Constructivist Security Studies: Portrait of a Research Program

• Published in: International Studies Review Vol. 4; no. 1; pp. 49 - 72
• Main Author: Farrell, Theo
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Boston, USA and Oxford, UK Blackwell Publishing, Inc 01.04.2002; Blackwell Publishing
• Subjects: Constructivism; Epistemology; International politics; International Relations; International relations theory; International security; Japanese culture; Liberalism; Methodology (Philosophical); Military culture; National security; Ontology; Paradigms; Positivism; Realism; Reflection and Reappraisal; Security; Security studies; Social Constructionism; Social constructivism; War
• ISSN: 1521-9488; 1468-2486
• DOI: 10.1111/1521-9488.t01-1-00252

The traditional focus on power and politics in security studies has been robustly challenged this decade by the development of two ideational approaches to the subject: constructivism and culturalism. The first section briefly examines these two literatures, considers how they have differed in the past, and suggests how they may now form a coherent constructivist research program. Section two clears up two common misconceptions about constructivism in security studies-namely, that it does not have a positivist epistemology but has a normative agenda. Constructivists do seek to explain the world (according to rules of social science) but not to change it. Section three addresses the criticism that a positivist epistemology is inconsistent with an ontology that gives causal weight to cultural variables. The final section concludes by discussing two options-one confrontational, the other cooperative-for a constructivist engagement of realism (the dominant approach in North American security studies).