THE COMPULSIONS OF INTERDEPENDENCE: NORBERT ELIAS’ CIVILIZING PROCESS AS EVOLUTIONARY REALISM

FRAUEN Jan-Boje (Jan-Boje Frauen, Xiamen University, School of International Relations, 422 Siming South Road, Siming Qu, Xiamen Shi, Fujian Sheng, China, 361005), jbfrauen@gmail.com

Despite Norbert elias’s moderate importance in International Practice Theory (IPT) and the occasional admittance that his work sometimes displays realist principles on the international stage, it has hitherto largely overlooked that The Civilizing Process starts out with an essentially realist picture of human nature. Only through norm internalization processes and discourse gets this nature altered in a constructivist way by the socialized environment rationalselfish agents find themselves in after the institution of sanctioning forces. Furthermore, individuals integrate into the social apparatus out of rational selfinterest. Thus, the theory never completely loses its realist roots. This article attempts to contribute to International Relations (IR) theory by augmenting classical realism’s dogmatic theory of crime & punishment with elias’s gradual process of social norms alienating ‘state of nature’ individuals internally and cognitively. The ‘social contract’ is thus reinterpreted as a gradual process of collective emergence.

Keywords: elias, IR theory, civilizing process, norm internalization, realism & constructivism