International Relations. A self-Study Guide to Theory

 
Constitutive theory: structural explanation ............................................ 
215 
Summary 
................................................................................................ 216 
4.3.
Epistemological interdependence: explaining through structural-
historical analysis ................................................................................... 
218 
4.4.
Political relevance: reification is disempowering .................................. 
219 

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Step 5: 
Check your understanding: 
key aspects and review questions ............................................................... 
220 
Step 6: 
Final self-study and consolidation .............................................................. 
222 

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Introduction 
In the previous unit you learned about world-systems analysis as a non-
positivist approach based on a holistic ontology, methodological holism, and 
an interpretivist epistemology (“understanding”). At the core of the current 
unit will be social constructivist theory as formulated by Alexander Wendt. 
In addition to the works of Immanuel Wallerstein, social constructivist theory 
provides another particularly interesting case when seen in the context of this 
book’s philosophy of science orientation. There are several reasons to choose 
Wendt’s works as a reference theory for this learning unit:
First, Alexander Wendt’s declared objective is to find “a via media be-
tween positivism and interpretivism by combining the epistemology of the 
one with the ontology of the other” (Wendt 2006: 182, my italics). He there-
fore attempts to synthesize what appear to be opposed positions: the episte-
mology of positivism and what he perceives to be the ontology of “interpre-
tivism”. As will be shown later in more detail, the term “interpretivism” as 
used by Wendt refers to ontological holistic/structuralist and social construc-
tivist philosophical assumptions. 
Second, with the so-called “positivism versus post-positivism debate” (or 
“Third Debate”) in the 1980s and 1990s, social constructivism in IR came up 
as one of the main challengers of positivist IR theorizing (see Ashley 1984 
for an early critique of neorealism; Kratochwil/Ruggie 1986 on regime theo-
ry; Wendt 1987 and Dessler 1989 on agency and structure). The work of Al-
exander Wendt, especially his meta-theoretical perspective of agency and 
structure as mutually constituted entities (Wendt 1987) and the theoretical 
argument of a social construction of “anarchy” (Wendt 1992) have been as-
sociated with social constructivism in IR. It was above all his seminal Social 
Theory of International Politics (1999) for which Wendt has been recognized 
as one of the major representatives of social constructivism in IR.
Third, Wendt’s work belongs at the center of this learning unit because he 
is one of the meta-theoretically most informed IR theorists. His writings illus-
trate his philosophy of science positions in an exceptionally precise and sys-
tematic way, making them ideal for this book concept.
Fourth, following the intellectual development Wendt undertakes regard-
ing his philosophy of science positions between 1987 (“The agent-structure 
problem in international relations theory”) and his recent writings (2006: 
“Social Theory as Cartesian Science” and 2010: “Flatland: Quantum Mind 
and the International Hologram”, and his forthcoming 2014 Limits of Interna-
tional Relations) may well be key to being well-prepared for upcoming meta-
theoretical debates in IR. Wendt’s Social Theory of International Politics re-

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flects an ontological turn towards the philosophical positions of scientific re-
alism – a turn that can be found in almost all social sciences, including eco-
nomics. This makes this turn a particularly interesting case for broader meta-
theoretical discussions in IR. Moreover, the ontological and epistemological 
re-orientation towards philosophical interpretations of quantum physics in 
Wendt’s more recent work presents the first attempt to transfer quantum the-
ory to International Relations. In doing so, Wendt recently completely re-
vised the philosophy of science basis of his constructivist Social Theory of 
International Politics. For this reason, the end of this text unit will be devot-
ed to the new lines of thinking in Wendt’s work, even though they leave be-
hind the social constructivist approach of Wendt’s Social Theory. 
Before we start to learn more about the social constructivist perspective of 
Alexander Wendt, we have to keep in mind that “social constructivism” in gen-
eral does not qualify as a coherent theoretical perspective in IR. There are many 
different social constructivist theories in IR that are based on quite different on-
tological and epistemological assumptions. Hence “social constructivism” is a 
term that subsumes many different approaches. In fact, constructivism can be 
considered a philosophy of science itself (see also Jørgensen 2010: 160-164). A 
theory is “constructivist” when it shares basic assumptions of constructivism as 
a philosophy of science. Consequently, the term can be applied to many theo-
ries of IR which share constructivist features (such as world-systems theory, a 
range of postmodern theories, Neogramscian approaches etc.) However, no co-
herent social constructivist theory of IR exists. There are theories of IR that to 
varying degrees share constructivist assumptions. In fact, this is ontologically 
true for almost all post-positivist approaches. 
It therefore comes as no surprise that all disciplines in the social sciences 
had a “constructivist turn” (and not only in the social sciences) that produced 
a variety of social constructivist-informed theories in those disciplines. For 
example, there is social constructivism in disciplines such as sociology (Ber-
ger/Luckmann 1966) and political geography (Reuber et al. 2003) In linguis-
tics, a constructivism exists that draws on the so- called linguistic turn (Lud-
wig Wittgenstein, John R. Searle 1995), hence pointing to the ontological po-
sition of acts of language and speech in social reality.
What social constructivist IR theories have in common is that they chal-
lenge the ontology of positivist IR theory by pointing to the importance of “so-
cial factors” such as ideas, norms, shared meanings, collective knowledge, cul-
ture, language and texts for the explanation of outcomes in international poli-
tics. According to these theories, reality is (to varying degrees and due to dif-
ferent social factors) socially constructed. “Social factors” are usually factors 
ascribed to “collectives”, not individuals. Different theories do this in different 

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ways and based on a range of other, often varying epistemological assump-
tions, hence the existence of a number of diverse social constructivist theories 
of IR (for a good overview see Ruggie 1998 and Jørgensen 2010: Chapter 7). 
To strengthen the argument of the previous paragraph about social con-
structivism as a philosophy of science, it might be helpful to recap what you 
have learned in our previous units about the distinction between philosophy 
of science positions (often called meta-theory) and IR theories. Wendt (1999: 
4-6) calls it “first- and second-order theorizing”: “Second order” relates to 
philosophy of science positions, that is, assumptions about the nature of hu-
man agency, its relation to structure, the role of ideas and material factors etc. 
You are already familiar with “second order theorizing” from the first part of 
the book. It encompasses the ontological, epistemological and methodologi-
cal assumptions (in short: philosophy of science) that any theory building 
rests on. Wendt calls it “social theory”. In contrast, “first order” relates to 
“substantial”, domain-specific theories. In IR, a “substantial theory” would 
be for example neorealist, new liberal or neoinstitutionalist theory etc. Theo-
ries are “domain-specific” in that they refer to particular social systems such 
as the international system, a