Commonsense Constructivism, or the Making of World Affairs (International Relations in a Constructed World) - Softcover

Pettman, Ralph

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0765605783 ISBN 13: 9780765605788

Publisher: Routledge, 2000

Synopsis

Fully accessible to students and scholars alike, this engaging book introduces the constructivist approach to understanding world affairs. In a highly readable and witty way, it shows how people and their social relations are the basis for everything around us -- International Relations included.

About this title

About the Author

Ralph Pettman

From the Back Cover

This engaging book presents an intriguing new approach to understanding world affairs.

"Constructivism" first found its way to IR -- the field of international relations -- in an exceptionally demanding form. This book is quite the opposite. In a highly readable and witty way, Commonsense Constructivism, or the Making of World Affairs, makes clear how everything around us (IR included) is constructed.

In the process, it also shows how narrow the standard IR approaches are, and how much we miss as a consequence. Ralph Pettman's conceptual framework of state-making, wealth-making, self-making, and mind-making allows us to see such notions as "globalization" in a revealing new light.

This work is intended to be fully accessible to students, but it will be welcomed by anyone who has been mystified by constructivism -- or who simply wants to better understand the ways we understand our world.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION: Commonsense Constructivism

1. Making World Affairs

I. THE NEGLECTED ASPECTS OF THE DISCIPLINE

2. Making Modernity

3. Making Sovereign Selves, Social Collectives, and Nations

II. THE DOMINANT ASPECTS OF THE DISCIPLINE

4. Making States and Making Markets

CONCLUSION: A Constructed World

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0765605783
• ISBN 13: 9780765605788
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256