ECN 306 Lecture Notes - Democratic Peace Theory, Liberal Internationalism, Robert Keohane
Document Summary
Core ideas in liberal thinking on international relations 104. The practice of international relations has not been accommodating to liberalism. The in- troductory section of the chapter will address this dilemma before providing a definition of lib- eralism and its component parts. The second section con(cid:173)siders the core concepts of liberalism, beginning with the visionary internationalism of the enlightenment, through to the idealism of the inter-war period, and the institutionalism that became dominant in the second half of the twentieth century. The third and final section considers liberalism in an era of globalization: in particular, it contrasts a status quo reading of the liberal project with a radicalized version that seeks to promote and extend cosmopolitan values and institutions. Although realism is regarded as the dominant theory of international relations, liberalism has a strong claim to being the historic alternative.
