Temple University Spring 2006

Syllabus for Political Science 1301:

Introduction to International Relations
Prof. Mark A. Pollack
461 Gladfelter Hall
e-mail: mark.pollack@temple.edu
Office Hours: Monday, 11:30 a.m. – 2:15 p.m.

Teaching Assistants: Kevin Hockmuth (hockmuth@temple.edu), John Hykel,

(johnh@temple.edu),Vinod Menon (vgmenon@temple.edu), and Juliana Troicki
(troicki@temple.edu).

The aim of this course is to explore the central issues of international relations – war and peace,
cooperation and conflict, and prosperity and poverty – in both theory and history. In terms of
theory, we will survey the basic theories that have been offered by political scientists to explain
and predict the workings of the international system, including the “realist” and “liberal”
schools, as well as other approaches such as constructivism, Marxism and feminism, asking
which theory or theories are most useful in helping us to understand international politics.

In addition to theory, however, we shall also examine the history of international relations, which
is divided roughly into three parts. First, we begin with Thucydides' classical realist account of
the Peloponnesian War in ancient Greece, continue into the development of the classical balance
of power in Europe, and study the causes of the two World Wars of the twentieth century. Next,
in the second part of the course, we examine the bipolar international system which emerged
after the second world war, including US-Soviet relations, the US policy of “containment,” the
problems of nuclear deterrence, the development of the United Nations and other international
organizations, and the management of the global economy between 1945 and 1989. Finally, in
the third part of the course, we look at the changing nature of international relations since the end
of the Cold War, asking how the United States and other states have dealt with the end of
bipolarity, and we examine a number of topics in contemporary international relations including
humanitarian intervention, terrorism, international law and organization, international political
economy, the global environment, and human rights and women’s rights.

Course requirements: The requirements for this course are (1) five one-page response papers
on the weekly readings (see study questions below), at least two of which must be written before
the mid-term (these questions are due at the start of class on the first day of the week for which
they are assigned, and late papers will not be accepted; 25% of the grade); (2) a mid-term
examination to be held in class on March 22nd (25%); (3) an in-class final exam, to take place
during exam period (30%); and (4) participation in weekly discussion sections (20%).

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Required reading: The following books, marked with an asterisk in the weekly readings, are
part of the required reading for the course:

• Joseph S. Nye, Jr., Understanding International Conflicts, 5th edition (New York:
Harper Collins College Publishers, 2004).

• Robert F. Kennedy, Thirteen Days (New York: Norton, 1968).

Nye’s book is available in the Temple University bookstore and on reserve at Paley Library.
Kennedy’s Thirteen Days has gone through multiple editions and can be found, often at steep
discounts, in bookstores or on-line at sites like amazon.com or half.com, and on reserve at Paley.
In addition to these two books, there are a number of other required readings, which will be on
reserve in Paley Library.

In addition to these readings, students are strongly encouraged to read a daily newspaper such as
The New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com) or the Washington Post
(http://www.washingtonpost.com), both of which have excellent, and free, web sites. Finally,
the course readings will in some cases be supplemented by new and up-to-date readings that will
be made available on Blackboard. Specific readings, and instructions on where to find them, will
be given during the semester as new events arise.

Note on Academic Misconduct

All students in this class are expected to adhere to Temple University standards on academic
conduct. In recent years, I have had increasing experience with students plagiarizing work from
either printed sources or internet web sites, and I therefore consider it important to clarify the
course policy regarding plagiarism and other types of academic misconduct. All students should,
in all assignments, fully and unambiguously cite sources from which they are drawing important
ideas and/or sizable quotations (for example, more than eight consecutive words or more than
50% of a given sentence or paragraph). Failure to do so constitutes plagiarism, which is a
serious act of academic misconduct and may result in a failing grade, notification of the
infraction to the Dean of Students and academic dismissal. Similarly, cheating during exams,
copying written assignments from other students, or providing answers to others during exams
are considered acts of academic misconduct. Given the seriousness of these infractions, there
will be no second chances and no leniency. Please avoid them at any cost. If you are unfamiliar
with policies about plagiarism or other types of academic misconduct, you may wish to consult
the on-line guide to “Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Acknowledging Sources,” available at
http://www.wisc.edu/students/plagiarism.pdf; or if you still have remaining doubts or specific
questions, raise them directly with me.

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 SCHEDULE OF READINGS AND LECTURES

PART I: IR THEORY AND INTERNATIONAL HISTORY

FROM PLATO (or at least Thucydides) TO NATO

Week 1. Introduction (Jan 18th)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, pp. 1-12.

Kenneth Waltz, Man, the State and War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1959), pp. 1-15.

Stephen M. Walt, “International Relations: One World, Many Theories,” Foreign Policy, No. 110
(Spring 1998), pp. 29-44.

Week 2. Realism from Thucydides to Today (Jan 23, 25)

• Thinking about International Relations
• Realist Theory, from Thucydides to Hobbes and Beyond

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, pp. 12-28.

Thucydides, The Pelopponesian War, Penguin edition, pp. 212-223, 400-408.

Machiavelli, The Prince, dedicatory letter and chapters 14, 15, 17, 18.

Arnold Wolfers and Laurence Martin, eds., The Anglo-American Tradition in Foreign Affairs (New
Haven: Yale University Press, 1956), pp. 26-40 [selections from Hobbes].

Joshua S. Goldstein and Jon C. Pevehouse, International Relations, seventh edition (New York:
Longman Publishing, 2005), Chapter 2, pp. 55-76.

Study Questions: Answer one of the following questions in a one-page, double-spaced essay. Be sure to
answer all parts of the question, and cite all relevant readings:

1. In the Melian Dialogue and the Mytilenean Debate, Thucydides depicts a set of debates about the role
of morality in international relations. What are the arguments made for including morality in
international relations during these debates, and by whom are they made? What are the arguments
against considering morality in IR, and who makes these arguments? Does Thucydides give any
indication of which view he thinks is correct? What do you think?

2. Both Machiavelli and Hobbes argue that, in their realist view of the world, there is no room for
morality in IR. Why not? What alternative views about the role of morality in IR do you find in
this week’s readings? Which do you find most convincing, and why?

Week 3: Theoretical Alternatives to Realism (Jan 30, Feb 1)

• Liberalism and Constructivism
• Marxism and Feminism

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Joshua S. Goldstein and Jon C. Pevehouse, International Relations, seventh edition (New York:
Longman Publishing, 2005), Chapter 3, pp. 99-108.

Robert Gilpin, “Three Ideologies of Political Economy,” from Gilpin, The Political Economy of
International Relations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987), pp. 8-41.

Jeffrey Checkel, “The Constructivist Turn in International Relations Theory,” World Politics, Vol. 50,
No. 2 (1998), pp. 324-48.

V. Spike Peterson and Anne Sisson Runyan, Global Gender Issues, 2nd edition (Boulder: Westview Press,
1999), chapter 1 plus pp. 17-19 and 29-44.

Study Question

1. This week’s readings survey four alternatives to realism, each of which starts from different
theoretical assumptions about the main actors and the most important factors in international politics, and
each of which offers a different argument about the most important causes of war and peace, conflict and
cooperation. In a very brief essay, pick one of this week’s four theoretical alternatives, state its basic
assumptions, and summarize briefly the most important causes of war and peace in your chosen theory.
Is this theory’s picture of international politics more or less convincing than the realist view, and why?

Week 4. The European Balance of Power and the Origins of World War I (Feb 6, 8)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, pp. 33-68.

Thomas D. Lairson and David Skidmore, International Political Economy: The Struggle for Power and
Wealth (New York: Harcourt Brace College Publishers, 1993), pp. 35-51.

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, pp. 68-81.

Study Questions

1. How might we define the so-called “balance of power,” according to your authors? And what,
specifically, was the nature of the so-called “classical balance of power” in 19th-century Europe?

2. At the same time that it was taking part in the military balance of power in Europe, Great Britain
emerged as an economic “hegemon.” What is a hegemon, what is an an economic hegemon, and why is it
important? What sort of international economic system did Great Britain set up in the last half of the 19th
century?

3. What are the competing explanations or images of the origins of World War I discussed in this week’s
readings? Which do you find most convincing, and why?

Week 5: The Origins of World War II (Feb 13, 15)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, pp. 85-109.

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Lairson and Skidmore, International Political Economy, pp. 51-59.

Study Questions

1. During the interwar years, a new system of “collective security” was intended to keep the peace, under
the auspices of the new League of Nations. What exactly was collective security, and why did the system
fail to prevent the coming of World War II?

PART II: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS DURING THE COLD WAR

Week 6: The Origins of the Cold War (Feb 20, 22)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflict, pp. 112-129.

John Lewis Gaddis, The Cold War: A New History (New York: The Penguin Press, 2005), preface and
Chapter 1.

Vladislav Zubok and Constantine Pleshakov, “The Soviet Union,” in David Reynolds, ed., The Origins of
the Cold War in Europe: International Perspectives (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994), pp. 53-
76.

Study Question

1. Much of the traditional literature on the origins of the Cold War has been divided among the
traditionalist, revisionist, and postrevisionist schools mentioned by Nye. Very briefly, what are the
arguments of each of these schools, and which view seems to be supported by the new evidence reported
in post-Cold War studies by Gaddis, Zubok and Pleshakov?

Week 7: The Cold War, Nuclear Deterrence, and the Long Peace (Feb 27, March 1)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflict, pp. 129-131, 135-146.

* Robert Kennedy, Thirteen Days (New York: Norton, 1968), entire.

John Lewis Gaddis, We Now Know (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. vii-x, 260-280.

John Lewis Gaddis, “The Long Peace,” International Security, Vol. 10, No. 4 (Spring 1986), reprinted in
Phil Williams, Donald Goldstein and Jay Shafritz, Classic Readings of International Relations, 2nd edition
(New York: Harcourt Brace, 1999), pp. 496-511.

Study Questions

1. In Thirteen Days, Robert F. Kennedy tells the story of how the Soviet Union installed missiles in
Cuba, how the Kennedy Administration responded with a blockade of Cuba and an ultimatum to the
Soviets, and how the Soviets ultimately backed down and removed the missiles. What do we know today

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that Kennedy either did not know, or did not tell us, in his book? How, if at all, does this new
information change our view of “lessons” of the Cuban Missile Crisis?

2. According to most accounts, the Cuban Missile Crisis represented the closest approach to war between
the United States and the Soviet Union, yet despite this and other crises, and despite a series of “proxy
wars” in places like Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Central America, the Cold War never turned into a
“hot” or direct military conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union. Why not?

Week 8: International Law and International Institutions (March 13)

Joshua S. Goldstein and Jon C. Pevehouse, International Relations, seventh edition (New York:
Longman Publishing, 2005), Chapter 7, pp. 251-277.

John J. Mearsheimer, “The False Promise of International Institutions,” International Security, Vol. 19,
No. 3 (Winter 1994/1995), pages 5-49, abridged in Karen A. Mingst and Jack L. Snyder, Essential
Readings in World Politics, second edition (New York: Norton, 2005), pp. 283-94.

Robert Keohane and Lisa Martin, “The Promise of Institutionalist Theory,” International Security, Vol.
20, No. 1 (Summer 1995), pp. 39-51.

Study Questions

1. International intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) are an increasingly common feature of

international relations, facilitating cooperation among states in areas as diverse as security, trade, and the
environment. Why do states form IGOs, and what purposes do they serve? Be sure to refer to the
readings and to at least one empirical example in your answer.

2. Do international institutions “matter?” What is the realist case against the importance of institutions?
What arguments for the importance of institutions are put forward by liberals like Keohane and Martin?
Which do you find more convincing, and why?

Week 9: Economic Interdependence and the World Political Economy (March 15, 20)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, Chapter 7, pp. 191-213.

Alan C. Lamborn and Joseph Lepgold, World Politics in the Twenty-First Century (Upper Saddle River:
Prentice Hall, 2003), pp. 299-333.

Study Questions

1. After World War II, the United States fostered the development of new international regimes for trade
and monetary policies. What was the nature of the international trade regime established by the US and
its allies, and how has it changed over the past five decades?

2. What is the nature of the international monetary regime established by the United States and its allies,
and how has it changed over the past five decades?

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Mid-Term Exam (March 22)

PART III: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS AFTER THE COLD WAR

Week 10: The End of the Cold War (Mar 27, 29)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, pp. 131-135.

John Mearsheimer, "Back to the Future," International Security, Vol. 15, No. 1 (Summer 1990), pp. 5-56,
and response by Robert O. Keohane International Security, Vol. 15, No. 2 (Fall 1990), pp. 191-3.

Francis Fukuyama, "The End of History?" in The National Interest, Summer 1989.

Samuel P. Huntington, "No Exit: The Errors of Endism," in The National Interest, Fall 1989.

Huntington, “The Coming Clash of Civilizations--Or, the West Against the Rest,” reproduced in
Comparative Politics 96/97 (Guilford, CT: Dushkin Publishing Group, 1996), pp. 263-67, with response
by Joffe et al..

Sean M. Lynn-Jones, “Preface,” in Michael E. Brown, Sean M. Lynn-Jones, and Steven E. Miller, eds.
Debating the Democratic Peace (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996), pp. ix-xxxiii.

Robert D. Kaplan, "The Coming Anarchy," The Atlantic Monthly, February 1994, pp. 44-76.

Study Question

1. After the Cold War, scholars of international relations raced to characterize the likely nature of the
post-Cold War world. They came up with a number of possible scenarios: A return to the future, the end
of history, a clash of civilizations, a democratic peace, or coming anarchy. Which of these theories of the
post-Cold War world—if any—has come closest to describing the post-Cold War international system
during the past decade, and why?

Week 11: The Challenge of World Order: War and Intervention After the Cold War (April 3,5)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, Chapter 6, pp. 153-74.

Michael Mandelbaum, “Foreign Policy as Social Work,” in Foreign Affairs: Agenda 1996 (New York:
Council on Foreign Relations, 1996), pp. 79-96.

Stanley Hoffmann, “In Defense of Mother Teresa: Morality in Foreign Policy,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 75
(March/April 1996), pp. 172-175.

Nicholas Wheeler, “The Limits to Humanitarian Intervention from the Air: The Cases of Bosnia and
Kosovo,” in Saving Strangers: Humanitarian Intervention in International Society (New York: Oxford
University Press, 2000), pp. 242-284.

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Barnett, Michael N., “The UN Security Council, Indifference, and Genocide in Rwanda,” Cultural
Anthropology, Vol. 12, No. 4 (1997).

Kofi Annan, “Two Concepts of Sovereignty,” The Economist, 18 September 1999.

Gareth Evans and Mohammed Sahnoun, “The Responsibility to Protect,” Foreign Affairs,
November/December 2002, pp. 99-110.

Additional readings on Darfur to be assigned during the semester.

Study Question

1. After the Cold War, the United States and its UN allies undertook a series of “humanitarian
interventions” in places like Northern Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia, Haiti, Kosovo, and East Timor; at the same
time, the US and the UN failed to act to stop humanitarian disasters in places like Rwanda and the Darfur
region of Sudan. The debate over such interventions is now over a decade old, and the key themes are
largely the same as they were in 1993-1994, when Michael Mandelbaum and Stanley Hoffmann debated
the wisdom of US intervention in places like Somalia. In an essay, spell out as clearly and succinctly as
you can the cases for and against humanitarian intervention. Are these interventions misguided efforts to
pursue “foreign policy as social work,” as Mandelbaum argues? Or do they represent an admirable shift
to a new politics guided less by state sovereignty and more by morality and humanitarian concerns, as
Hoffmann suggests?

2. One of the greatest challenges for humanitarian intervention, for both the US and the UN, has been
deciding when or under what conditions to intervene. Neither the US nor the UN has acted consistently
in this regard, intervening in some places while failing most strikingly to intervene in others (see Michael
Barnett’s discussion of Rwanda). In 2002, a UN commission chaired by Gareth Evans and Mohammad
Sahnoun proposed a series of clear criteria for future humanitarian interventions. What are these criteria?
How useful are the criteria, and what would they prescribe for the ongoing case of Darfur?

Week 12: International Relations in an Age of Terror (April 10, 12)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, pp. 229-31.

Steven Walt, “Beyond Bin Laden: Reshaping U.S. Foreign Policy,” International Security, Vol. 26, No.
3 (Winter 2001/2002), pp. 56-78.

The White House, The National Security Strategy of the United States of America (September 2002),
Sections I, III, and V (available on-line at http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss.html).

Todd S. Purdum, A Time of Our Choosing: America’s War in Iraq (New York: Times Books), chapters
3-6 (pp. 33-91) and chronology (pp. 294-300).

“Iraq: Were We Wrong?” special issue of The New Republic, 28 June 2004, essays by the editors, Leon
Wieseltier, John McCain, Kenneth Pollack, and Thomas L. Friedman.

Study Questions

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1. On September 11, 2001, New York and Washington, D.C., fell victim to the largest terrorist attack
ever perpetrated against the United States, and much of the subsequent period has been dominated by the
Bush Administration’s “War on Terror.” What challenges does the threat of terrorism pose for U.S.
foreign policy, and how does the international relations scholar Steven Walt suggest the United States
should deal with those challenges? Has the Bush Administration followed Walt’s advice?

2. The 2003 war in Iraq represents the implementation of a new “Bush Doctrine” of preventive war, and
a decision that Iraq could not be contained in the traditional sense of that term. What were the arguments
for, and against, preventive war in Iraq? Granted that the outcome of the war was impossible to predict
with any accuracy, what would you have advised the Bush Administration to do in February of 2003?

Week 13: Globalization and Environmental Protection (April 17, 19)

(Note: Look back again at Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, pp.192-197.)

David Held et al., “Globalization,” in Karen A. Mingst and Jack L. Snyder, Essential Readings in World
Politics, second edition (New York: Norton, 2005), pp. 462-71.

“Dueling Globalizations: A Debate between Thomas L. Friedman and Ignacio Ramonet,” reprinted in
Richard Mansbach and Edward Rhodes, eds., Global Politics in a Changing World, third edition (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin), pp. 449-58.

Oran Young, “International Environmental Governance,” in Young, International Governance:

Protecting the Environment in a Stateless Society (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1994), pp. 12-32.

Richard Elliot Benedick, "Protecting the Ozone Layer: New Directions in Diplomacy," in Jessica
Tuchman Matthews, ed., Preserving the Global Environment (New York: W.W. Norton and Company,
1991), pp. 112-153.

Elizabeth Kolbert, “The Climate of Man – III: What Can Be Done?” The New Yorker, May 9, 2005, pp.
52-63.

Study Questions

1. What do we mean when we talk about “globalization?” To what extent is today’s world really
“globalizing,” and what challenges does globalization create for the United States and other countries?

2. In “International Environmental Governance,” Oran Young examines whether the states of the world
can cooperate to govern the global environment, even in the absence of a world government. What sorts
of environmental “problem sets” does the world face at the end of the 20th century, according to Young,
and what kind of international responses are most promising as solutions to them?

3. The global atmosphere is what Young and others refer to as a “global commons,” raising the question
of whether and how the countries of the world might cooperate to protect the atmosphere from man-made
threats including ozone-depleting gases (which cased the famous “hole” in the ozone discussed in
Benedick) and greenhouse gases (widely held to be responsible for climate change). During the 1980s
and 1990s, the international community was able to cooperate to deal with the challenge of the earth’s
ozone layer, but it remains unclear whether the world—including the United States, which has rejected an

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international agreement to limit greenhouse-gas emissions—will cooperate to deal with the challenge of
climate change. In a brief essay, discuss (a) the nature of the climate-change challenge, (b) the primary
obstacles to cooperation, and (c) what kind of policy you believe the United States should pursue in these
circumstances.

Week 14: Human Rights and Gender in International Politics (April 24, 26)

Margaret Karns and Karen Mingst, International Organizations: The Politics and Processes of Global
Governance (Boulder: Lynne Reinner, 2004), Chapter 10, pp. 413-57.

Michael Ignatieff, “Is the Human Rights Era Over?” The New York Times.

J. Ann Tickner, “Feminist Perspectives on International Relations,” in Handbook of International

Relations, pp. 275-291.

Study Questions

1. Concern for human rights seems nearly universal in today’s world: the United States has committed
itself to the promotion of human rights, and most of the world’s states have signed up to various UN
declarations and conventions on the subject. Why, then, has it been so difficult for the United States to
consistently promote human rights, and why have the various UN instruments failed to secure widespread
respect for human rights? Given these difficulties, do you think the United States should make the effort
to include human rights considerations in its foreign policy? Why or why not?

2. Earlier in the semester, we introduced feminist theory and the notion of gender as a “lens” on global
politics. What, specifically, do we see when we turn the lens of gender onto world politics, according to
Ann Tickner? What are the strengths and weaknesses of feminism as a theory of international relations?

Week 15: Conclusions and Review (May 1)

* Nye, Understanding International Conflicts, Chapter 9.

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