From Structure to Complexity: Exploring the Relationship Between History and International Relations Theory through the Falklands & Iraq Conflicts

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When International Relations (IR) began to emerge as an academic discipline in the early 20th Century,many of its most prominent scholars, such as E.H. Carr, were themselves historians and early IR theorywas deeply rooted in the field of history (Duke, 1993). However, in the post-Second World War erawith the onset of the Cold War, the historical focus of realism was replaced with a newfound emphasison structure (Waltz, 1979). Nonetheless, the end of the Cold War was a transition point for therelationship between history and IR which, overlapping with Francis Fukuyama's neo-Hegelianapproach to the end of history (Fukuyama, 1992), laid the foundations for a return to history in IRtheory (Welsh, 2016). Equally, the emergence of realist constructivism as a critique of structuralrealism in the post-Cold War period illustrates that there is room to re-evaluate what a closerrelationship between history and I.R. can offer both disciplines (Barkin, 2003, p.325).