Social construction and integration
By: CHECKEL, Jeffrey T
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ArticlePublisher: London : Routledge, 1999Journal of European Public Policy 6, 4, p. 545-560Abstract: Social construction, which has made key contributions to contemporary international relations (IR) and institutional theorizing, has yet to make significant in-roads among scholars of integration. This is unfortunate, for it has privileged methodological individualism in the study of European institutions - either in its strict (rational choice institutionalism) or more loose (historical institutionalist) versions. As a result, too much debate has focused on which institutions matter in the integration process, and not on how they have effects. This article examines the latter, arguing that a sociological and social constructivist understanding of institutions as constitutive can significantly broaden the methodological tools we bring to the study of integration; it will also help us to explore how, or, indeed, whether, integration is affecting fundamental actor identities, and not simply constraining strategy or behaviour.
Social construction, which has made key contributions to contemporary international relations (IR) and institutional theorizing, has yet to make significant in-roads among scholars of integration. This is unfortunate, for it has privileged methodological individualism in the study of European institutions - either in its strict (rational choice institutionalism) or more loose (historical institutionalist) versions. As a result, too much debate has focused on which institutions matter in the integration process, and not on how they have effects. This article examines the latter, arguing that a sociological and social constructivist understanding of institutions as constitutive can significantly broaden the methodological tools we bring to the study of integration; it will also help us to explore how, or, indeed, whether, integration is affecting fundamental actor identities, and not simply constraining strategy or behaviour.
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