Reflectivism is a broad umbrella label, used
primarily in International Relations theory,
for a range of theoretical approaches which
oppose rational-choice accounts of social
phenomena and, perhaps, positivism more generally.
The label was popularised by Robert Keohane
in his presidential address to the International
Studies Association in 1988.
The address was entitled "International Institutions:
Two Approaches", and contrasted two broad
approaches to the study of international institutions
(and international phenomena more generally).
One was "rationalism", the other what Keohane
referred to as "reflectivism".
Rationalists — including realists, neo-realists,
liberals, neo-liberals, and scholars using
game-theoretic or expected-utility models
— are theorists who adopt the broad theoretical
and ontological commitments of rational-choice
theory.
== Rationalism vs. reflectivism ==
Keohane characterised rationalism in the following
fashion:
[Rationalists accept] what Herbert Simon has
referred to a "substantive" conception of
rationality, characterizing "behaviour that
can be adjudged objectively to be optimally
adapted to the situation" (Simon, 1985:294).
As Simon has argued, the principle of substantive
rationality generates hypotheses about actual
human behaviour only when it is combined with
certain auxiliary assumptions about the structure
of utility functions and the formation of
expectations.Since this research program is
rooted in exchange theory, it assumes scarcity
and competition as well as rationality on
the part of the actors.
Rationalistic theories of institutions view
institutions as affecting patterns of costs.Keohane
went on to contrast this with the approach
of "reflective" scholars:
These authors, of whom the best-known include
Hayward Alker, Richard Ashley, Friedrich Kratochwil,
and John Ruggie, emphasize the importance
of the "intersubjective meanings" of international
institutional activity (Kratochwil and Ruggie,
1986:765).
In their view, understanding how people think
about institutional norms and rules, and the
discourse they engage in, is as important
in evaluating the significance of these norms
as measuring the behavior that changes in
response to their invocation.These writers
emphasize that individuals, local organizations,
and even states develop within the context
of more encompassing institutions.
Institutions do not merely reflect the preferences
and power of the units constituting them;
the institutions themselves shape those preferences
and that power.
Institutions are therefore constitutive of
actors as well as vice versa.
It is therefore not sufficient in this view
to treat the preferences of individuals as
given exogenously: they are affected by institutional
arrangements, by prevailing norms, and by
historically contingent discourse among people
seeking to pursue their purposes and solve
their self-defined problems.[I]t would be
fair to refer to them as "interpretive" scholars,
since they all emphasize the importance of
historical and textual interpretation and
the limitations of scientific models in studying
world politics.
But other approaches also have a right to
be considered interpretive.
I have therefore coined a phrase for these
writers, calling them "reflective", since
all of them emphasize the importance of human
reflection for the nature of institutions
and ultimately for the character of world
politics.Reflectivism and rationalism are
typically used as labels applying not just
to the study of international institutions,
but of international relations more widely,
and even the social world as a whole.
Sociologies and histories of the International
Relations discipline have sometimes used the
opposition between these approaches to describe
one of the central fault-lines within the
discipline.
== Reflexivity ==
There may be another sense, not specifically
discussed by Keohane, in which the label is
apt.
Reflectivist scholars tend to emphasise the
inherent reflexivity both of theory and of
the social world it studies.
Unlike the term reflectivism, the concept
of "reflexivity" has wide currency outside
of international relations, having come to
prominence in social theory in the latter
part of the 20th century.
Reflexivity refers to the ways in which elements
and phenomena in social life have the capacity
to "fold in on", or be "directed towards",
themselves.
That is, they can produce effects on, or have
implications for, their own features, dynamics
and existence.
An example is the "self-fulfilling prophecy"
(or "self-disconfirming prophecy") — a situation
in which merely describing, predicting, imagining
or believing something to be the case may
eventually result in its actually coming to
be the case.
More generally, reflectivists emphasise the
significance of human self-awareness: the
ways people observe, imagine, describe, predict
and theorise about themselves and the social
reality around them, and the recursive effect
this "self-knowledge" or these "reflections"
have on that social reality itself.
Some scholars link reflexivity with the broader
debate, within International Relations theory
and social theory more generally, over the
relationship between "agency" and "structure"
in the social world.
That is, the relationship between people's
capacity to "freely" choose their actions
and/or to "make a real difference" to the
world around them, and the social "structures"
in which people are always embedded, and which
may powerfully shape – often against their
will or in ways they are unaware of – the
kinds of things they are able to do.
Reflectivists also often claim that studying
and theorising about international relations
can be, should be, and are necessarily, reflexive.
For one thing, they claim, theories about
social reality may affect – might change
– social reality itself.
Some critics of (neo-)realism have raised
the possibility that realist theories, for
instance, may act as self-fulfilling prophecies.
To the extent that they are taken by theorists
and practitioners to be the "common sense"
of international politics, diplomacy and policy-making,
those theories may encourage precisely the
kind of mistrust, ruthless competition and
amorality that they posit to be natural and
inherent features of the international realm.
Familiar methodological examples of the capacity
of observation and theorising to affect the
object/phenomena of study include the "observer-expectancy
effect" and long-running concerns among anthropologists
and ethnographers over the possible effect
of participant observation on the very people
and behaviours being studied.
Furthermore, reflectivists argue, those theories
invariably reflect in important ways the social
context in which they were produced; so in
a sense the social world shapes the theories
made of it.
There is often a normative or ethical aspect
to the emphasis on reflexivity.
Reflectivists often argue that theorists should
be as self-aware as possible — to reflect
as much as possible on the influences (assumptions,
biases, normative commitments, etc.) that
feed into and shape the theories they produce.
In addition, they should be able to hold their
own theories to the standards and arguments
they set out in those same theories.
And finally, they should reflect on the likely
and possible effects of their theorising.
Some reflectivists (e.g. those of a post-structuralist
persuasion) have argued that theorising should
itself be understood as a practice, like the
human practices that theories study; that
it is an act (conscious or unconscious) of
intervention into social reality, and that
as such it is never "innocent" or "neutral",
and there is a degree of responsibility for
its consequences that theorists cannot (and
should not try to) escape.
== Reflectivism and post-positivism ==
Reflectivist approaches include such approaches
as constructivism, feminism, post-structuralism,
post-colonialism and Critical Theory.
The challenge launched by these approaches
against rationalist approaches, which have
largely dominated the IR discipline for the
past three decades, was linked to the "Third
Debate in International Relations" between
positivists and post-positivists/anti-positivists.
(The first two disciplinary "Great Debates"
are supposed to have pitted (1) realists vs.
so-called "idealists", and (2) behaviouralists
vs. so-called "traditionalists", the latter
favouring historical methods and insights
from political philosophy.)
Although the large majority of reflectivists
oppose positivism, it might be a mistake to
equate reflectivism with post-positivism or
anti-positivism, as (conventional) constructivists
who are positivist in orientation would nevertheless
fall under Keohane's description.
Confusion may be compounded by the fact that
in International Relations theory, rationalism
and positivism can often be (erroneously)
equated.
There are many positivist political scientists
who do not adopt rational-choice assumptions.
Some mainstream International Relations scholars,
dismissing the importance or value of non-positivist
approaches to social science, have reframed
the rationalism-reflectivism debate narrowly,
as a debate between rationalism and ("conventional")
constructivism, construed as the two major
social theories (or "ontologies") of (mainstream)
International Relations theory.
The rationalism-constructivism debate drew
considerable attention within the mainstream
at the turn of the 21st century, with some
rejecting the starkness of the opposition
itself and asserting a fundamental compatibility,
or possibility of synthesis, between the two
approaches.
== Criticism of reflectivist approaches ==
The main criticisms of reflectivist approaches
stem from the epistemological differences
between reflectivism and what in the social
sciences has come to be known as positivism.
Since the 1970s, mainstream International
Relations theory has become increasingly,
and more insistently, positivist in epistemological
orientation.
The typical reflectivist rejection of positivist
assumptions and methods has led to criticism
that the approach cannot make reliable statements
about the outside world and even that it has
repudiated the entire "social science enterprise".
Such criticisms are widespread in American
political science, and reflectivism is not
generally popular in U.S.-based IR scholarship,
especially when compared with scholarship
originating in Europe and the third world.
== See also ==
Antipositivism
Postpositivism
Self-reflection
Sensemaking
