2021 is What We Make of it

Joe Iuliano, Assistant Head of Academic Affairs
Two weeks into a new year, we are striving to disentangle ourselves from the tentacles of the past (of 2020) that we so desperately wish to shake off—coronavirus, toxic politics, economic hardship, social unrest, and loss of social interactions and life experiences—so we can return to ‘normal life’ and begin to move forward. While January 1 always marks a turning point on the calendar, it doesn’t automatically hit the reset button for all of life. We can hit a reset button for how we approach our lives and what our community and world bring us and hopefully be better prepared to handle the disappointments and cherish the joys that come our way and that we make for ourselves. 2021 doesn’t call for the typical new year’s resolution to eat less, work out more, avoid procrastination, re-connect with family members, etc. It’s time to reconstruct, not just resolve.
 
In the spring of 1992, following the relatively recent end of the Cold War, Alexander Wendt, a highly respected international relations scholar, penned a seminal article titled, “Anarchy is what states make of it: the social construction of power politics.” With this article, he firmly established a place for constructivism as a viable, thought-provoking theoretical perspective in the study of world politics. His thinking offered a counterpoint to the realist and liberal theoretical models that dominated the discipline at that time.
 
In this article Wendt offers significant complexity as he introduces a new paradigm through which to examine a core concept of international relations: anarchy. The anarchy he discusses is that which is understood or perceived to exist in the international system composed of sovereign states and multiple non-state actors. It is the idea that the world operates politically without any overarching government, that is, there is no centralized political authority that governs international relations. This is the concept that is at the foundation of the realist and liberal perspectives—a core idea—not the ideology of practicing anarchists who seek no government because they believe no government at all best meets human needs. I won’t dwell on them.
 
Wendt poses these three questions at the end of the first paragraph: “Does the absence of centralized political authority force states to play competitive power politics? Can international regimes overcome this logic, and under what conditions? What in anarchy is given and immutable, and what is amenable to change?” If you have an interest in the formation and implementation of foreign policy, these questions immediately set you to thinking—more so if your mindset is not already predetermined, of course. Here’s step one for 2021: Reconstruct the open mind.
 
In the classroom, I have tried to introduce these questions and some of the subsequent argument to my students, but it is exceptionally challenging both practically speaking—Wendt uses complex terminology and sentence structure to communicate complex ideas—and conceptually. Unlike realism and liberalism (at their base), constructivism presents abstractions—identities, ideas, intersubjectivity—as the driving forces behind change in international relations; it’s not just power and self-interest in a self-help world or cooperation, interdependence and norms that limit conflict in the international order (I’ve simplified significantly here). These matter conceptually, as much as or more than practically.
 
If my students can survive the first nine paragraphs that constitute the introduction of the article, then they may come away with some understanding of the approach being taken, the lens being offered (particularly if I have had any success helping them to learn about realism and liberalism beforehand). Admittedly, it is an overly ambitious slog for a high school student, but I do seek to challenge them and want to develop their thinking muscles. This what school is for, and it is why I still teach. Here is step 2 for 2021: Reconstruct your perspective—2021 is not happening to you; it is what you make of it.
 
This is not a Pollyannaish view of the world. There are so many (too many) elements of our social systems that have been created to advantage some and disadvantage others. Social injustice, inequality, economic deprivation, and poverty among other social plagues are, as we are seeing, difficult to overcome and reconstruct. These are significant hand-me-downs from 2020 (and decades and centuries before) and will take a significant, concerted effort to deconstruct. Step 3 for 2021: work to deconstruct even if it’s just within the six-foot social distancing sphere we live in now. If everyone does that, we will cover a great, great distance.
 
We begin the second semester in IR class with a deep dive into theory. They have few preconceptions here to deconstruct and open minds for learning. I hope the students make much of their studies and I hope we can all, together, make of 2021 something so, so much better than 2020. It’s early; let’s get after it.
As an inclusive private school community, Brimmer welcomes students who will increase the diversity of our school. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, sex, gender, gender identity and expression, disability, sexual orientation, national origin, ancestry, or any other characteristic protected from discrimination under state or federal law, in the administration of our educational policies, admissions practices, financial aid decisions, and athletic and other school-administered programs.