State Sovereignty as Social Construct: 46 (Cambridge Studies in International Relations, Series Number 46) - Softcover

Biersteker, Thomas J.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0521565995 ISBN 13: 9780521565998

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1996

Synopsis

State sovereignty is an inherently social construct. The modern state system is not based on some timeless principle of sovereignty, but on the production of a normative conception which links authority, territory, population (society, nation), and recognition in a unique way, and in a particular place (the state). Attempting to realize this ideal entails a great deal of hard work on the part of statespersons, diplomats, and intellectuals. The ideal of state sovereignty is a product of the actions of powerful agents and the resistances to those actions by those located at the margins of power. The unique contribution of this book is to describe, theorize, and illustrate the practices which have socially constructed, reproduced, reconstructed, and deconstructed various sovereign ideals and resistances to them. The contributors analyse how all the components of state sovereignty - not only recognition, but also territory, population, and authority - are socially constructed and combined in specific historical contexts.

About this title

Review:

"This useful collection poses an important intellectual challenge to the dominant epistemology...and the central substantive concern...of international politics. The contributors perceptively employ a social constructivist approach to unpack the concept of state sovereignity and reinterpret its several constituent dimensions: recognition, territory, population, authority." S. Mozaffar, Choice

Book Description:

State sovereignty is an inherently social construct. The modern state system is not based on some timeless principle of sovereignty, but on a conception that uniquely links authority, territory, population (society, nation), and recognition, in a particular place (the state). This book describes the practices that have produced various sovereign ideals and resistances to them.

About this edition

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0521565995
• ISBN 13: 9780521565998
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 316