Introduction
In international relations, three
theories provide contrasting analyses and perspectives on governance in
general. This essay will introduce each
theory, discuss it further in terms of governance, and then conclude with some
contrasting thoughts about the Kingdom of God. To some readers' consternation, I will equate the Kingdom of God with the Church on the grounds that Christ's reign as Lord is through His 'body', the Church, 'the fullness of him who fills all in all' (Ephesians 1.22-23). The essay is intended as a discussion of the relationship of Church and
State. The argument is that some forms
of government are more amenable to the Church, but the Church, insofar as it
represents the Kingdom of God on earth, is an alternative community to
government that does not replace government but is constructively critical of
it.
Realism
Realism has a variety of forms,
but its key tenets are, according to Tim Dunne and Brian Schmidt, statism,
survival, and self-help.[1] While political theorists may prefer
definitions and distinctions in international relations theory to be expressed
in post-World War I developments, Dunne and Schmidt understand classical realism
to originate in ancient Greece, as in Thucydides’ rendition of negotiations
between the powerful Athenians and the weaker Melians (History of the
Peloponnesian War 5.84ff). Whereas
the Melians attempt to appeal to the ideal of justice, the Athenians respond
with straight-forward realism: they are the stronger and, as such, will do what
they please and the Melians will be forced into submission. The Melians appeal to fair play and just
dealings, but the Athenians respond that the fight is not fair: the question is
whether the Melians want to save their lives in the face of the more powerful
force or not. The Melians then suggest
that the gods may look with favour upon them despite their inferior
strength. To this argument, the
Athenians offer a realistic response, the safe rule in life that one should
stand up to equals, show deference to superiors, and treat inferiors with
moderation. The Melians look to something
outside the situation—outside the relationship between the two states: justice,
the gods, and also the hope they place in having an ally, the Spartans. The Athenian position demonstrates a unifying
theme for realism: outside state relationships there is nothing to which one
might appeal (outside states, there is in the international sphere only
anarchy). If so, the state does not
exist because of some external authority but because of its own, internal
power. Thus, survival depends on a
state’s looking to its own needs and defenses.
This, then, points realists to the need for self-help. States should not rely on others for their
own defense or thriving. They should not
rely on international institutions or allies, and they should not outsource
their key industries to other nations or be overly dependent on others for
their resources.
A key realist in the
Enlightenment era was Thomas Hobbes. Hobbes, writing in England during the Civil War, found the state
of nature to be chaotic and dangerous. Nature
endowed individuals with an equality of body and mind as well as an equality of
hope in attainment of our goals, but one could not locate politics in any
natural bonds that draw humans into community (Leviathan, 13.60-61). Indeed, this ‘equality of hope’ to attain our
goals leads human beings to formulate ways and means to take from others what
they want for themselves. To protect
against this, individuals band together, forming social contracts that they
might provide mutual protection against aggressors. Hobbes says that there are, in the nature of
man, three principal causes of quarreling: competition, diffidence, and
glory. ‘The first, maketh man invade for
Gain; the second, for Safety [the need for defense], and the third, for
Reputation’ (13.62).[2]
Realism need not be considered an
a-moral theory of international relations.
Realism is not synonymous with ‘might is right’, although that is the
tenor of the Athenian argument with the Melians. Hans J. Morgenthau argued with
‘Classical Realism’ that power is the medium for a state’s actions—it is what
will permit them to (or obstruct them from) doing whatever they wish to do.[3] This perspective was advanced with
‘Structural Realism’ (or ‘Neorealism’) in the Cold War period by Kenneth Waltz,
when the bipolar balance of power between the superpowers of the United States
and the Soviet Union dominated international politics.[4] Waltz argued that states were ultimately
concerned with security, not simply power, which was the means to security. Neoclassical realism since the end of the
Cold War introduces the notion that the perceptions of leaders and internal,
domestic politics also influence international politics.
The strength of realism is,
simply, that it is realistic. This comes
across already in the response of the Athenians to the Milenians. Ideals and theory aside, facts are facts, and
the fact of the matter is that power wins.
The challenge for realists is not in the facts but in distinguishing the
possession and use of power from ethics rather than intertwining them: might
does not make right even if it does describe how international relations
work. Where, then, is a moral authority
to be located if not in power? For this,
we turn to suggestions in a second theory: liberalism.
Liberalism
Liberalism, in the sense of
international relations, arises after the religious wars of Europe in the
period of the Enlightenment. The term ‘liberalism’
is confusingly fluid and broad. Helen
Pluckrose and James Lindsay say that the
main tenets of
liberalism are political democracy, limitations on the power of government, the
development of universal human rights, legal equality for all adult citizens,
freedom of expression, respect for the value of viewpoint diversity and honest
debate, respect for evidence and reason, the separation of church and state,
and freedom of religion.[5]
Discussion here, however, is
focused on liberalism as a theory in international relations. Three thinkers might be considered from the
Enlightenment period of the 1700s in discussing this view: John Locke (1632-1704),
Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), and Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832). The tenets of liberalism might, however, be contrasted
with realism, already discussed.
John Locke argued (Two
Treatises 2) that natural law was an important reality that could and
should be taken into consideration even when individual states may not have
developed certain laws to punish wrongful behaviour. Roman law was founded on the view that there
were three types of law: the law of nature, the law of nations (international
law), and the laws of specific peoples.
In Locke’s view, nations may agree that a law of nature has been broken
and punish persons whether or not their countries had prescribed laws to do
with some specific act. Furthermore,
punishment may be applied internationally where natural law has been broken,
such as in the case of war crimes. Locke
advocated that natural law protected life, liberty, and property (amended to
‘the pursuit of happiness’ in the American Declaration of Independence). Locke’s arguments highlight key contentions
for liberalism: the notion that there is more than just the self-interest of
individual states seeking their own ends; the notion of natural law; and the
articulation of natural law in terms of universal truths. These are key tenets of liberalism. We might add one additional point from Locke
that he held to be essential: the positive laws of a state are those that are
based in natural law (Two Treatises 2.12). If so, then the laws of a particular nation might
be judged in light of the higher law of nature and—anticipating the discussion
of constructivism—the laws of a nation are not to be established on the mere
majority agreement of its citizenry. Thus,
If the rule of
law is ignored, if the representatives of the people are prevented from
assembling, if the mechanisms of election are altered without popular consent,
or if the people are handed over to a foreign power, then they can take back
their original authority and overthrow the government (2.212–17).[6]
Natural law, then, stood over
both domestic and international law and is a fundamental concept for
liberalism’s holding the power of a state or of states to account.
Kant’s argument was that liberal
states tended toward peace rather than war.
Three things, he argued, are necessary to foster peace. First, a republican government—one requiring
the consent of the citizens—would more likely deter countries from war than a
monarchical government would. Second, a
league or ‘pacific federation’ with its own constitution would foster peace
among the participant nations. Third,
Kant encourages a ‘cosmopolitan right’ that has to do with human good (cf.
‘human rights’). One can easily see the
outline of the later League of Nations and United Nations in the 20th
century, the latter having a charter that describes various human rights. Kant’s plan is not based on the independent
rights of states but on the universalism of humanity across national
boundaries. The universalism of Kant,
therefore, is key to his politics as it is to his ethics, in which the
‘categorical imperative’—a universal principle that what is right for one must
be right because it is right for all—is fundamental.
Jeremy Bentham’s ethics is often
contrasted with Kant’s in that he proposed, alternatively, the utilitarian
principle for deciding moral actions.
This principle located ‘the good’ in the greatest good for the greatest
number of people. (Note that this
definition still fails to define ‘the good’ and on what authority people have
the right to determine it.) As applied
to international relations, Bentham, firstly, introduced the term
‘international’ to replace the Roman ‘law of nations’. The latter term relied on custom and
convention rather than agreement on law between nations. Note that Bentham locates the law by which
states might operate not in natural law, as did Locke, but in his equivalent
for the law of nations. Secondly, he sought an agreement between nations that
there is an equality of sovereigns. This
restricts a state’s justification of its use of power simply because it is the
more powerful. However, it does not
locate the restriction in God’s authority over the nations. Thirdly, he called for legislators and judges
to seek among the family of nations the greatest happiness.[7] While this utilitarian principle of the
greatest happiness for the greatest number of people is popular to this day, it
is notoriously slippery in application.
All three of these arguments from
Bentham are attempts to locate an authority outside the power of a particular
state apart from God or theology and involve a trust in the goodness of
humanity. The same might be said of Kant’s
proposals. Only Locke appeals to divine
authority, even if only in vague terms.
It is God as Creator and Sustainer of our world rather than God as the
revealer of moral law (as in the Mosaic Law) who holds an authority above the
rights of nations in their use of power.
We might say that Kant and Bentham have bought the serpent’s argument
with Eve in the Garden of Eden: men and women may become like God in their
exercise of reason to know right and wrong.
Deists like Locke, however, contended that, just as nations require an
external authority over the use of their power, so also humans need an external
authority of their reasoning power as to what is right and wrong.
Constructivism
Upon the impending demise of the
Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War and in an age of postmodernity,
Nicholas Onuf proposed in 1989 that international relations are constructed.[8] Another key proponent of constructivism is Alexander
Wendt, whose article, ‘Anarchy is What States Make of It: the Social
Construction of Power Politics,’ appeared in 1992.[9] He writes, ‘identities and interests [not the
‘self-help’ interest of realism] of states are socially constructed [not
‘exogenously given’, as in neoliberal theories, but ‘endogenous’] by
knowledgeable practice.’[10] He redefines ‘self-help’ as a process whereby
states develop their self-interests rather than respond to the anarchic forces
of power-politics in international relations.
Also, Wendt notes that both realism and liberalism are rationalist in
their seeking to change behaviour through reasoning rather than, as
constructivism, seeking to change actual identity and interests. They assume that ‘states are the dominant
actors in the system.’[11]
This new theory holds that human
association is, first, not primarily grounded in material forces but in shared
ideas and, second, these shared ideas help construct the identities and interest
of the actors in international relations.
Perceptions, social norms, actions, and interactions shape politics. As Wendt says, ‘A fundamental principle of
constructivist social theory is that people act towards objects, including
other actors, on the basis of meanings that the object have for them.’[12] If the object is perceived as an enemy rather
than a friend, an individual or state will act differently. Quoting Peter Berger, Wendt writes,
“Identity, with its appropriate attachments of psychological reality, is always
identity within a specific, socially constructed world.”[13] Expanding on Berger’s and Luckman’s
understanding of the interplay between individuals and society in the
construction of the identity of both, they say,
Identity is a
key element of subjective reality and, like all subjective reality, stands in
dialectical relationship with society.
Identity is formed by social processes.
Once crystallized, it is maintained, modified, or even reshaped by
social relations. The social processes involved in both the formation and
maintenance of identity are determined by social structures. Conversely, the identities produced by
the interplay of organism, individual consciousness and social structure react
upon the given social structure, maintaining it, modifying it, or even
reshaping it.[14]
Along these lines, Wendt suggests
that ‘an institution is a relatively stable set or “structure” of identities
and interests.’[15] So, ‘institutionalization is a process of
internalizing new identities and interests, not something occurring outside
them and affecting only behaviour.’
Given this, state relations are not merely about power and
institutions. A more dynamic and
constructive view adds that they are also about expectations and understandings
arising from the institutional identities and interests that participants in
them form. Thus, relations begin with
agency (the agency of the body for individuals and the agency of the apparatus
of governance for the state) and the desire to survive.[16] States, like individuals, take their agencies
and desire to survive into their encounters with others and produce identity
and interests in the interactions and relationships that develop, whether
friendly or hostile.[17]
Weaknesses in constructivism are
likely not so much in their description of some aspects of relationships but in
their failure to give an adequate account of identity and interests beyond
agency and the desire to survive. The
description they offer is a sort of myth of origins that omits other key
aspects of real relationships determined (not constructed) by history and
religion in particular and of identity that includes some notion of
morality—what is right objectively.
Islam, for example, makes no distinction between religion and the state. Its identity is formed as an interpretation
of Islamic Law, history, and goals to convert or dominate everyone else. Its core identity is ‘submission’ in the
sense of submission to Allah’s rule and therefore to Islamic rule living under
that rule. This view requires an
understanding of relations that goes quite beyond agency and the desire to
survive. In the end, Thomas Hobbes’
realism that states form for survival against hostile forces (Leviathan)
offers a better lens to interpret relationships with Islamic states.
The Kingdom of God
What lies behind constructivism’s
failure in this regard is its denial of a moral order—the very thing that
liberalism insisted on but increasingly did so only in terms of a European
Deism and subsequent secularism rather than a Biblical worldview. We might add here that African traditional
religion also posited divinity behind and above interactions, but with so vague
an understanding of this that it amounted to little beyond sacrifices
(including human) to appease the spiritual forces. A Biblical perspective gives
far more clarity and detail to divine rule and expresses what this means
through the pages of Scripture.
Furthermore, constructivism has
to deny any fundamentally evil principle in the world. It may be true that institutions do not have
to be the way they are but can be perceived and used according to human
identities and intentions in relationships.
This view is fundamentally undermined, however, if there is an operative
evil in the world whose agency is not amoral and whose desire to survive is a desire
to survive as a force of lies, evil, and destruction. If so, international relations are not
limited to the self-help and survival of states (realism) or the self-making
through agency and the desire to survive of states defining their identity and
interests in relationships with others (constructivism). They may be formed more fundamentally by
powers beyond themselves, whether by God in His goodness or by demonic forces. This was the view of the Greek and Roman
world. Jews and Christians added to this
an historical perspective, or a narrative perspective with a beginning, middle,
and end to the story. What is happening
now is part of a larger narrative of God’s salvation history.
One question the early Church
asked was whether government was a demonic force. It asked this for very good reason: its
regular encounter with government was often negative. The New Testament offers different answers to
the question, since some governmental authority is God-ordained but government
can and often does abuse its authority. One
thing was certain: government was not the Kingdom of God. Several texts need to be considered to answer
this question and to come to something like an early Church understanding of
Church and State.
The first relationship between Church and State is Jesus’
famous distinction between things religious and things to do with the State:
‘render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are
God’s’ (Mark 12.17, ESV). At one level,
this statement makes room to pay required taxes and, by extension, to abide by
the State’s laws. At another level, this
relativizes the State’s authority, declaring that it does not have authority in
matters of Christian religion. As Peter
famously said to the high priest and the Jewish Council, ‘We must obey God
rather than any human authority’ (Acts 5.29).
This Council held authority over religious and Jewish civil affairs in
Jerusalem. Peter’s response to the
Council states more than the separation of Church and State. He first contrasts God’s Law with any human
authority, whether in the religious institution or in the State. He second insists that God’s Law is above
human authorities.
The second type of relationship between Church and State is found
in Romans 13.1-8. Paul affirms that the
State has its purpose and authority from God.
He writes,
Romans 13.1-4 Let every person be subject to
the governing authorities; for there is no authority except from God, and those
authorities that exist have been instituted by God…. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct,
but to bad. Do you wish to have no fear
of the authority? Then do what is good,
and you will receive its approval; for it is God’s servant for your good. But if you do what is wrong, you should be
afraid, for the authority does not bear the sword in vain! It is the servant of God to execute wrath on
the wrongdoer.
In context, this passage follows Paul’s call on believers
not to take revenge on their enemies but to do good to them, leaving vengeance
to God (Romans 12.17-21, quoting Proverbs 25.21-22). This perspective brings out a different
nuance from the first. The separation
here is not so absolute, not so black and white. God’s authority can work through human
authorities; God can delegate His authority, as it were. This understanding of government authority is
that it brings order in an otherwise chaotic and sinful world. We see God doing this already in creation in
Genesis 1.1-2.3. The divine function of ruling is to bring order. Similarly, 2 Thessalonians pictures the
current situation in the world in terms of the restraint of lawlessness and
rebellion—by which we should understand opposition to God’s Law. The passages speaks of a future time when
this restraint will be removed and the man of lawlessness revealed. On this understanding, God sets in place what
is needed, such as government, to restrain lawlessness—to hold back the chaos
monster, as it were. We might contrast a
contemporary view of government that sees the State as the guarantor of freedom
rather than the authority to restrain lawlessness. The restraint of lawlessness is not a blanket
approval of State authority, though.
‘Lawlessness’ is understood religiously—God’s Law. The State itself can be criticized if it sets
its power in motion not to restrain but to promote what is opposed to God’s
Law. Thus, government stands under God.
The third, slightly different perspective is in 1 Timothy
2.1-8. Paul affirms the traditional
Jewish perspective that believers should pray for those in powerful and
authoritative positions. This is,
however, not because they support the authorities but because prayer can lead
to God’s purpose being worked through people in positions of authority. In particular, the prayer is directed to
God’s mission that all might be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth (v.
4).
The fourth perspective comprises all the book of
Revelation. In Revelation, the overly
powerful State usurps divine authority and persecutes the Church. The problem is not just that people do bad
things, it is that the power of the State takes on an absolute authority of its
own. This is the situation that elicits
apocalyptic literature like Daniel and Revelation. These four perspectives are, to be sure,
compatible. They bring out different
aspects of the relationship between Church and State.
There is a difference between ‘big government’ and
government that wrestles away power from the people, although the two certainly
go together. We have seen in recent
years a shift from concern about big government to a government of (over) rather
than by the people. A big government, it
is well-argued, is a government that is at best clumsy for its
bureaucracy. It is often inefficient (or
dangerously efficient in some things), expensive, ‘stupid’ for its lack of
nuance, inattentive to local concerns, process-driven, legalistic, and operated
by unelected officials who can and do establish a deep state.
The first half of the twentieth century saw fundamental
disagreement over ideologies: communist, fascist, democratic (and still, to
some extent, monarchic). Such battles
will surely reappear, but the current fracturing of civil society is occurring
within the democratic option. Democracy
was long seen as the antidote to tyranny.
What has developed, however, is a democratic tyranny. This tyranny
functions in two ways: (1) as the overreaching power of a democratically
elected government; (2) as an oppression of the minority by the majority. The American founding fathers anticipated
this when instituting a democratic government, which is why they instituted an
electoral college, a representational legislature in the Senate, a separation
of powers, and various checks and balances.
This was the main concern in James Madison’s Federalist Paper No.
10, in which he contends that a republican form of government rather than pure
democracy can safeguard against majority domination or unrepresented minorities. The problem is no longer ‘big
government’; it is now a powerful government that restricts individual
freedoms. The system of government was
meant to protect citizens not only from the tyranny of the majority but also
from the majority voting in a different system that would shut out minority
voices and concerns. Christians ought
always to understand their presence in society is as a minority voice, and they
should, therefore, be deeply concerned with governments that lack protection of
and freedom for its minority groups.
Another dimension to Christian
thought about government is the existence not of an alternative world
government but of an alternative people, the Church. The Church is the institutional alternative
to government, but it can exist alongside of and independently from government
because it is a different order altogether.
One of the fatal flaws of much Christian thinking about social justice
is its thinking of what this means for government and society rather than, or
more than, of what it means for the Church.
The Church is God’s people embodying His reign on the earth. Christ Jesus reigns now over the
Church as He will over everything in the future; the Church is Christ’s
body in the present world, the present fullness of Him is filling all
things with the presence of God.
What this meant for the early Christians is that their focus in social
justice was in who they were—their identity and interests, which were formed in
Christ and were, therefore, Christ’s identity and interests. Being Christ in the world, the Church could
illuminate the world with the light of God’s rule.
This answers the alternative
theories considered here in international relations. It does not answer them in the sense that the
Kingdom of God is the right theory where these other theories are wrong because
the Church is not a real alternative to government in the sense of intending to
overthrow or replace it. The Church
gives up necessary actions in this present world that government performs. Thus, the Church represents to government
what God’s reign involves without itself becoming a government. As Paul points out in Romans 12.17-13.7, the
Church gives up the sword of retribution and punishment in pursuit of justice,
but God empowers government to deliver order and justice in a sinful
world. This is no outright endorsement
of any actual government, all of which are faulty. It removes the sword from the Church.
Paul also offers a view of
government in terms of God’s hand holding back the apocalyptic forces of
lawlessness in 2 Thessalonians 2.26-28:
26 And you know
what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time. 27 For the mystery of lawlessness mis already
at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. 28 And then the lawless one will be revealed,
whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing
by the appearance of his coming (ESV).
A secular version of this would
simply speak of ‘pariah states’ or ‘predator states’ that come and go, without
a notion of this culminating in a final unleashing of evil. There are states that are evil for impersonal,
systemic reasons, but there are also states that are evil for the intentional,
personal reasons of their rulers and those in authority. The immense evil of the state could be
equated with evil leaders and their henchmen.
If any passage comes close to a view of international relations like
that of Thomas Hobbes, it is 2 Thessalonians 2, which simply reflects a deeply
held perspective in apocalyptic Judaism.
1 Enoch 91.5-7 speaks of a state of violence that will intensify on the
earth and then references a great plague on the earth, oppression, everything
being uprooted, warfare, and the increase of sin, blasphemy, injustice, crime,
iniquity, uncleanliness (cf. Jubilees 23.14-25; 2 Baruch 27). In regard to 2 Thessalonians 2’s ‘man of
lawlessness,’ Eugene Boring notes that the Roman general, Pompey, who ‘evoked
apostasy, scattered the covenant people, and even entered the holy of holies,’
was called the ‘Lawless One.’[18] F. F. Bruce suggested that the image of the
man of lawlessness is built on Old Testament and Jewish notions of a wicked
leader. The most interesting of his
suggestions is Isaiah 14.12-15. The King
of Babylon is said to boast that he will rise above the clouds to make himself
like the Most High, but he will be brought down to Sheol.[19] Greg Beale suggests, rather, that the man of
lawlessness is based on Daniel 11.29-34,[20] which speaks of the
return of Antiochus IV Epiphanes to attack Egypt but then turn to attack ‘the
holy covenant’. He will profane the
temple and fortress, remove the regular burnt sacrifice, and set up the
abomination that makes desolate (vv. 30-31).
He will seduce people to violate the covenant, while some would stand
firm even though they will ‘stumble by sword and flame, by captivity and
plunder’ (v. 33). God’s people will be ‘refined,
purified, and made white’ with the stumbling of some (v. 35).
Conclusion
Some governmental forms are
better than others, and some are more amenable to the Church than others. Yet form is only one aspect of a larger
discussion of Church and State. Even
better forms of government can be problematic. The Church exists as a community with
convictions, ethics, and activities that can support or challenge
governments. It is not itself a
government. It is high functioning within
its own community and can be exemplary to the State as to what it ought to
do. The Church’s voice and nature of
community ought to be a prophetic voice to the State. Yet the State is not the Church, and there
are things that the Church does that the State ought not to try to do (enforce
religion, e.g.). One of the matters
distinguishing Church and State is that of power. The Church—when it truly is the Church and
not some misrepresentation of it—understands power through the cross of Jesus
Christ. It rejects the means of power of
the State either by seeing it as a legitimate form of justice in a sinful world,
with qualifications, or as an abusive aggression that needs to be challenged,
just as the prophets of old would challenge the governments of Israel for their
religious and social abuses.
[1]
Tim Dunne and Brian C. Schmidt, ‘Chapter 8: Realism,’ in The Globalization
of World Politics: An Introduction to International Relations, 8th
ed., ed. John Baylis, Steve Smith, Patricia Owens (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press,
2020), pp. 130-144.
[2] Hobbes, Leviathan, rev.
student edition, ed. Richard Tuck (Cambridge Texts in the History of Political
Thought; Cambridge: Cambridge Univ., 1991).
[3]
See Ibid., pp. 136-137. Hans J.
Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, 4th
ed. (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1948).
[4]
Kenneth Waltz, Theory of International Politics (Reading, MA:
Addison-Wesley, 1979).
[5]
Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay, Cynical Theories: How Activist
Scholarship Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity—and Why This Harms
Everything (Durham, NC: Pitchstone Pub., 2020).
[6]
‘Locke’s Political Philosophy,’ Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
(rev. 2020); online https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/locke-political/#:~:text=Locke%20describes%20international%20relations%20as,in%20the%20state%20of%20nature..
See section 6.
[7]
Tim Dunne, ‘Liberal Internationalism,’ in The Globalization of World
Politics, pp. 103-114. See p. 105.
[8]
Nicholas Onuf, World of our Making (Columbia, SC: University of South
Carolina Press, 1989).
[9]
Alexander Wendt, ‘Anarchy is What States Make of It: The Social Construction of
Power Politics,’ International Organization, Vol. 46, No. 2. (Spring,
1992), pp. 391-425.
[10]
Ibid. The quotation is from the
abstract of the article.
[11]
Ibid., p. 392.
[12]
Ibid., p. 396-397.
[13]
Ibid., p. 397-398. See Peter
Berger, ‘Identity as a Problem in the Sociology of Knowledge,’ European
Journal of Sociology 7.1 (1966), pp. 32-40.
The connection of constructivism to Peter Berger helps readers to see
the larger picture: constructivism is an application of a sociology of
knowledge that involves a variety of thinkers such as Berger and Michel
Foucault. See Reiner Keller, ‘The
Sociology of Knowledge Approach to Discourse (SKAD),’ Human Studies 34.1
(Spring, 2011), pp. 43-65.
[14]
Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality: A
Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge (London: Allen Lane, 1966), p. 194.
[15]
Wendt, p. 399.
[16]
Ibid., p. 402.
[17]
Wendt offers a systemic diagramme to illustrate the interactions. Ibid., p. 406.
[18]
He references (Psalms of Solomon 17.11-22; Josephus, Antiquities of the
Jews 14.71-72; Jewish Wars 1.152-153). See M. Eugene Boring, I and II
Thessalonians: A Commentary (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press),
p. 273.
[19]
F. F. Bruce, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, Word Biblical Commentary, Vo. 45,
rev. ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Academic, 2017).
[20]
G. K. Beale, 1 and 2 Thessalonians (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity,
2010), p. 206.
Comments