POL 5032

A new year, a new beginning in the graduate school. This year we have to answer nine questions and I want to address each one of them each week to see whether I can tease out some semblance of continuity.  And so:

Are states still the most important unit of analysis within IR and IPE theory? If so explain how the theories elaborate on this viewpoint, and if not why not? 

Realism and Pluralism with the corresponding IPE theories of Mercantilism and Liberalism, to my mind, still dominate the theoretical debate. And the more I think about IPE theory, the more I believe that politics dominates economics.  This I hope to prove over successive weeks, particularly when we deal with regional theories.  So to my mind states are still the most important unit of analysis, and we should be asking ourselves whether the world has moved beyond the US unipolar moment to a more multipolar balance of power or not.  And just how should we think about the current Balance of Power within the international system? 

Alternatively, we can argue that states are no longer the prime movers and shakers within the international system, and accept the liberal viewpoint of the withering away of the state.  I am not buying right now, as I believe nationalism is once again on the rise and we have not entered a post-Westphalian system.