Liberalism

In International Relations Theory

Dmitry Pobedash
Ural State University

Outline

Major figures
The first IR paradigm
It takes all sorts to make the liberalism
Key concepts
A success story?

Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)

Leviathan created to avoid war of all
against all
Individual sovereignty
surrendered to preserve
individual rights
The best solution

monarchy!

John Locke (1632-1704)

All men are born free and equal
in rights to life, liberty, estate.
In civil society everyone surrenders
its sovereignty to community ruled
by separate executive and
legislative powers.
If the ruler breaks the social contract
down with him!

Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)

Utilitarianism
between the interests of nations
there is nowhere a real conflict

establish a common tribunal and the

necessity for war no longer follows
from the difference of opinion
American Confederation,
Swiss League, German Diet

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804)

Contemporary IR Lawless state of

savagery
Transformation of individual consciousness
Republican constitutionalism
A federal contract between states to
abolish war a permanent
peace
treaty rather than a
superstate
actor or world
government

Richard Cobden (1804-65)

The Apostle of Free Trade

Improve education, decrease military
spending, lower taxes
National hero for Corn Law, 1846
Traitor for campaign against the
Crimean War
Anglo-French Commercial Treaty,
1860

Herbert Spenser, (1820-1903)

Social Darwinism
The Organic Analogy, but
Differences between Society and
Body
Social Evolution

Military society compulsory cooperation of

members
Industrial society voluntary
Ethical state common resources to perfect
human character

The Happy Gang

John Atkinson Hobson

Norman Angell
Alfred Eckhardt Zimmern
James Thomson Shotwell
Pitman Potter

The Birth of a Discipline

The day of conquest and aggrandizement is gone by...
justice to all peoples and
nationalities, and their right
to live on equal terms of
liberty and safely with one
another, whether they be
strong or weak.

The first Chair of International Relations,

in University of Wales, Aberystwyth

Woodrow Wilson

The only President with a Ph.D.

President of Princeton University,
1902-10
The 14 points address to Congress,
January 1918
The first sitting President to visit
Europe
Women and blacks are excluded

14 points
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.

Open covenants openly arrived at

Freedom of the seas in peace and war
Remove all economic barriers to trade
Reduction of national armaments
A readjustment of all colonial claims
Leave Russia alone
Evacuate and restore Belgium
Restore France, return Alsace-Lorraine

14 points
9. Readjust Italian frontiers along national
lines
10. Self-determination for peoples of
Austria-Hungary
11. Redraw boundaries of Balkan states
along historically established lines of
nationality
12. Self-determination for peoples under
Turkish rule

14 points
13. Independence for Poland with free
access to the sea guaranteed by
international covenant
14. Form a general association of nations
under specific covenants to afford mutual
guarantees of political independence and
territorial integrity to great and small
states alike.

Three Images

Individual
State
System

The Three Images

Images

Who, when Causes of war

Human
nature

R. Cobden
mid-19thc.

How to make
peace

Govts intervene at
Indiv. liberty, free
home and abroad,
trade, prosperity,
disturb natural order interdependence

The state W. Wilson Undemocratic nature National selfearly 20th c. of intntl. politics, esp.determination, open
foreign policy and
balance of power

Structure J. Hobson Balance of power

of system early 20th c. system

govts respond to
public opinion,
collective security

World govt. with

powers to mediate
and enforce
decisions

Liberalism in

Economics
Domestic politics
International relations:

Liberal internationalism
Idealism
Liberal institutionalism

Liberal Internationalism

A law-governed international society

can emerge without a world govt.
The progress of freedom depends on
maintenance of peace, spread of
commerce and diffusion of education
Human society can be based on natural
order

Liberal Internationalism

Natural harmony in relations by the

invisible hand of laissez faire economic
principles
By pursuing self-interest actors
inadvertently promote public good
Capitalism is natural and inherently
pacific
Economic interdependence fosters peace

Idealism

Peace is not natural but must be

constructed
Domestic analogy international
governance must use the same
procedures
Collective security rather than alliance
system (collective defence)
Teaching what ought to be and not
just what is Wilson Chair

Liberal Institutionalism

Transnational cooperation needed to

resolve common problems
Cooperation in one sector would
extend range of collaboration
Growing integration increases the
cost of withdrawal from cooperative
ventures
Pluralism of actors

Key Concepts of Liberalism

Collective security
Democratic peace and democracy
promotion
Integration and interdependence
Rule of law, human rights
Normative element in theory
Pluralism of actors
World government

Liberal Successes

The League of Nations

The ILO, the Health Organization, the
Mandates Commission
Political disputes resolved

Finland-Sweden, Germany-Poland, GreeceBulgaria, Turkey-Iraq, Bolivia-Paraguay,

Peru-Colombia

Apprenticeship for the UN

The English School of IR

The First Great Debate

Reinhold Niebuhr. Moral Man and

Immoral Society, 1932
Edward Carr. The Twenty Years
Crisis, 1939
Frederick Schuman
Georg Schwarzenberger