The evolution of war: theory and controversy

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-139 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony C. Lopez
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
The Social ◽  
Theory Of War ◽  
Modern Warfare ◽  
The Human Condition

The use of evolutionary theory for explaining human warfare is an expanding area of inquiry, but it remains obstructed by two important hurdles. One is that there is ambiguity abouthow to build an evolutionary theoryof human warfare. The second is that there is ambiguity abouthow to interpret existing evidencerelating to the evolution of warfare. This paper addresses these problems, first by outlining an evolutionary theory of human warfare, and second by investigating the veracity of four common claims made against the use of evolutionary theory for explaining warfare. These claims are: (1) ancestral warfare was not frequent or intense enough to have selected for psychological adaptations in humans for warfare; (2) the existence of peaceful societies falsifies the claim that humans possess adaptations for fighting; (3) if psychological adaptations for warfare exist, then war is an inevitable and universal component of the human condition; (4) modern warfare and international politics is so qualitatively different from ancestral politics that any adaptations for the latter are inoperative or irrelevant today. By outlining an evolutionary theory of war and clarifying key misunderstandings regarding this approach, international relations scholars are better positioned to understand, engage, and contribute to emerging scholarship on human warfare across the social and evolutionary sciences.

Billy Higgins in the Zone: Brushwork, Breath, and Imagination

2021 ◽  
pp. 45-70
Author(s):  
James Gordon Williams
Keyword(s):  
Social Movement ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Community Leader ◽  
Place Making ◽  
Musical Space ◽  
Cultural Considerations ◽  
The Social ◽  
Interpretive Frame ◽  
The Human Condition ◽  
Leimert Park

This Chapter presents an analysis of the late drummer and community leader Billy Higgins’s improvised brushwork and breathing strategies in his performance on Hoagy Carmichael’s “Georgia on My Mind” on his frequent collaborator’s Charles Lloyd’s recording The Water Is Wide (2000). Connecting with the book’s theme of political and cultural considerations of what it means to create Black musical space, Ashon Crawley’s “black pneuma” interpretive frame is used to help understand Higgins’s breathing strategies relative to his drumming as an orchestration of individual and community sound. Higgins’s breathing strategies during improvisation are theorized as a way to cross bar lines, accessing all colors of the human condition while creating a Black sense of musical place. Higgins’s values of musical place-making thrive through his ego-denying philosophy for the benefit of group sound throughout his career and within the social movement of Leimert Park. 

Understanding and Classifying Constructivisms

2019 ◽  
pp. 43-62
Author(s):  
J. Samuel Barkin ◽  
Laura Sjoberg
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Social Theory ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
The Social

The chapter discusses various ways that constructivism might be defined, and finds in them a tendency to make constructivisms into at once more than they are (by imbuing them with “naturally” associated politics) and less (by divorcing them from their roots as social theory). The chapter builds an argument that what constructivisms have in common is the ontological assumption of the social construction of international politics as expressed in methodology for doing International Relations research. This assumption should not be understood as taking specific ontologies, let alone methods, methodologies, or politics, as definitional of constructivism. Work can reasonably be described as constructivist if it builds on an ontology of co-constitution and intersubjectivity in the context of a particular set of methodological claims underlying a research exercise about global politics. This brackets what work might be called constructivist but does not associate constructivism either with any specific ontology or with any specific methodology.

SEXUALITY, DIVERSITY AND LAW: THE LEGAL PROTECTION OF SEXUAL EXPRESSIONS

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Valéria Silva Galdino ◽  
Caio Eduardo Costa Cazelatto
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Minorities ◽  
Human Sexuality ◽  
Legal Protection ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Sexual Diversity ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Human Condition

The social and juridical contours attributed to the values and expressions of human sexuality are the constant target scientific discussions, especially when this attention is focused on sexual diversity. As a result of this, the present research had bibliographical and narrative reviews in order to investigate the legal protection of sexuality, above all, that related to the experience of sexual minorities. For that, the historical, conceptual and classificatory aspects about the theme were explored as well as sexuality, discussed as a fundamental right and personality, since its exercise is immanent to the human condition.

Wendt's world

2000 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 151-163 ◽  
Author(s):  
STEVE SMITH
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Social Theory ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Social Constructivist ◽  
Standard Account ◽  
Easy Task ◽  
The Social ◽  
Definitive Statement

Alexander Wendt's book, Social Theory of International Politics, is published twenty years after Kenneth Waltz's enormously influential Theory of International Politics. The similarity in their titles is no coincidence, since Wendt wants to build on the insights of Waltz's realism and construct an idealist and holist account of international politics (not, note, international relations). In my view, Wendt's book is likely to be as influential as Waltz's. It is a superbly written and sophisticated book, one that has clearly been drafted and redrafted so as to refine the argument and anticipate many of the likely objections. I think that although I can anticipate the objections of both his rationalist and his reflectivist critics. I am also aware that he makes life difficult for them by defining his ground very precisely, and by trying to define the terms of any debate in which he might be engaged. Criticism of the book is not an easy task. The book is likely to become the standard account for those working within the social constructivist literature of International Politics. It is a book that has been eagerly awaited, and it will not disappoint those who have been waiting for Wendt to publish his definitive statement on constructivism.

scholarly journals Deep theorizing in International Relations

2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 814-840 ◽  
Author(s):  
Felix Berenskötter
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Social Space ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Actor ◽  
Grand Theory ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Theoretical Pluralism ◽  
The Human Condition

This article starts from the observation that International Relations scholars do not agree on what they mean by theory. The declining popularity of grand theory and the celebration of theoretical pluralism are accompanied by the relative absence of a serious conversation about what ‘theory’ is or should be. Taking the view that we need such a conversation, especially given the shallow theorizing of modern scholarship that conflates theory with method, and the postmodern view that abstract narratives must be deconstructed and rejected, this article puts forward the notion of ‘deep theorizing’ as the ground for grand theory. Specifically, it argues that deep theorizing is the conceptual effort of explaining (inter)action by developing a reading of drives/basic motivations and the ontology of its carrier through an account of the human condition, that is, a particular account of how the subject (the political actor) is positioned in social space and time. The article illustrates this angle through a discussion of realist, liberal and postcolonial schools of thought. It basically argues that, through their particular readings of the human condition, these approaches develop distinct conceptions of political agency and, hence of the nature and location of world politics.

scholarly journals SEXUALITY, DIVERSITY AND LAW: THE LEGAL PROTECTION OF SEXUAL EXPRESSIONS

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Valéria Silva Galdino ◽  
Caio Eduardo Costa Cazelatto
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Minorities ◽  
Human Sexuality ◽  
Legal Protection ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Sexual Diversity ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Human Condition

The social and juridical contours attributed to the values and expressions of human sexuality are the constant target scientific discussions, especially when this attention is focused on sexual diversity. As a result of this, the present research had bibliographical and narrative reviews in order to investigate the legal protection of sexuality, above all, that related to the experience of sexual minorities. For that, the historical, conceptual and classificatory aspects about the theme were explored as well as sexuality, discussed as a fundamental right and personality, since its exercise is immanent to the human condition.

Integral Engagement: Christian Constructivism and the Social Sciences

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 445-457
Author(s):  
Donald Guthrie
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Critical Realism ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Human Condition

This article explores how Christian constructivism can guide educators who are Christians toward an integral engagement with the social sciences that is both critically reflective and humbly teachable. Such an engagement requires a recognition that all image-bearing human beings may contribute insights about the human condition, responsible stewardship of knowledge with the mind of Christ, and approaching the social sciences with gospel-directed critical realism that is neither fearful nor uncritically accepting of social science perspectives.

The Individual/Agent and Culture/Structure in the History of the Social Sciences

2002 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 429-445 ◽  
Author(s):  
Caroline B. Brettell
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Problem ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Individual Agent ◽  
Structure And Agency ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Human Condition

In facing up to the problem of structure and agency social theorists are not just addressing crucial theoretical problems in the study of society, they are also confronting the most pressing social problem of the human condition.

Michael Nicholson on Martin Wight: a mind passing in the night

1982 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-123 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan James
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Human Behaviour ◽  
International Studies ◽  
Large Claim ◽  
The World ◽  
Entertainment Value ◽  
The Human Condition

In his article on ‘The enigma of Martin Wight’ (Review of International Studies, i, 1981, pp. 15–22), Michael Nicholson makes some questionable assertions. One concerns the object of international studies. He says, ‘Surely the point of studying international relations or any other aspect of human behaviour is to improve the human condition not to stand as passive spectators deploring the appalling standard of play’ (p. 19). He goes on to doubt whether Wight's position was really that of the passive spectator, but on the revealing ground that a man who had such a big impact on others could hardly have been in the business for its ‘entertainment value’ (p. 20). I find this a remarkable pair of alternatives: improvement or entertainment! There seems no place here for the scholar, the man dedicated to finding out how the world works because he is fascinated by it. Nor is account taken of the vocation of teaching, the desire just to pass on to others the understanding one has gained. Of course, I am sure Nicholson would say that his remarks were not an exhaustive account of the possibilities. But what he does seem to be, saying is that the scholar must also be concerned about making the world a better place. I see no ground for this position. It implies a moral deficiency in those who are simply devoted to learning or who do not believe in the possibility of progress. This is a large claim.

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