Political Communication in International Relations:

Connecting Arguments to Theoretical Paradigms

Dr. Philip N. Howard

Department of Communication

University of Washington

Attributes	Three Paradigms
	Realist	Liberal	Marxist
Actor	Unitary State—mutually exclusive and territorially distinct. A benevolent hegemon accepts costs with eye to long-term power; malevolent hegemon thinks short term	State representative such as a head of government or diplomat, or other non-state actors such as corporations, domestic political parties	Classes, social elites; civil society, consumers
System	Anarchy; balance of power	Interdependence; trans-nationalism; transactions	Hierarchical; powerful groups structure capitalist world economy
Interests	Power and security	Welfare and liberty	Capital accumulation
Peace & cooperation	Balance of power	Actors with complimentary capabilities; through trade and market institutions	Always in interests of rich & Northern, and at the expense of poor & Southern; until the revolution!
Change & disruption	Interruptions in balance of power, cycle of concern and disinterest, miscommunication of interests	Differences in technology and information; miscommunication of interests	Class conflict
Strengths	One strong dominant power can really get things done	Explains multi-polarity & declining role of USA; parsimonious	Good critique of motivations; global & systemic trends
Weaknesses	Not explain lags between changes; persistence of other actors	Not everybody is maximizes utility, so what are real motivations? Is everything voluntary?	Not great on policy recommendations
Authors	Gilpen, Morgenthau, Kennedy	Nye, Putnam	Marx, Lenin