Morganthau, Zvobko, and Loken Related to bell hooks

 Tickner's critique of Morgenthau’s six principles of political realism based on feminist theory and Zvobgo and Loken’s argument of why race matters in international relations very strongly relate to the ideas in bell hooks’ Theory as Liberatory Practice.  In hooks’ argument, she looks at how theory has historically been defined in a white patriarchal society and works to disregard the ideas of women and non-white people.  She argues that what people consider to be “valid” theory is actually just the theories that support the system that benefits white men.  Theory in itself is a broad concept that can be used in many different ways to arbitrarily support certain ideas.  Zvobgo and Loken bring this idea back to international relations by arguing that it “privileges theorizing over historical description and analysis”.  By using theory instead of analyzing history, people are able to justify racial imperialism by using theoretical concepts that favor western white nations through terms like “civilized” and “uncivilized”.  According to hooks’ argument, the reason that these types of theoretical concepts work is because the people that define this type of theory benefit from the actions taken based on these ideas.  If one were to look at what “civilized” and “uncivilized” mean from a historical and analytical in the context of international relations, rather than theoretically, it would be clear that “civilized” means white and “uncivilized” means non-white.  Hooks’ argument is also applicable to Tickner’s critique.  Morganthau defines power from a masculine perspective and ignores the feminine perspective.  Based on hook’s argument the reason that Morganthau’s theory is accepted is because, similarly to racially motivated theory of arguments like “civilized” and “uncivilized”, his theory upholds the patriarchal white system.  Tickner’s redefinition of the six principles of political realism shows how if mainstream theory is questioned, instead of accepted at face value as fact, new theory can arise that would support changing the way political systems function. 

The second part of hooks’ Theory is a Liberatory Practice looks at how theory can be liberating if it is made more accessible and easier to understand.  The most glaring example of this is the original six principles of political realism outlined by Morganthau.  The wording is complex and would be difficult for many people to grasp.  The ideas presented are used to justify the exploitation of people who may not understand the theory behind it.  Hooks argues that if theories such as this were made simpler to understand, people would be more inclined to question the actions that political actors are taking.  Zvobgo and Loken’s argument questions the acceptance of words like “civilized” and “uncivilized”.  These words are vague and allow people to use them to justify their actions.  Zvobgo and Loken present their ideas in a way that is straight to the point and easy to understand.  This allows the reader to understand the basis of racial imperialism and may lead to people questioning the status quo.  Overall, Tickner, Zvobgo, Loken, and hooks all have a similar goal of questioning how theory is viewed and accepted in society and inviting people to not only question one specific theory, but use analytical thinking and historical analysis to question all the ways in which theory is used to justify political action.  


Works Cited

Hooks, Bell. “Theory as Liberatory Practice.” Yale Journal of Law and Feminism 4 (1991): 2.

Comments

  1. Kyle LionettiFebruary 9, 2022 at 9:13 AM

    While I have never read anything from Bell Hooks, I agree with your argument that theory is what creates these power imbalances through men. Your first example from the Zvobgo and Loken reading highlights the uses of the word civilized and uncivilized, and how many people accepted this theory for years, when in reality, this was just something Europe pushed to justify the means. Furthermore, when you look at Morganthau, it is easy to see how other white men might agree with his theory, because a white man in international relations made it.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

ICC articles

When it comes to the arguments on the International Crimes Court, I think the article presented by Daniel Abebe is the most convincing to me. After reading the article presented right before it, (the article by Anne Marie Gotez), it seemed that maybe the best way to fix the problems within the ICC would be to give them more funding and allow them to give more financial aid to the victims of these war crimes. Furthermore, she said that the funding for this program had been below a million and it was not enough for the ICC to function effectively. However, after reading the article presented by Abebe it stated that since 2002, the ICC has spent over a billion dollars. If in 20 years they were able to spend this mass amount of money, then there is no way that they are being underfunded. Moreover, Abebe states that the funding for the ICC is over 100 millions dollars a year, which is an incredible quantity of money for people to be asking for more money to be pumped into the system. Abeb...
Read more

Global Justice and Nationalism

  The Stanford Encyclopedia of philosophy writes in brief the philosophical values and traditions regarding global justice, how it is defined by their standards, and how it is played out within other nation states. I will be focusing mainly on section 2.3, which discusses the duties of compatriots versus non-compatriots, and goes on to further understand the differences between the two, such as how state actors and non-state actors view one another and potentially interact. While most have viewed nationalism in a positive light, nationalism goes beyond respect for national sovereignty, this ideology can perpetuate negative attitudes towards other countries and sometimes even make one states citizens seem morally superior than another citizen who is belonging to another state (Gillian, 2015). There is a debate among egalitarian theorists discussing whether or not concerns with equality should be confined to state members or be granted to every individually globally (Gillian, 2015). ...
Read more

The United States and the World Trade Organization

     Recently there has been large debates regarding the implications regarding the possibility of the United States potentially pulling out of the World Trade Organization. While some politicians and economists supported this idea and have argued that it would be beneficial for the US to leave this organization, the US would have to face some serious consequences that would be hard to bounce back from, not only domestically, but globally since other countries could potentially be positively affected if this deal were to go into effect. The debate is still ongoing, but the consequences and risks of this action, especially during an economic crisis from the covid-19 pandemic, are too great to ignore and continue to be in pursuit of departing from the World Trade Organization.       There are several strong arguments that support my claims that leaving would present more bad than good. First, the US being involved in the world trade organization adds gre...
Read more