Charles A. McClelland

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Charles A. McClelland (1917) is an American political systems analyst and International Relations Professor Emeritus at the San Francisco State University, who was among the first to introduce General Systems Theory in the field of International Relations.^[1]

Contents 1 Biography 2 Work 2.1 International Relations theory 2.2 General Systems theory 2.3 Interaction Survey 3 Publications 4 References 5 External links

[edit] Biography

Charles A. McClelland was born in Oakley, Idaho, in 1917. He received his undergraduate education at San Jose State College, and his MA and doctoral degrees in history from the University of California.^[2]

He started working in the 1940s at the department of International Relations at the San Francisco State College, where he became professor of history and international relations, as well as a visiting professor in the department of Political Science, University of Michigan, and at the University of Southern California. One of his students was James N. Rosenau.

McClelland was one of the first scholars of the Center for the Study of the American Experience at USC. McClelland has received research grants from the Advanced Research Projects Agency, a research arm of the Pentagon.^[3]

He was president of Society for General Systems Research from 1959 to 1961. In 1967 he received a USC Associates Awards for Letters, Arts and Sciences.

[edit] Work

[edit] International Relations theory

International relations theory attempts to provide a conceptual model upon which international relations can be analyzed. Each theory is reductive and essentialist to different degrees, relying on different sets of assumptions respectively. In the 1959 article "A Classification of International Relations Theory" McClelland describes a six-class system of describing theories distinguishes between universal and culturally rooted concepts, and among actor theory, interaction theory, and environmental theory.

In the International relations theory McClelland observes that crisis interaction is likely to be in terms of effects on the stability or equilibrium of the system and he sees an international crisis occurring “when a succession of extraordinary inputs begetting new outputs begetting new inputs, passes some point in volume and intensity”.^[4]

[edit] General Systems theory

McClelland was among the first to introduce General Systems Theory in the social sciences, among with Walter F. Buckley and his "Sociology and Modern Systems Theory" (1967) and Morton A. Kaplan and his "System and Process in International Politics" (1957), along with Karl W. Deutsch, Robert A. Dahl and David Easton.^[5]

In "Theory and the International System" (1966) McClelland took different approaches to the application of general systems ideas in the study of international relations.^[6]

Charles A. McClelland introduced, what he called the "wisdom approach." The wisdom approach invites scholars to prudently examine history and appreciate the precarious nature of human conduct, rather than being overwhelmed by masses of data, which more often than not lead to blind spots of partisanship.^[7]

[edit] Interaction Survey

In the paper "Interaction Survey of the Middle East" (1970) McClelland treat the Middle East conceptually as a separate and distinct world arena, and compare relations for this arena with other subsystems. His findings suggested that the Middle East arena possesses some unique characteristics among which is the propensity of nations in the area to direct a larger proportion of their interactions to their neighbors within the region, than to the rest of the members of the international system. McClelland gained some insight into theoretical propositions regarding Israeli retaliation policies and the relationship between some trends in inter-Arab cooperation and the Arab-Israeli conflict.

[edit] Publications

• 1960, The United Nations: the Continuing Debate. Chandler publishing. 1960
• 1960, Nuclear weapons, missiles, and future war: problem for the sixties.
• 1962, College teaching of international relations; problems of organization and collaboration. A report on applied and experimental studies of undergraduate college education in international relations.
• 1967, Theory of the International System. New York : The Macmillan Company.
• 1970, An Interaction Survey of the Middle East, with Anne Ancoli.
• 1972, International Events Interaction Analysis: Some Research Considerations. With , Edward E. Azar and Richard A. Brody (eds.) Beverly Hills: Sage Publications.

Articles

• 1958, "Systems and History in International Relations". In: General Systems Yearbook 3 (1958), p. 237.
• 1959, "A Classification of International Relations Theory" in: American Behavioral Scientist, Vol. 2, No. 4, 32-34 (1959)
• 1960, "The function of theory in international relations" in: Journal of Conflict Resolution 4 (1960), pp. 303-336.
• 1961, "The Acute International Crisis," in: World Politics, Vol. 14 (October 1961), p. 199.
• 1962, "General Systems and the Social Sciences," in: A Review of General Semantics, 18 (1962), 456.
• 1972, "The Beginning, Duration, and Abatement of International Crises: Comparisons in Two Conflict Arenas", in C. F. Hermann (ed.), International Crises: Insights from Behavioral Research (New York: Free Press, 1972).

Publications about McClelland

• Charles P. Schleicher (1967), "Reviewed work(s): Theory of the International System by Charles A. McClelland", in: The Western Political Quarterly, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Mar., 1967), pp. 232-233

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Charles A. McClelland at Scientificcommons.org
• Charles McClelland at the ISSS website.