International Relations. A self-Study Guide to Theory

 
World-systems analysis 
Core question 
•
What does historical social science as a form of analy-
sis contribute to the transformation of social reality? 
Ontological assumptions 
about actors and structure 
•
The “historical social system” as the basic unit of the 
social world
•
The whole (system) is ontologically prior to its parts 
(ontological holism) 
•
The social whole is not reducible to its constituent 
elements (ontological and methodological holism) 
•
Unity of the spheres of social life (politics, econom-
ics, society) 
“Agency and structure” 
•
Ontological priority of structure (ontological holism) 
•
Social structures are ontologically independent of 
the actions 
•
Agents (persons, identity groups, states, and class 
agents) act according to the single logic of the sys-
tem, they are determined by structure. Agency is ex-
plained in terms of the “whole” (methodological ho-
lism) 
•
Agency only in the transition phase from one histori-
cal system to another: historical choices. Here, hu-
man actions are crucial for the transformation of 
structures 
Nature of explanation and 
causality 
•
Explanation is structuralist/holistic, constitutive form 
of causality
•
Structuralist/holistic explanation: structures (the 
whole) are generative (explanation NOT in terms of 
the properties of individuals or their relations). Struc-
tures constitute or generate actors (e.g. the state, 
classes, identity groups) 
•
Actors/actions are explained in relation to the world-
system as a whole (methodological holism) 
Approach to “levels of 
analysis” 
•
No “level of analysis” (concept is not applicable be-
cause positivism is rejected)