As a term of art within the fields of political science and international relations, constructivism has come to mean many different things to different people. For some, it signals an interest in topics such as the influence of normative standards (e.g., the taboo against the use of nuclear weapons) or the way a country’s sense of identity shapes its foreign policy (e.g., the way Russia’s post-Cold War desire to retain recognition as a major power has shaped its policies). This latter topic—the influence of identity politics on foreign policy—is one of my own longstanding interests. It inspires my forthcoming book on Japan’s image, Seeing Japan, as well as my ongoing study of Differences among Countries.

For other scholars, constructivism signals something more specific: a preoccupation with the way language functions to make sense of the world and, thereby, to define it. This version of constructivism is sometimes called language-oriented or rule-oriented constructivism. In international relations, it owes a great debt to the pioneering work of Nicholas Onuf and Friedrich Kratochwil, and more generally to a philosophical tradition indebted to John Searle, J. L. Austin, Jürgen Habermas, and Ludwig Wittgenstein. This approach urges scholarship that embraces discursive analysis and is sensitive to the way speech constitutes an ever-evolving reality. Together with Nicholas Onuf and Vendulka Kubálková, I co-edited a book that presented the first sustained introduction to language-oriented constructivism in international relations: International Relations in a Constructed World. And, with Katja Weber, I wrote a book analyzing Germany and Japan’s different approaches to regional order using this linguistic approach: Cultures of Order.

For still others, constructivism signals a broader skepticism about positivist approaches to social science and the way the evidence of our senses corresponds to an objective, knowable reality. This skepticism has led some to embrace the notion of critical constructivism as an alternative to constructivisms (such as the approach, for example, of Alexander Wendt) perceived as “mainstream,” “late modern,” or perhaps “neo-positivist.” Although I share this sense of skepticism about positivism as an adequate foundation for science, I also find it difficult to ignore the many compelling insights we have gained from the research of scholars who adopt more-or-less positivist scientific premises. In a book co-edited with Vaughn Shannon on Psychology and Constructivism in International Relations: An Ideational Alliance, and in my contribution to J. Samuel Barkin and Laura Sjoberg’s Interpretive Quantification: Methodological Explorations for Critical and Constructivist IR, I’ve taken an agnostic position.