the uk’s european university politics at kent day 2015/ welcome to the school of politics and...
TRANSCRIPT
The UK’s European university
Politics at Kent Day 2015/ Welcome to the School of Politics and International Relations31st October 2015 Dr Toni HaastrupDr Ben Seyd
Kenneth Waltz’s three images
Man, the State and War (1959)
Page 2
1.Individuals (human nature)
2. States
3. International system (international anarchy)
Human nature
A. Human nature as NATURE (biological)
B. Human nature as NURTURE (cultural)
C. Human nature as MYTH
Page 3
A. Human nature as NATURE
• Sociobiology literature: the study of human behaviour from the perspective of evolutionary theory.
• Gives scientific proof to the realist claims of human selfishness/egoism and their desire for power/dominance.
• Humans biologically/genetically programmed for hunting/killing/fighting.
• Evolutionary theory can therefore be used to explain the origins of war and conflict.
Page 4
An elemental instinct for aggression and destruction
Page 5
Freud: “a lust for aggression and destruction”
Einstein: “man has in him an active instinct for hatred and
destruction”
HuMAN nature?
An implicit, and sometimes explicit, gender bias underlies much of the human nature debate – is it humans or men?
Fukuyama:
• “The line from chimp to modern man is continuous.”
• “Humans are hard-wired to act in certain predictable ways.”
• “phenomena like aggression, violence, war, and intense competition for dominance…are more closely associated with men than women.”
Page 6
Van Creveld: “...however unpalatable the fact, the real reason why we have wars is that men like fighting, and women like those men who are prepared to fight on their behalf”.
BUT...
• Can we really understand human behaviour by analysing animal behaviour?
• Are we really ‘hard-wired’ and incapable of change?
• Do we do what we do because we are what we are?
• What about intelligence?
• What about a moral sense?
• What about reflection?
• How to explain difference?
Page 7
Kaplan, M. (2006) ‘Why bonobos make love, not war’, New Scientist
Page 8
BONOBOS CHIMPS
B. Human nature as NURTURE
“War begins in the minds and emotions of men, as all acts
do: but can minds and emotions be changed?”
(Waltz)
• Human Nature = LEARNED behaviour
• Consequence of environmental factors, culture and social learning.
Page 9
Overcoming ‘nature’: learning
• Richard Dawkins: Human nature cannot be changed, but human behaviour certainly can be modified.
• Garnett: “Civilized societies spend a great deal of energy on making people behave themselves despite their natures.”
• Rewards, threats, education, international law…
C. Human nature as MYTH
• Human nature is a socially constructed IDEA, not biology.
• Negative conceptions of human nature rationalise war.
Page 10
Page 11
‘The myth of human nature is one of the most ancient, the most widespread, the most powerful of all myths... The myth of human nature...is apparently as vigorous and noxious as ever, powerfully conditioning not only mass consciousness but also the minds and the behaviour of the socially and intellectually privileged, up to and including the behaviour of the governments of so-called states’
(Philip Allott, 1998)
Page 12
Source: MORI
Source: House of Commons Library Standard Note 1467 (2013); data for 2015 are from MORI