POLI 244 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Christianism
5 Dec 2017
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Document Summary
International relations is the study of interactions among the actors that participate in world politics. It is the study of the behavior of these actors and the way they individually act in the world of politics. Interests are what actors want to achieve through political action. Interests determine how an actor ranks the desirability of different outcomes. To identify them, analysts sometimes draw on prior theories of human nature or rely on actions or statements of the actor. There are three different groups of interest: power and security, economic or material welfare and ideological goals. State preferences: what a state"s goal is before strategic thinking takes place. What a state"s immediate goal is after thinking about other state"s reaction and their own preferences. A state is a central authority that has the ability to make and enforce laws, rules and decisions within its territory. Sovereignty refers to the expectation that states have legal and political supremacy within their boundaries.
