2.2.1 Constructivism Social Constructivism is one of international relations approach. This approach challenged the rationalism and positivism of neorealism and neoliberalism. One of constructivism character is its emphasis on the importance of normative as well as material structures, the role of identity in shaping political action and on the mutually constitutive relationship between agents and structures (Burchill et al. 2005: 188). The term “constructivism” was first introduced by Nicholas Onuf in his book World in Our Making.
Through identifying, defining, and understanding the key concepts of Marxism, the preconditions and contradictions of a capitalist society become more prominent. The contradictions of a capitalist society will be introduced through identifying and defining; radical change by societal transformation exploitation, conflict between different social groups (the bourgeoisie and proletariat), and exploitation. The two contradictions “exploitation” and “conflict between social groups” can be explained complimentary to one another as a result of being closely related. Key concepts such as; historical materialism, means of production, class consciousness, superstructure, and alienation will be referred to in order to aid the further understanding of Marxism, which in turn will address the preconditions of a capitalist society. The preconditions of capitalism can be understood as the requirements for Marxism - what formulates the views of Marxism – due to Marx working hard to create a theory for the capitalist economy.
Framing social inequality, he ‘elaborates a theory of class that fuses the Marxian insistence of economic determination with the Weberian recognition of the distinctiveness of the cultural order and the Durkheimian concern for classification’ (Wacquant 2007, 270). By combining different theories, Bourdieu distances himself from the unilateral Marxist theory of classes. Instead of focusing on social inequality and a class based system simply on behalf of economic estate, he ‘argues that classes arise in the conjunction of shared position in social space and shared dispositions actualized in the sphere of consumption’ (ibid, 272). Thus, he draws upon the concepts of habitus, capital and fields when capturing and explaining social
Fitzgerald demonstrates a Marxist critique by separating the setting into two parts called East Egg and West Egg through social-economic relations, social wealth and geographical locations. Marxism is a system of economic, social, and political philosophy based on ideas that view social change in terms of economic factors. A general opinion is that the means of production is the economic base that impacts or resolves the political life. Marxist literary theory of how everything relates back to wealth and social and financial status, reflecting on the economical experiences of Fitzgerald. It is clear that Fitzgerald has a Marxist message in the way he develops his characters in his novel.
Linklater’s view is that knowledge can be the basis for ‘unsatisfactory social arrangements’ (Linklater in Smith, Booth, and Zalewski, 1996, p.279), so, through the assessment of this knowledge, the roles can be reversed (so to say), and intellect and insight can be used to advance society. While this idea seems to lack a clear plan of action and leaves us wondering how exactly one would go about nurturing such ideas, it is still an important conversation point in Critical Theory discourse. A final Critical Theorist examined in terms of what they contributed to the conversation on Critical Theory is Robert Cox. Cox has famously said ‘theory is always for someone and for some purpose’ (Burchill, Linklater, and Devetak, 2009, p.163). He denies that facts and values can be separated, as followers of Problem-Solving-Theory would claim.
Political analysts attempt to provide an understanding of the workings of the modern state had necessitated the employment of certain philosophies, thoughts and theories in order to simplify and clarify their assumptions about the political system and how it works. Some of these analytical tools or methods include – the Systems theory, Group theory, Political Development theory, Power theory, Frustration Aggression theory and the Elites theory among others. Given these plethora of theories in the social sciences and bearing in mind that, no meaningful research can be undertaken in the absence of a sound theoretical base, this study adopts the Systems theory in order to explain the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by the United
The critical theoretical approach to organisational communication is merely a tool used establish and analyse whether or not the processes/operations within organisational communication are just and to identify methods of rectifying unjust systems within organisational communication. The following argument proposes that organisations are indeed sites of domination and therefore aims to discuss the critical theoretical approach to organisational communication. 2. THE CRITICAL THEORETICAL APPROACH As mentioned above, one may describe the critical theoretical approach as a tool to look further into internal operations of organisational communication and to further distinguish whether or not these operations are fair. Miller, K. (2015) suggests that critical theories were initially developed by Karl Marx, a social theorist/scientist from the nineteenth century; who believed there was a lack of consistency of equality between employers and employees within an organisation.
Neo-Gramscianism in Sociology of International Relations: Robert Cox Neo-Gramscianism is a critical theory based on the study of international relations and global political economy. This theory explores different ideas, institutions and material capabilities, how do these ideas form the specific contours of the state appearance. The main idea of this theory is strongly influenced by the works of Antonio Gramsci. Neo-Gramscianism analyzes the way in which the specific social forces, the state and the dominant ideological formations define and maintain world order. On this basis, neo-Gramscian approach destroys long-term stagnation and contradictions that exist between the so-called realist school of thought and liberal theory.
Fairclough (2012: 2), inheriting Marxist traditions, understands CDA as “a form of critical social science” aimed at uncovering “the nature and sources of social wrongs, the obstacles to addressing them, and possible ways of overcoming those obstacles” (Fairclough, 2012: X). While Critical Social Analysis (CSA) is simultaneously “normative” and “explanatory”, being a branch of CSA, CDA aims at not only a description of existing realities but also an explanation of them and does this through what Fairclough (2012: 2) refers to as a “material-semiotic”
Marxism, as a political ideology, originated from Karl Marx (1818-1883) and his friend Friedrich Engels (1820-1895). Marxism seeks to understand the problems of mankind and society through historical analysis and treats history as a process of conflict between antagonistic forces and classes. The conflict is a product of the contradictions inherent in the mode of production in which the class that “has” dominates the class that does “not