Question

Discuss brief nature and scope of political science

Answer 1

Till date, unfortunately, no universally accepted definition of international relations have been coined because of its continuous changing nature.

However, Goldstein and Pavehouse in his book “International Relations” write, “The field of international relations concerns the relationships among the world’s government. But these relationships cannot be understood in isolation. They are closely connected with other actors (such as intergovernmental org., multinational corporations, and individuals); with other social structures (including economics, culture, and domestic politics); and with geographical and historical influences. These elements together power the central trends in IR today-globalization.”

The word “international relations” for the first time used in 1880. In UNESCO Nomenclature (1998) (It is a system developed by UNESCO for classification of research papers and doctoral dissertations), No. 5901 represent international relations within political science. In practice, international relations is studied either as a subfield of political science or as an independent discipline. The discipline of international relations deals with the war, military alliance, diplomacy, trade, cooperation & peace. 

Military alliance, for example, LEMOA (Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement) signed between India & US recently in April, 2016 with resolution ‘to exchange each other’s military base’. According to Defence and External Ministry officials, Indian and U.S. military troops would access each other’s facilities more for “technical than political reasons.” In particular, a senior official said the need for the LSA was felt during humanitarian rescue efforts such as Operation Raahat that evacuated Indian citizens from Yemen last year.

Source – http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/no-military-alliance-with-us-say-officials/article8477136.ece

 

Cooperation, for this Paris Climate Summit COP 21 is a masterpiece example, wherein 148 countries come forward to keep average global temperatures no more than 2°C above pre-industrial temperatures (Accurate assessment of temperatures in 1750s – when industrial revolution began – is difficult. To overcome problem, climatologists use average temperatures recorded between 1850 and 1900 i.e., 13.7 degree C.