International Relations Theories

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‘The strong do what they want and the weak suffer what they must’ (Thucydides). Discuss with reference to International Relations Theories. The study of international relations (IR) has existed for thousands of years, since the time of Thucydides, and involves a diverse range of subjects such as history, philosophy, law and other major studies, featuring political dimensions and the geographical and cultural features of each state. However IR only became a separate discipline and a branch of political science in the early 20th century after WW1, when the need for interstate communication was seen as essential in order to avoid another war. IR is concentrated around two major theories: Liberalism - an optimistic approach extoling personal freedom, cooperation, peace and progress, which draws upon thinkers such as Kant, Locke and Bentham - and the Realist approach, which is more pessimistic and emphasizes the brutal nature of humanity and can be summed up in the sentence by the ancient Greek historian Thucydides, one of the founding fathers of Classical Realism - “The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.”(1972:406). Different theories of International Relations will be discussed throughout this essay, featuring traditional approaches and those of their contemporary offspring. Realism has been the dominant aspect of International Relations in many different forms. Starting from the 1930s, after the utopian liberal idealism of the 1920s had failed to provide answers and peaceful cooperation was not achieved, Classical Realism appeared and remained paramount until the behaviourist revolution of the 1960s(Jackson,Sorensen,2007 :36-39), and the discipline began to imbibe the ideas of the Classical Realists Thucydides (ancient Greek historian), Machiavelli (Renaissance Italian political theorist) and Hobbes (17th century English political and legal
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