question in the past: political Realism and the idea of Liberalism (with the constructivist idea gaining momentum since the 1990s). There is still debate about the number of ideas in IR theory, for example, Legro and Moravcsik count ‘at least three paradigmatic alternatives’ to Realism (1999: 10). One approach to understand the differences and the different usages of the theoretical approaches is to look at the variables under consideration in each strain of thought.

Rose (1998: 146) argues that the main difference in explaining state behaviour lies in the dichotomy between Realist approaches that see international pressures and structures as the driving force in international politics, whereas ‘Innenpolitik’ approaches like Liberalism and Constructivism focus on domestic pressures. Sterling-Folker (1997) identifies the difference between environment-based Realist approaches and process-based Liberal approaches. While the assessment of the Realist approach coincides with Rose’s, her focus on process is not necessarily confined to domestic politics, but can rather be applied to international organisations and institutions as well. Legro and Moravcsik, on the other hand, equally claim that the central variable defines the respective paradigm in IR theory. ‘Power, preferences, beliefs, and information […] correspond to the four major categories of modern rationalist International Relations theory, namely realist, liberal, epistemic, and institutionalist theories’ (1999: 46–47).

Taking a step back from this theoretical discussion, what are the problems we are trying to analyse using these approaches? The main questions raised by the two dominant schools of thought are how states act in the international arena and what their motives are. Or to simply put it in Moravcsik's (1992) words, ‘to explain what states do.’ Deducted from these general considerations, the question of war, peace and security is dominant in the literature – indeed it has been a driving force of the normative ideas behind Liberalism – and has been extended by the question of how cooperation in IR works and what role do norms and institutions play.