On constitution and causation in international relations

Review of International Studies

Volumn 24, Issue 4, 1998, Pages 101-114

  Wendt, Alexander ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0032285704     PISSN: 02602105     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/s0260210598001028     Document Type: Article

References (52)

1. These labels are far from ideal, since in the strict 'logical', sense 'positivism' has been dead in the philosophy of science for decades, and as such all contemporary epistemologies are 'post'-positivist. However, they are the terms in which the current debate in International Relations about the epistemological status of social science is being carried out and as such I reluctantly adopt them here.
2. For a good overview of the Third Debate, see Yosef Lapid, 'The Third Debate: On the Prospects of International Theory in a Post-positivist Era', International Studies Quarterly, 33 (1989), pp. 235-54, and the subsequent commentaries in the same journal. On the Second Debate see, for example, Hedley Bull, 'International theory: The Case for a Classical Approach', in K. Knorr and J. Rosenau (eds.), Contending Approaches to International Politics (Princeton, NJ: 1969), and Morton Kaplan, 'The New Great Debate: Traditionalism vs. Science in International Relations', Ibid.
3. For a good overview of the Third Debate, see Yosef Lapid, 'The Third Debate: On the Prospects of International Theory in a Post-positivist Era', International Studies Quarterly, 33 (1989), pp. 235-54, and the subsequent commentaries in the same journal. On the Second Debate see, for example, Hedley Bull, 'International theory: The Case for a Classical Approach', in K. Knorr and J. Rosenau (eds.), Contending Approaches to International Politics (Princeton, NJ: 1969), and Morton Kaplan, 'The New Great Debate: Traditionalism vs. Science in International Relations', Ibid.
4. For a good overview of the Third Debate, see Yosef Lapid, 'The Third Debate: On the Prospects of International Theory in a Post-positivist Era', International Studies Quarterly, 33 (1989), pp. 235-54, and the subsequent commentaries in the same journal. On the Second Debate see, for example, Hedley Bull, 'International theory: The Case for a Classical Approach', in K. Knorr and J. Rosenau (eds.), Contending Approaches to International Politics (Princeton, NJ: 1969), and Morton Kaplan, 'The New Great Debate: Traditionalism vs. Science in International Relations', Ibid.
5. For a broader exploration, see 'Scientific Realism and Social Kinds', ch. 2 in Wendt, Social Theory of International Politics (Cambridge, 1999).
6. Martin Hollis and Steve Smith, Explaining and Understanding International Relations (Oxford, 1990).
7. The author addressed the ontological aspects of this book in 'Bridging the Theory/Metatheory Gap in International Relations', Review of International Studies, 17 (1991), pp. 383-92, which was followed by a reply from Hollis and Smith, 'Beware of Gurus: Structure and Action in International Relations', Ibid., pp. 393-410, and a further exchange in 1992. Here I take up its epistemological aspects, which I had set aside in my 1991 review.
8. The author addressed the ontological aspects of this book in 'Bridging the Theory/Metatheory Gap in International Relations', Review of International Studies, 17 (1991), pp. 383-92, which was followed by a reply from Hollis and Smith, 'Beware of Gurus: Structure and Action in International Relations', Ibid., pp. 393-410, and a further exchange in 1992. Here I take up its epistemological aspects, which I had set aside in my 1991 review.
9. Explaining and Understanding International Relations, p. 1.
10. Ibid.
11. First as a student of his in graduate school and then through several unpublished manuscripts on the logic of constitutive inquiry which he co-authored with Stephen Majeski, most recently 'Modeling Theories of Constitutive Relations in Polities' (1998); for an earlier approach, see David Sylvan and Barry Glassner, A Rationalist Methodology for the Social Sciences (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985). Two other key sources for thinking about constitutive theory are Friedrich Kratochwil, Rules, Norms and Decisions (Cambridge, 1989) and Nicholas Onuf, World of Our Making (Columbia, SC, 1989). And although using other terminology, much the same kind of argument has long been advanced by Hayward Alker; see Rediscoveries and Reformulations (Cambridge, 1996). Use of the term 'constitutive' to describe this kind of theory seems to be gaining ground, as evidenced by Steve Smith's 'The Self-images of a Discipline: A Genealogy of International Relations Theory', in K. Booth and S. Smith (eds.), International Relations Theory Today (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 26-8.
12. First as a student of his in graduate school and then through several unpublished manuscripts on the logic of constitutive inquiry which he co-authored with Stephen Majeski, most recently 'Modeling Theories of Constitutive Relations in Polities' (1998); for an earlier approach, see David Sylvan and Barry Glassner, A Rationalist Methodology for the Social Sciences (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985). Two other key sources for thinking about constitutive theory are Friedrich Kratochwil, Rules, Norms and Decisions (Cambridge, 1989) and Nicholas Onuf, World of Our Making (Columbia, SC, 1989). And although using other terminology, much the same kind of argument has long been advanced by Hayward Alker; see Rediscoveries and Reformulations (Cambridge, 1996). Use of the term 'constitutive' to describe this kind of theory seems to be gaining ground, as evidenced by Steve Smith's 'The Self-images of a Discipline: A Genealogy of International Relations Theory', in K. Booth and S. Smith (eds.), International Relations Theory Today (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 26-8.
13. First as a student of his in graduate school and then through several unpublished manuscripts on the logic of constitutive inquiry which he co-authored with Stephen Majeski, most recently 'Modeling Theories of Constitutive Relations in Polities' (1998); for an earlier approach, see David Sylvan and Barry Glassner, A Rationalist Methodology for the Social Sciences (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985). Two other key sources for thinking about constitutive theory are Friedrich Kratochwil, Rules, Norms and Decisions (Cambridge, 1989) and Nicholas Onuf, World of Our Making (Columbia, SC, 1989). And although using other terminology, much the same kind of argument has long been advanced by Hayward Alker; see Rediscoveries and Reformulations (Cambridge, 1996). Use of the term 'constitutive' to describe this kind of theory seems to be gaining ground, as evidenced by Steve Smith's 'The Self-images of a Discipline: A Genealogy of International Relations Theory', in K. Booth and S. Smith (eds.), International Relations Theory Today (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 26-8.
14. First as a student of his in graduate school and then through several unpublished manuscripts on the logic of constitutive inquiry which he co-authored with Stephen Majeski, most recently 'Modeling Theories of Constitutive Relations in Polities' (1998); for an earlier approach, see David Sylvan and Barry Glassner, A Rationalist Methodology for the Social Sciences (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985). Two other key sources for thinking about constitutive theory are Friedrich Kratochwil, Rules, Norms and Decisions (Cambridge, 1989) and Nicholas Onuf, World of Our Making (Columbia, SC, 1989). And although using other terminology, much the same kind of argument has long been advanced by Hayward Alker; see Rediscoveries and Reformulations (Cambridge, 1996). Use of the term 'constitutive' to describe this kind of theory seems to be gaining ground, as evidenced by Steve Smith's 'The Self-images of a Discipline: A Genealogy of International Relations Theory', in K. Booth and S. Smith (eds.), International Relations Theory Today (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 26-8.
15. First as a student of his in graduate school and then through several unpublished manuscripts on the logic of constitutive inquiry which he co-authored with Stephen Majeski, most recently 'Modeling Theories of Constitutive Relations in Polities' (1998); for an earlier approach, see David Sylvan and Barry Glassner, A Rationalist Methodology for the Social Sciences (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985). Two other key sources for thinking about constitutive theory are Friedrich Kratochwil, Rules, Norms and Decisions (Cambridge, 1989) and Nicholas Onuf, World of Our Making (Columbia, SC, 1989). And although using other terminology, much the same kind of argument has long been advanced by Hayward Alker; see Rediscoveries and Reformulations (Cambridge, 1996). Use of the term 'constitutive' to describe this kind of theory seems to be gaining ground, as evidenced by Steve Smith's 'The Self-images of a Discipline: A Genealogy of International Relations Theory', in K. Booth and S. Smith (eds.), International Relations Theory Today (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 26-8.
16. First as a student of his in graduate school and then through several unpublished manuscripts on the logic of constitutive inquiry which he co-authored with Stephen Majeski, most recently 'Modeling Theories of Constitutive Relations in Polities' (1998); for an earlier approach, see David Sylvan and Barry Glassner, A Rationalist Methodology for the Social Sciences (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985). Two other key sources for thinking about constitutive theory are Friedrich Kratochwil, Rules, Norms and Decisions (Cambridge, 1989) and Nicholas Onuf, World of Our Making (Columbia, SC, 1989). And although using other terminology, much the same kind of argument has long been advanced by Hayward Alker; see Rediscoveries and Reformulations (Cambridge, 1996). Use of the term 'constitutive' to describe this kind of theory seems to be gaining ground, as evidenced by Steve Smith's 'The Self-images of a Discipline: A Genealogy of International Relations Theory', in K. Booth and S. Smith (eds.), International Relations Theory Today (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 26-8.
17. Gary King, Robert Keohane, and Sidney Verba, Designing Social Inquiry (Princeton, 1994).
18. Ibid., p. 75, footnote 1.
19. See, for example, Charles Cross, 'Explanation and the Theory of Questions', Erkenntnis, 34 (1991), pp. 237-60.
20. For discussion of these competing views of causal explanation, see Russell Keat and John Urry, Social Theory as Science, 2nd edn (London, 1982), and Ernan McMullin, 'Two Ideals of Explanation in Natural Science', in P. French, et al. (eds.), Midwest Studies in Philosophy, vol. 9 (Minneapolis, MN, 1984), pp. 205-20.
21. For discussion of these competing views of causal explanation, see Russell Keat and John Urry, Social Theory as Science, 2nd edn (London, 1982), and Ernan McMullin, 'Two Ideals of Explanation in Natural Science', in P. French, et al. (eds.), Midwest Studies in Philosophy, vol. 9 (Minneapolis, MN, 1984), pp. 205-20.
22. King, Keohane, and Verba, Designing Social Inquiry, p. 79.
23. Robert Cummins, The Nature of Psychological Explanation (Cambridge, MA, 1983).
24. Ibid., pp. 14-22.
25. The example is Cummins', ibid., p. 15.
26. For a good discussion of how behavioural methods and language relate to constitutive theorizing, see David Sylvan and Barry Glassner, 'Is Statistical Inference Appropriate to Structuralism?', Quality and Quantity, 17 (1983), pp. 69-86.
27. The phrase 'tacit realism' is Mario Bunge's in 'Realism and Antirealism in Social Science', Theory and Decision, 35 (1993). pp. 207-35. A similar argument is made by Linda Alcoff about Foucault's work in 'Foucault as Epistemologist', The Philosophical Forum, 25 (1993), pp. 95-124.
28. The phrase 'tacit realism' is Mario Bunge's in 'Realism and Antirealism in Social Science', Theory and Decision, 35 (1993). pp. 207-35. A similar argument is made by Linda Alcoff about Foucault's work in 'Foucault as Epistemologist', The Philosophical Forum, 25 (1993), pp. 95-124.
29. For perhaps the definitive statement of how ideas, in the form of reasons, can have causal effects on behaviour see Donald Davidson, 'Actions, Reasons, and Causes', Journal of Philosophy, 60 (1963), pp. 685-700. In saying that reasons can be causes I am taking one side in a debate about what remains a controversial issue; for an opposing, Wittgensteinian, view see David Rubenstein, 'The Concept of Action in the Social Sciences', Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 7 (1977), pp. 209-36. On the causal role of ideas in international politics, see especially Judith Goldstein and Robert Keohane (eds.), Ideas and Foreign Policy (Ithaca, NY, 1993).
30. For perhaps the definitive statement of how ideas, in the form of reasons, can have causal effects on behaviour see Donald Davidson, 'Actions, Reasons, and Causes', Journal of Philosophy, 60 (1963), pp. 685-700. In saying that reasons can be causes I am taking one side in a debate about what remains a controversial issue; for an opposing, Wittgensteinian, view see David Rubenstein, 'The Concept of Action in the Social Sciences', Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 7 (1977), pp. 209-36. On the causal role of ideas in international politics, see especially Judith Goldstein and Robert Keohane (eds.), Ideas and Foreign Policy (Ithaca, NY, 1993).
31. For perhaps the definitive statement of how ideas, in the form of reasons, can have causal effects on behaviour see Donald Davidson, 'Actions, Reasons, and Causes', Journal of Philosophy, 60 (1963), pp. 685-700. In saying that reasons can be causes I am taking one side in a debate about what remains a controversial issue; for an opposing, Wittgensteinian, view see David Rubenstein, 'The Concept of Action in the Social Sciences', Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 7 (1977), pp. 209-36. On the causal role of ideas in international politics, see especially Judith Goldstein and Robert Keohane (eds.), Ideas and Foreign Policy (Ithaca, NY, 1993).
32. See John Haugeland, 'The Nature and Plausibility of Cognitivism', The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 2 (1978), p. 216, and Cummins, 1983, p. 15.
33. See John Haugeland, 'The Nature and Plausibility of Cognitivism', The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 2 (1978), p. 216, and Cummins, 1983, p. 15.
34. On this conception of reification, see Douglas Maynard and Thomas Wilson, 'On the Reification of Social Structure', in S. McNall and G. Howe (eds.), Current Perspectives in Social Theory, vol. 1 (Greenwich, CT, 1980), pp. 287-322, and also Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality (New York, 1966), p. 89.
35. On this conception of reification, see Douglas Maynard and Thomas Wilson, 'On the Reification of Social Structure', in S. McNall and G. Howe (eds.), Current Perspectives in Social Theory, vol. 1 (Greenwich, CT, 1980), pp. 287-322, and also Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality (New York, 1966), p. 89.
36. William Dray, '"Explaining what" in history', in P. Gardiner (ed.), Theories of History (Glencoe, IL, 1959), and Philosophy of History (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1964). For a contemporary critique of Dray's position, see Richard Reiner, 'Necessary conditions and explaining how-possibly', The Philosophical Quarterly, 43 (1993), pp. 58-69.
37. William Dray, '"Explaining what" in history', in P. Gardiner (ed.), Theories of History (Glencoe, IL, 1959), and Philosophy of History (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1964). For a contemporary critique of Dray's position, see Richard Reiner, 'Necessary conditions and explaining how-possibly', The Philosophical Quarterly, 43 (1993), pp. 58-69.
38. William Dray, '"Explaining what" in history', in P. Gardiner (ed.), Theories of History (Glencoe, IL, 1959), and Philosophy of History (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1964). For a contemporary critique of Dray's position, see Richard Reiner, 'Necessary conditions and explaining how-possibly', The Philosophical Quarterly, 43 (1993), pp. 58-69.
39. Steven Rappaport, 'Economic Models and Historical Explanation', Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 25 (1995), pp. 421-41. For a good overview of the role of unification in scientific explanation more generally see Philip Kitcher, 'Explanatory Unification and the Causal Structure of the World', in P. Kitcher and W. Salmon (eds.), Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol. 13 (Minneapolis, MN, 1989), pp. 410-505.
40. Steven Rappaport, 'Economic Models and Historical Explanation', Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 25 (1995), pp. 421-41. For a good overview of the role of unification in scientific explanation more generally see Philip Kitcher, 'Explanatory Unification and the Causal Structure of the World', in P. Kitcher and W. Salmon (eds.), Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol. 13 (Minneapolis, MN, 1989), pp. 410-505.
41. Ibid., pp. 430-1.
42. Cummins, p. 18.
43. Rappaport, 'Economic Models and Historical Explanation'.
44. Haugeland, 'The Nature and Plausibility', pp. 215-26.
45. This usage is different to Kenneth Waltz's in Theory of International Politics, but compatible with the idea of 'structural' explanation. See Ernan McMullin, 'Structural Explanation', American Philosophical Quarterly, 15 (1978), pp. 139-47.
46. See Jarrett Leplin, 'Is Essentialism Unscientific?', Philosophy of Science, 55 (1988), pp. 493-510. For doubts about the claim that an essentialist strategy is necessary in the natural sciences see Paul Teller, 'Relational Holism and Quantum Mechanics', British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 37 (1986), pp. 71-81, and for a thoughtful discussion of essentialism in the social sciences, see Andrew Sayer, 'Essentialism, Social Constructionism, and Beyond', Sociological Review, 45 (1997), 453-87.
47. See Jarrett Leplin, 'Is Essentialism Unscientific?', Philosophy of Science, 55 (1988), pp. 493-510. For doubts about the claim that an essentialist strategy is necessary in the natural sciences see Paul Teller, 'Relational Holism and Quantum Mechanics', British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 37 (1986), pp. 71-81, and for a thoughtful discussion of essentialism in the social sciences, see Andrew Sayer, 'Essentialism, Social Constructionism, and Beyond', Sociological Review, 45 (1997), 453-87.
48. See Jarrett Leplin, 'Is Essentialism Unscientific?', Philosophy of Science, 55 (1988), pp. 493-510. For doubts about the claim that an essentialist strategy is necessary in the natural sciences see Paul Teller, 'Relational Holism and Quantum Mechanics', British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 37 (1986), pp. 71-81, and for a thoughtful discussion of essentialism in the social sciences, see Andrew Sayer, 'Essentialism, Social Constructionism, and Beyond', Sociological Review, 45 (1997), 453-87.
49. See Wendt, Social Theory of International Politics, ch. 4.
50. For a systematic development of this idea, see Bertell Ollman, Alienation (Cambridge, 1971).
51. Social Theory of International Politics, ch. 6.
52. Cross, 'Explanation and the Theory of Questions', p. 245; emphasis in the original.