23 January 2008

Not me

A borrowed abstract, just cause it fits the theme.

Yim, Jaeyeon. 'State Identity' and 'Collective Self': Problems and Solutions Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, Hilton Chicago and the Palmer House Hilton, Chicago, IL, Sep 02, 2004. 2006-10-05 [http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p59936_index.html]

Abstract: While we take for granted the prevalence of “self” in key terms such as self-help, self-preservation, or self-determination in the theory of international relations, the ways in which the collective “self” should be conceptualized and applied to the analysis of conflicts between selves remain obscure. The constructivist perspective, as one of many efforts to understand interstate relations by way of situating a “self” with relation to an “other” positioned to play a counterrole at the interpersonal level, explains interactions between states by using the notion of “state identity.” This perspective offers limited insights due to the incompatible components of the term “state identity,” which is oriented toward an external, as opposed to internal, perspective of “identity.” As a result of using “state identity” in this way, we construe an actor’s identity not by what the actor does, but by virtue of how an author has ascribed a certain “identity” to the state; the term “identity” is treated as a mere taxonomic tool according to a particular author’s research focus, which is separate from the actor’s self-conception and the actor’s identification with and commitment to that “identity.” As a result, the distinct perspective resulting from such a consideration of “identity” leaves the real actors and their self-identification out of the study of international relations. In this paper I question the theoretical postulation of “state identity,” i.e., state as a unitary actor, in two ways: (1) I point out that the convention of seeing the state as a unitary actor who plays an assigned role is derived from a dramaturgical metaphor and I question how the metaphor can be adequately applied to the study of “state identity” by covering two important aspects of the actor––what constitutes the actor and the way in which an actor’s self-conceptualization affects his choice of action in different contexts; and (2) I reconsider the use of metonymy in ordinary language. Metonymy enables us to refer to the subject of an action as though it were a single coherent entity and I show that the concept of “state identity” is an example of metonymy.

Because the subject of “identity” shifts between individuals and groups, in order to make sense of an actor’s “identity” in international relations, we should examine the ways in which members of a nation interact with their political leaders in the process of identifying who they are, on the one hand, the ways in which political leaders as co-members of the nation implement certain national policies against other nations, on the other. Based on the insights of a social identity perspective from social psychology, I present “collective self” as a useful concept for international relations by focusing on people’s identification of “self” within the context of the group to which they belong. Viewed from the perspective of the subjective self or others, what the “self” is represents a different identity. I highlight the role of memory in the subjective meaning of one’s “identity” and sense of “self.” In further developing the notion of memory, I introduce three conceptual stages of “collective self”––remembering self, securitizing self, and legalizing self––as part of a larger conceptual framework which inks constitution of the “collective self” to the sources, formulation, and implementation of national security policy.

 

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