29 research outputs found
Practice Theory and International Relations
No full textAre social practices actions, or institutional frameworks of interaction structured by common rules? How do social practices such as signing a cheque differ from international practices such as signing a peace treaty? Traversing the fields of international relations (IR) and philosophy, this book defends an institutionalist conception of practices as part of a general practice theory indebted to Oakeshott, Wittgenstein and Hegel. The proposed practice theory has two core aspects: practice internalism and normative descriptivism. In developing a philosophical analysis of social practices that has a special relevance for international relations, Silviya Lechner and Mervyn Frost depart from Pierre Bourdieu's sociology of practice that dominates the current 'practice turn' in IR. The authors show that the contemporary global realm is constituted by two distinct macro practices - the practice of sovereign states and that of global rights
The Art of Aiming at a Moving Target: A Critique of Lechner and Frost’s Practice Theory and International Relations
Full text linkHow can we account for the normative dimension of international practices? Silviya Lechner and Mervyn Frost’s Practice Theory and International Relations answers this question by proposing, with a considerable degree of epistemological sophistication, what the authors call ‘normative descriptivism’, which they combine with a focus on ‘macro practices’. In this contribution, I start by examining the authors’ engagement with IR’s practice turn, and the insights this engagement may offer on the underlying objective of their approach. I then turn to Lechner and Frost’s decision to eclipse history. The contribution concludes by using the evolution of international law as a cursory illustration of the types of analyses Lechner and Frost’s approach would lead to. It thereby emphasises potential challenges inherent in the authors’ combination of internalism as rooted in individual self-consciousness and a focus on ‘macro practices’, including the possibility that it might limit the potential to critically question the standard that becomes identified as universal
Practice theory and international relations
No full text"Are social practices actions, or institutional frameworks of interaction structured by common rules? How do social practices such as signing a cheque differ from international practices such as signing a peace treaty? Traversing the fields of International Relations (IR) and philosophy, this book defends an institutionalist conception of practices as part of a general practice theory indebted to Oakeshott, Wittgenstein and Hegel. The proposed practice theory has two core aspects: practice internalism and normative descriptivism. In developing a philosophical analysis of social practices that has a special relevance for international relations, Silviya Lechner and Mervyn Frost depart from Pierre Bourdieu's sociology of practice that dominates the current 'practice turn' in IR. The authors show that the contemporary global realm is constituted by two distinct macro practices- the practice of sovereign states and that of global rights"..."This book aims to provide a general analysis of social practices in order to advance our understanding of contemporary practices in international relations. Recently, the discipline of International Relations (IR) has experienced a 'turn' to practice, associated with Emanuel Adler and Vincent Pouliot and inspired by social theorists such as Theodore Schatzki and especially French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu. A central premise underlying such sociological investigations is that practices represent doing or actions, including patterned actions carried out by a multitude of agents. In what follows, we do not elaborate on this sociological approach to practices but, develop an independent account, a philosophical one, that is fundamentally critical of it. While our account owes much to H.L.A. Hart and John Rawls, it is above all indebted to G. W. F. Hegel, the Hegelian philosopher Michael Oakeshott, and the late Ludwig Wittgenstein. Each of these three thinkers considered individually has been discussed within IR, but in this study we have reworked and integrated their ideas into a coherent conceptual position for making sense of practices which we call practice theory. The theory is expounded in Part One and Part Two extends it to the sphere of international practices, hence the book's title, Practice Theory and International Relations"..
Wood's <i>Kantian Ethics</i>: A Hermeneutics of Freedom - Allen W. Wood, Kantian Ethics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008, Pp. 342, pbk
No full textAnarchy in International Relations
Full text linkThe concept of anarchy is seen as the cardinal organizing category of the discipline of International Relations (IR), which differentiates it from cognate disciplines such as Political Science and Political Philosophy. It is important to distinguish between concepts of anarchy and theories where anarchy operates as a central premise. The concept of anarchy can mean (a) a lack of a common superior in an interaction domain; (b) chaos or disorder; or (c) a horizontal relation between nominally equal entities sovereign states. The first and the third senses of “anarchy” are central to IR as a field, and figure as premises within three broad families of IR theory: (a) realism and neorealism, (b) English School theory (international society approach), and (c) Kant’s republican peace. Despite normative and conceptual differences otherwise, all three bodies of theory are ultimately based on Hobbes’s argument for a “state of nature,” and on an understanding that the key actors in international relations are sovereign states. The major challengers to the discourse of international anarchy are theories of international politics that rely on the methodology of economics as well as cognate approaches that prioritize the “global” over the “international” such as theories of globalization, global hierarchy, and global governance.</p
Why anarchy still matters for International Relations: On theories and things
Full text link The category of anarchy is conventionally associated with the emergence of an autonomous discipline of International Relations (IR). Recently, Donnelly has argued that anarchy has never been central to IR (hierarchy is more weighty). His criticism targets not just concepts of anarchy but theories of anarchy and thereby expresses an anti-theory ethos tacitly accepted in the discipline. As a form of conceptual atomism, this ethos is hostile to structuralist and normative theories. This article aims to reinstate theoretical holism against conceptual atomism and to defend the enduring relevance of theories of international anarchy for IR. This is done by revisiting two classic, structuralist accounts of international anarchy articulated in Kenneth Waltz’s Theory of International Politics (scientific structuralism) and Hedley Bull’s Anarchical Society (normative structuralism). It will be shown that both represent coherent theoretical ‘wholes’ which reveal a more complex relationship between anarchy and hierarchy than supposed by critics and which recognise the important connection between the structure of international anarchy (whose key players are states) and the value of freedom. The conclusion examines the prospects of normative theories of international anarchy and ‘anarchical’ freedom in a globalising world where state agency is being challenged. </jats:p
Equality, Authority, and the Locus of International Order
Full text linkThe puzzle of international society has long occupied International Relations (IR) theory, but it lends itself to a clearer articulation in legal positivist theory. On strict legal positivist terms, international society is defined as a compact of legal equals, states. However if states claim to belong to a social order they ought to recognise a common authority. Authority is a form of hierarchy—‘authoritative’ means ‘one that cannot be overridden’, ‘one of a higher standing’. The paradox of international society then is this: state relations are organised horizontally and each state is seen as independent from other states, but at the same time these relations seem to be organised hierarchically because each state is dependent on an authority other than its own. As I argue, the crux of the matter depends on clarifying where authority resides, not who holds it. After discussing authority in political theory (Jean Bodin, Thomas Hobbes, Carl Schmitt, Giorgio Agamben), the essay goes on to articulate a concept of international authority compatible with an equality-of-states principle. Crucially, this concept rests on what I call ‘rule-based legal positivism’ traceable to the writings of H.L.A. Hart. The question of international authority thus invites us to attend to the conversation of three traditions: IR theory, political theory, and legal theory.law; institutions; internationalism; normative political theory; rule of law; sovereignty
