This week’s readings mainly challenge neorealists’ prescriptions about war and peace. While the systemic theory presented by Waltz (1979) sees international structure as the main source of war and equal distribution of power between two actors (bipolarity) as the main guarantee of peace, Bremer (1992) and Reed (2000) emphasize the role of domestic factors on the emergence of conflict, and Wohlforth (1999) claims that unipolarity not bipolarity will stabilize the international system. Thompson (2006), in contrast to Wohlforth, presents completely opposite arguments about the unipolarity of current system and makes different prediction related to its possible period of persistency. According to the subjects of debates this paper consists of two parts where besides findings and arguments of each article, I focus on the possible counterarguments that might be given as a response by realists. Systemic factors vs. domestic factors The first debate area is covered in articles by Stuart A. Bremer and William Reed. Particularly, Bremer claims that assumptions of idealism about pacifying effects of collective security alliances; democratization, economic development and reduced level of weaponry are more accurate than realism’s tenets. In contrary to Waltz’s (1988, 627) argument that “wars, hot and cold, originate in the structure of the international political system”, Reed contributes to this debate by further emphasizing the effects of domestic factors on the conflict onset and
"Your surroundings may change but your essence and your personality pretty much stay the same" (Dewan). The setting of the novel A Separate Peace is at an all boys school located in New Hampshire. The characters and plot are finely woven into the fabric of this institution. However, would events in this novel turn out differently if the story was set in a public high school, with a diverse environment? The characters and plot of A Separate Peace are not solely driven by their surroundings because the boys would still break the rules, Gene would have internal conflicts, and the war would affect the students.
What is the Just War theory and how did it pertain to St. Augustine? According to Augustine there is no private right to kill. According to Paul Ramsey opposes in The Just War, Christian participation in warfare “was not actually an exception to the commandment, “you shall not murder” but instead an expression of the Christian understanding of moral and political responsibility. One can kill only under the authority of God. St. Augustine argued that Christian rulers had such an obligation to make peace for the protection of his subjects even if the only way to eliminate such a threat was through force of arms. St. Augustine believed that in wars there was a right intention.
Betrayal, one of the most horrible things you could do to anyone your family, a friend anyone. To me it’s one of my all time most hated things a person could do and it’s almost unforgivable. In this book A Separate Peace by John Knowles two boys Phineas and Gene who are best friends at a boarding school in New Hampshire experience some of the worst kinds of Betrayal you could think of. Gene commits a very bad betrayal when he jousts the tree limb they are both standing on ending up with Finny falling and badly breaking his leg. This was no accident because Gene can’t stand the guilt.
At the Devon School in New Hampshire, in 1942, during World War II, the main character, Gene, becomes closer with his adventurous roommate, Finny, whose elemental charisma distracted them from the reality outside of the school. Throughout the novel the realness of the war becomes present and the war’s continuation parallels the growth of Gene, from a young innocent boy, to a man. These changes happen to align with one another and that coordination represents the theme of a loss of innocence in the novel. Due to the contradictory interactions with the war and the pursuit of adulthood, Genes development as a person runs alongside the progression of the war. In the novel, A Separate Peace by John Knowles, the relationship between the author’s use of war impacts the maturing of the main character Gene and further develops the theme of the loss of innocence.
In 1959, John Knowles’ novel A Separate Peace was published. The story chronicles the lives of young juniors at an all-boys fictional preparatory school named Devon, located somewhere in New England. Told in the years 1942–43, the story focuses on two main protagonists named Gene and Phineas, their friendship, and the notable differences in each boy’s personality. Gene’s number one pursuit at the school is to be the best academically, while Phineas revels in being a natural-born athlete. They develop a friendship, but the relationship is often one-sided, with Phineas wanting only Gene’s friendship, but Gene somehow is always suspicious of Phineas's intentions.
War is defined as a state of armed conflict within a nation or state or between nations or states. How can war be reduced to a mere conflict without explaining the vivid night terrors from the soldiers that must now live a life of psychological torment or the accumulating pressure placed on young adolescents to partake in the bloody event of the murder of human lives; furthermore, what does the definition of war imply about the societal views on the glorification of war? A Separate Peace prominently explores how war majorly affects not only the soldiers that are in the center of the war, but the civilians that live under the nation. The psychological toll that the younger generation faces is evidently shown through the causes and effects of the young men at a boys’ boarding school whose decisions are influenced by the war, such as Leper whose actions triggers an array of character development across several characters and reveals the philosophical significance of war. Leper’s role in A Separate
The purpose of this essay is to inform on the similarities and differences between systemic and domestic causes of war. According to World Politics by Jeffry Frieden, David Lake, and Kenneth Schultz, systemic causes deal with states that are unitary actors and their interactions with one another. It can deal with a state’s position within international organizations and also their relationships with other states. In contract, domestic causes of war pertain specifically to what goes on internally and factors within a state that may lead to war. Wars that occur between two or more states due to systemic and domestic causes are referred to as interstate wars.
The Just War Theory is a doctrine founded by Saint Augustine which has helped bring much discussion and debate to wars and the morality to fight in them. Wars and fights between people have gone on forever and are not perceived to stop anytime soon so it is important that some people thought about when and why they should ever fight. For many years Christians never part toke in this fighting due to teachings of the Bible and Jesus' teaching on 'turning the other cheek' and 'live by the sword, die by the sword'. Saint Augustine would be one of the first to talk about how a Christian could be a soldier and serve God at the same time. Through this thought we would receive the Just War Theory which gave a set of requirements for someone to partake
Huntington’s initial article argued that in the post-Cold War era the fundamental source of conflict would not be ideological or economic, but cultural. He continues by arguing that nation states will continue to be the most powerful actors in global affairs, but the conflicts of global politics that are to occur in the future will happen between
Realism has dominated international relations theory since emerging in the 1930’s. The era of state conflict lasting from the 1930’s to the end of the cold war in 1947, proved the perfect hostile environment to fit the largely pessimistic view of world politics. While many aspects of realism are still alive in International Relations today; including the dominant presence of states, intrinsic of war and the decentralised government. However, realism only reaches so far in explaining and creating a structure for international relations. Whilst the strengths of the theory lie in its pragmatic approach to power politics and conflict. However, the realist view is weakened by changes in the way that conflict is fought, the ineffectiveness of the balance of power model and the increasing global and interconnected world. Thus, using realism as a structure to explain international relations today is to some extent, a theory of the past.
Martin van Creveld wrote The Transformation of War book in 1991 when he detailed a predictive hypothesis about the changing character of war into what he called ?Nontrinitarian War. There were conflicts arise as intrastate wars and were not based on the simplified version of Clausewitz?s ?remarkable trinity? of government, people and military forces (Van Creveld, 1991, pg. 49). In his book, Van Creveld offers an account of warfare in the previous millennium and suggests what the future might hold. The drive was that major war was draining and the emergence of forms of war ?that are simultaneously old and new? now threatened to create havoc.
International order, though it may be fleeting in the grand scheme of history, seems to be at least on a continuous track of lingering longer and longer each time before chaos takes over. The Persians, Greeks, and Romans all seemed to enjoy ever-increasing periods of relative peace at the top of their systems of international order before it unraveled. Most of Europe was in good order on the tail of the Industrial Revolution until some arch duke decided to vacation in Sarajevo. After each major conflict, the world re-shuffles itself and order is established again in some form or fashion. The players are bigger and more numerous with greater consequences for conflict but order is still unseated from time to time and the rules of the existing orders seem to change daily. Realism can explain this violent cycle of order and disorder. States and even non-state actors continuously seek to balance regional power in order to secure their survival in a world dominated by fear and uncertainty; if unable to balance that power through violent means, players will seek to form alliances and organizations to at least prevent domination; once a status quo has been created and survival is temporarily assured, players will seek to maintain life within that order; new members thrust the order back into violence and potentially chaos if unable or unwilling to play by those rules. This cycle of power balancing can be illustrated in three phases. International orders are created as
Most poets use their unique gift of writing poetry to relieve stress or just to document their emotions towards a given subject. Others use it as a key to bring about social change and voice their opinion on modern events. This is the case in Stephen Crane’s War Is Kind. The speaker in the poem uses irony as a strategy to convince the reader of the harsh reality of war.
In my essay first I will explore the basic underlying concepts of realism, then I will revisit some of the main currents of thoughts in the field and finally I will point out some of the flaws and limitations of realist theories. To explore the weaknesses of realism I decided to turn to the criticism that was outlined by constructivists and by scholars of the English School.
“As globalisation has helped to spread the culture of violence, it has also helped to spread the need for global peace”. The urge for peace increased so much that the strategy of winning a war at all cost switched to the strategy where preventing a war became more important. Because peace is such an essential factor in global society, adjectives are used to make the definition more detailed. Positive and negative peace were a result from these adjustments. (Umoh & Udoh, 2011)