DWA 103 · Introduction to Global Political Economy · Week 4 · Tue Sep 15 & Thu Sep 17

Ideas and Identity:
Constructivisms

Thursday Sep 17 · 12:00–1:00 pm · Choi Auditorium

Sergii Glebov

“Russia’s War on Ukraine and European (In)Security”

Visiting Associate Professor, UC Irvine; Associate Professor, Odesa I. I. Mechnikov National University
Young Initiative public talk; the first of five fall talks listed in the syllabus
One-page, single-spaced response by email within a week: title and speaker, the event’s purpose, one course theme

Thursday Sep 17 · Young Initiative · the poster

Event poster: Russia's War on Ukraine and European (In)Security. Dr. Sergii Glebov, Visiting Associate Professor, UC Irvine; Associate Professor, Odesa I. I. Mechnikov National University. Thursday, September 17, 2026, 12:00 to 1:00 pm, Choi Auditorium, Johnson Hall. The John Parke Young Initiative on the Global Political Economy, Occidental College.

Thursday Sep 17 · Quiz 1 · first fifteen minutes of class

Quiz 1 on Thursday

10:05–10:20 — in class, handwritten, closed notes
Study guide forwarded by email: Weeks 1–3 Core readings and decks
Part I — five multiple-choice items. Part II — one paragraph.
The higher of the two quiz scores counts double

Recap · Weeks 2–3 · liberalism and realism

	Liberalism (Week 2)	Realism (Week 3)
Unit	Individuals, firms, groups	The state
Key themes	Gains from exchange; comparative advantage (Smith, Ricardo) Free trade as the road to prosperity and peace (Cobden; Britain repeals the Corn Laws, 1846) Self-regulating markets, a limited state: laissez-faire, the gold standard Interdependence and institutions: cooperation under anarchy (Keohane & Nye; Aggarwal & Dupont) Preferences come from domestic groups and coalitions (Lake, Open Economy Politics)	Anarchy and self-help; wealth in the service of security — “power and plenty” (Viner, via Drezner) Relative gains: “Who will gain more?” (Waltz; Kirshner) Economic nationalism: infant industries, the productive powers of the nation (Hamilton, List; Bismarck’s tariff, 1879) Interdependence as vulnerability (Hirschman); weaponized interdependence (Farrell & Newman) Three realist traditions: building power, using leverage, paying for security

Pivot · from what states want to how they came to want it

There was nothing natural about laissez-faire. Karl Polanyi, The Great Transformation (1944), as quoted in Rawi Abdelal, “Constructivism as an Approach to International Political Economy,” in Blyth ed., Routledge Handbook of IPE (2009): 64

“the basic constructivist stance is that with so much possibility, we must explain why things are ‘historically so and not otherwise.’” (Abdelal 2009: 63–64, quoting Max Weber)

Pivot · what counted as normal · global markets, 1846–2026

“Historically so and not otherwise”

Instructor-composed periodization; dated entries as follows. Helleiner, CWE: Corn Laws repeal 1846 30, Cobden–Chevalier 1860 32, gold standard by unilateral decisions 35, Bismarck’s tariff 1879 62, Depression and collapse of the gold standard 136, Schacht’s 1934 exchange controls 225, sanctions on Italy 1935 227, League sanctions 242, Bretton Woods 1944 10, gold convertibility ended 1971 1. Abdelal 2009: 65–66 (embedded liberalism), 69 (1958; codification in the 1990s). “Hyperglobalization”: Rodrik, The Globalization Paradox (2011) — not assigned. 2018–26 entries: Week 3 deck and slides 13–14 of this deck.

Pivot · two kinds of fact

Rationalist tools, in Abdelal’s description

“materialist — in the sense that the incentive structures faced by agents are composed primarily of the material facts of the world, those facts that exist irrespective of our interpretation of them.”Abdelal 2009: 63

Constructivist tools

“constructivist approaches assume that the economy consists of both material facts and social facts.” … “these facts by themselves are indeterminate”Abdelal 2009: 73

Pivot · three lenses on the state and its preferences

	Liberal	Realist	Constructivist
The state	Pluralist arena	“a self-interested, rational state”	“purposive … political authority is derived not from power itself, but from the ends to which power is legitimately used”
Where preferences come from	Domestic struggles among groups	Deduced from anarchy and self-help	“government preferences vary” with domestic societies, other governments, and norms of appropriate practice
Source of policy	Material interests	Relative power, the search for security	International institutions and norms, domestic cultural norms, national identities

A framework for the week · Abdelal’s four logics of construction

Logic	Abdelal’s formulation	Reading / case this week
1 · Meaning	“What societies want … depends on who they think they are” 72	Canada, 2025–26
2 · Cognition	Shared causal models of how the economy works; orthodoxy “affects what governments can and cannot do” 73	Embedded liberalism → neoliberalism → a “new consensus” (2023)
3 · Uncertainty	“Knightian uncertainty holds when agents cannot even estimate the probabilities of various outcomes” 74	Nelson 2014; IMF and Argentina, 2025–26
4 · Subjectivity	“For rationalists, norms are regulative; for many constructivists, constitutive” 75; theory as “an engine” for change, not “a camera” 75	Central banks and the net-zero alliances, 2025

Logic 1 · Meaning · identity and interdependence

What societies want … depends on who they think they are Abdelal 2009: 72

Post-Soviet Lithuania: economic dependence on Russia read as a security threat; dependence on the European Union read as an opportunity (72)
“international norms define the boundaries of choice” (72)

Logic 1 · Meaning · Canada, 2025–26

Declines, 2025

Mark Carney, Prime Minister

“The old relationship we had with the United States, based on deepening integration of our economies and tight security and military cooperation, is over.”Mar 27 2025 (Global News)

“Building at home and diversifying our trade abroad, that’s not plan B. It’s been our plan A from the start.”Aug 25 2026 (Rev transcript)

Instructor-composed application of Abdelal 2009: 72. Data: Statistics Canada, “Travel between Canada and other countries, December 2025,” Feb 23 2026 (29.1 mn return trips, −25.4%); Global News, “Travel spending to U.S. fell by $3.3B in 2025 amid ‘Buy Canadian’ push,” Jul 22 2026 (spending $18.8 bn; leisure visits −21.5%); DISCUS, “American Spirits Exports Report,” Mar 31 2026 (provincial shelves cleared of U.S. spirits from March 2025). Carney quotes: Global News, “Canada’s ‘old relationship’ with U.S. ‘is over,’” Mar 27 2025; rev.com, Aug 25 2026.

Logic 2 · Cognition · one policy, two readings

1958

“In, say, 1958 capital controls signaled neither heresy nor even unfriendliness to financial markets.”

1998

“The capital account regulations themselves were objectively identical during the 1950s and 1990s” — by 1998, capital controls signaled “poor international financial citizenship.”

Logic 2 · Cognition · “a new consensus,” 2018–26 · three administrations

There was one assumption at the heart of all of this policy: that markets always allocate capital productively and efficiently — no matter what our competitors did, no matter how big our shared challenges grew, and no matter how many guardrails we took down. Jake Sullivan, National Security Advisor, “Remarks on Renewing American Economic Leadership,” Brookings Institution, Apr 27 2023 — same speech: “this moment demands that we forge a new consensus”; “a small yard and high fence”

	Trump, 2017–21	Biden, 2021–25	Trump, 2025–
Tariffs on China	Section 301 tariffs from Jul 6 2018, in four tranches to Sep 2019	Directs USTR to “maintain all existing tariffs” (May 14 2024); raises EVs 25→100%, semiconductors 25→50%, solar cells 25→50%	Retained; 25% Section 232 tariff on “certain advanced computing chips,” Jan 14 2026
Export controls	Huawei added to the Entity List, May 16 2019	Oct 7 2022: controls on advanced chips and chipmaking tools bound for China	Retained; Nvidia H200 sales to China licensed with 25% to the U.S., Dec 8 2025
Steel and aluminum	Section 232 tariffs, 25% and 10%, Mar 2018	Retained; tariff-rate quota for the EU, Oct 2021	Raised to 50%, Jun 4 2025

Instructor-composed application of Abdelal 2009: 73. Sullivan transcript: bidenwhitehouse.archives.gov, Apr 27 2023. Row 1: Holland & Knight, May 2024 (“President Joe Biden announced he will direct USTR to maintain all existing tariffs on Chinese imports”); White House fact sheet, May 14 2024 (rates); Proclamation “Adjusting Imports of Semiconductors …,” Jan 14 2026 (cf. Week 3, slide 12). Row 2: Federal Register, May 21 2019 and Oct 13 2022; Week 3, slide 19 (H200). Row 3: Proclamations 9704–9705, Mar 8 2018; White House fact sheet, Jun 3 2025. Depth pairing: Stahl, “The End of Economics Hegemony?” RIPE 32(4), 2025.

Logic 3 · Uncertainty · Nelson, “Playing Favorites”

IMF lending is systematically biased. Preferential treatment is largely driven by the degree of similarity between beliefs held by IMF officials and key economic policy-makers in the borrowing country. Stephen C. Nelson, “Playing Favorites: How Shared Beliefs Shape the IMF’s Lending Decisions,” International Organization 68(2), 2014: 297

486

programs, 1980–2000: conditions, loan size, waivers (299)

2,000+

policy-makers in ninety developing countries, coded for “fellow neoliberals” (299)

“never”

“The IMF is the rare credit union that never rejects a loan applicant” (300)

Video · Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy, ep. 1 “The Battle of Ideas” — “Chicago School” (PBS, 2002) · youtube.com/watch?v=c-IHedwT0lk

Logic 3 · Uncertainty · Nelson’s three findings

Relative loan size, % of quota

Conditions: a unified neoliberal government “shaves approximately two conditions off lending programs” (317)
Loan size: one standard deviation more neoliberals, “a 12 percent increase in relative loan size” (318)
Enforcement: unified neoliberal teams “approximately 50 percent more likely to receive a waiver” (320)
Recruitment: “Nearly 80 percent of the American-trained senior officials … from one of thirteen universities” — Chicago 11%, Harvard and Columbia 10% each (309 n. 62)

Logic 3 · Uncertainty · Argentina · Javier Milei, 2023 campaign

Logic 3 · Uncertainty · the IMF in 2025–26

Argentina · Milei government

Apr 11 2025: 48-month, $20 bn Extended Fund Facility, 479% of quota; $12 bn up front
Georgieva: “a vote of confidence in the Government’s determination to advance reforms”
May 21 2026, second review: $1 bn disbursed with a waiver for missed reserve targets; $15.8 bn of $20 bn disbursed

Egypt · $8 bn EFF (2022)

Fifth review postponed for months, then merged with the sixth
IMF criticism of “the slow pace of the state’s exit from the economy, including of military-affiliated entities”
Dec 23 2025 staff-level agreement, $2.5 bn; Board completion Feb 25 2026

Logic 4 · Subjectivity · norms and discourse

For rationalists, norms are regulative; for many constructivists, constitutive; but for post-modern constructivists, norms are objects of power Abdelal 2009: 75

MacKenzie on financial models: the theory was “an engine” for change, not “a camera” recording market practices (75)
“Constructivism is not the answer.” (76)

Logic 4 · Subjectivity · central banks and the net-zero alliances, 2017–25

NGFS · Network for Greening the Financial System

Central banks and supervisors, founded Dec 2017 at the Paris One Planet Summit by eight members; “over 171 Members and Observers” now
Purpose: “to enhance the role of the financial system to manage risks and to mobilise mainstream finance”
The Federal Reserve joined Dec 15 2020; withdrew Jan 17 2025

NZBA · Net-Zero Banking Alliance

Commercial banks, convened by UNEP FI; launched Apr 21 2021 with 43 banks; a founding member of GFANZ (Carney, COP26)
Commitment: align “lending and investment portfolios … with pathways to net-zero by 2050 or sooner”

the work of the NGFS has increasingly broadened in scope, covering a wider range of issues that are outside of the Board’s statutory mandate. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, press release, Jan 17 2025

Coda · CWE Part II · beyond the three orthodoxies

Ch.	Perspective	One voice
8	Autarkic visions	Gandhi: “every village of India will almost be a self-supporting and self-contained unit” 135
9	Environmentalism	Jevons, The Coal Question (1865): coal “limited in quantity” 144
10	Feminist critiques	He-Yin Zhen: “the very origin of inequality between men and women lies in militarism” 185
11	Pan-African responses	1900 Pan-African Conference: “The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the colour-line” 187
12	Pan-Islamism, Pan-Asianism	Al-Afghani: British railways in India built “only in order to drain the substance of our wealth” 203
13	Economic regionalism	Akamatsu: “import, production, and export” — the flying-geese pattern 222

This week, mapped

Four logics, three texts, four cases

Logic	Abdelal 2009	Nelson 2014 / CWE Part II	2020s case
Meaning	“who they think they are” 72	CWE chs. 11–13: Pan-African, Pan-Islamic, Pan-Asian, and regional economic communities 187, 202, 219	Canada 2025–26
Cognition	1958 vs 1998 capital controls 69	CWE ch. 8: Keynes, “National Self-Sufficiency” (1933) 136	Sullivan 2023; 232 tariff 2026
Uncertainty	Knightian uncertainty 74	Nelson: shared beliefs, sweeter deals 297	Argentina vs Egypt
Subjectivity	Norms regulative vs constitutive 75	CWE ch. 10: He-Yin Zhen, “military buildup and warfare harm women” 185	NGFS / NZBA 2025

Thursday Sep 17 · Quiz 1 · 10:05–10:20

Quiz 1

Handwritten, closed notes. Fifteen minutes.
Part I — five multiple-choice items. Part II — one paragraph.
Name on both pages.
Coverage: Weeks 1–3 Core readings and decks, per the study guide.

This week and next

Before Thu Sep 17, 10:05 — discussion question in the shared doc
Thu Sep 17 — Quiz 1 at 10:05; Glebov talk at noon, Choi Auditorium
Tue Sep 22 — Week 5, Marxism: CWE chs. 6–7; Wallerstein, “World-Systems Analysis” (2013); Przeworski, “What Have I Learned from Marx” (2020)
Thu Sep 24 — Jason Bell author talk, noon; midterm question pool circulated