Still critical after all these years? the past, present and future of Critical Theory in International Relations

Review of International Studies

Volumn 33, Issue SUPPL. 1, 2007, Pages 3-24

  Rengger, Nicholas ^a   Thirkell White, Ben ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 34547357507     PISSN: 02602105     EISSN: 14699044     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0260210507007371     Document Type: Review

References (97)

1. Discussions of the development and character of so-called 'positivist' IR are something of a drug on the market. Many of them, of course, treat IR and political science as virtually interchangeable. For discussions of the rise of 'positivist' political science, see: Bernard Crick, The American Science of Politics (Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press, 1960).
2. Klaus Knorr and James Rosenau (eds.), Contending Approaches to International Politics (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1969) highlight the emergence of what might be termed 'classical' behaviouralist approaches.
3. The growing diversity of the field can be seen in K. J. Holsti, The Dividing Discipline (London; Allen and Unwin, 1985)
4. and the debates between positivism and its critics traced ably in the introduction to Steve Smith, Ken Booth and Marysia Zalewski (eds.), International Theory; Positivism, and Beyond (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).
5. Waltz's move from a traditional to a much more scientific mode of theory is found, of course, in Theory of International Politics (Reading, MA: Addison Wesley, 1979).
6. The exhaustive (and exhausting) history of the 'English School' is given in Bruno Vigezzi, The British Committee for the Theory of International Politics 1954-1985: The Rediscovery of History (Milan: Bocconi, 2005),
7. though good accounts of the structure and types of argument typical of it can also be found in Andrew Linklater and Hidemi Suganami, The English School of International Relations: A Contemporary Reassessment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006).
8. This was Scientific Man. versus Power Politics (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1946), though this was a view Morgenthau retained.
9. See, for example, Truth and Power: Essays of a Decade (New York: Praeger, 1970).
10. It is worth adding that there have been many ways of cutting up the evolution of IR theory: 'Great Debates' (such as Realism versus Idealism), Traditions (like Wight's Realism, rationalism and revolutionism); and Paradigms, such as the alleged 'inter-paradigm debate much discussed by some British IR scholars in the 1970s and 80s. We do not take a view on these readings, rather we are simply situating the emergence of critical theory against other reigning kinds of theory.
11. For some internal treatments of Marxism and IR, see Andrew Cruickshank and Vendulka Kublakova, Marxism and International Relations (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985).
12. Wallerstein's major statement of world systems theory remains The Modern World System ((New York: Academic Press, 1974).
13. For Galtung's most explicit and detailed formulation of his approach, see his Essays on Methodology, 3 vols. (Copenhagen: Eijlers, 1977).
14. Robert Cox, 'Social Forces, States and World Orders: Beyond International Relations Theory', Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 10:2 (1981), pp. 126-55.
15. Richard K. Ashley, 'Political Realism and Human Interest', International Studies Quarterly, 25 (1981), pp. 204-36.
16. Andrew Linklater, Men and Citizens in the Theory of International Relations (London: Macmillan, 1982).
17. We will discuss the constructivist elements in the critical turn in more detail later on.
18. See, for example, Barry Buzan, From International to World Society : English School Theory and the Social Structure of Globalization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).
19. Good examples would include, David Boucher, Political Theories of International Relations (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999);
20. Thomas Pangle and Peter Ahresndorf, Justice Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace (Kansas, KS: University of Kansas Press, 1999);
21. and Brian C. Schmidt, The Political Discourse of Anarchy (New York: SUNY Press, 1998).
22. See, for example, the discussions in Chris Brown, Sovereignty Rights and Justice: International Political Theory Today (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2002).
23. For the integration of these fields into political science, see William Poundstone, Prisoner's Dilemma (New York: DoubleDay, 1992).
24. The literature on the Frankfurt School is now vast. The most exhaustive general history is Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994);
25. the best account of its origins, Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, 1973);
26. and perhaps the clearest exposition of its central tenets, David Held, Introduction to Critical Theory: From Horkheimer to Habermas (Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press, 1980).
27. Horkheimer's original essay was published in the Zeitschrift fur Sozial Forschung (the house journal of the Institute for Social Research which he directed and which was the institutional home of the School) in 1937, as Traditionelle und kritische theorie', ZfS, 6:2 (1937), pp. 245-94.
28. Cox, 'Social Forces', p. 128.
29. Mark Hoffman 'Critical Theory and the Inter-Paradigm Debate', Millennium, 16 (1987), pp. 231-49.
30. Andrew Linklater, 'The Changing Contours of Critical International Relations Theory', in Richard Wyn-Jones (ed.), Critical Theory and World Politics (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2001).
31. For an account of Cox's career and its significance for his theoretical development see chapter 2 ('Influences and Commitments') in Robert Cox with Tim Sinclair, Approaches to World Order (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).
32. Good treatments of Gramsci can be found in A. Showstack-Sassoon, Gramsci's Politics (London; Croom Helm, 1980),
33. Chantai Mouffe (ed.), Gramsci and Marxist Theory (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979),
34. J. Larrain, Marxism and Ideology (London; Macmillan, 1983)
35. and James Martin, Gramsci's Political Analysis: An Introduction (London; Palgrave Macmillan, 1998).
36. See also James Martin (ed.), Antonio Gramsci: Contemporary Philosophical Assessments, 4 vols. (London: Routledge, 2001).
37. Ernesto Laclau and Chantai Mouffe, Hegemony and Socialist Strategy (London: Verso, 1985).
38. Volumes that have contributed to this developing position would include: Stephen Gill, American Hegemony and the Tri-Lateral Commission (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990),
39. Stephen Gill (ed.), Gramsci: Historical Materialism and International Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993);
40. Craig Murphy, Global Institutions, Marginalization and Development (London: Routledge, 2005),
41. and Kees Van Der Piji, Transnational Classes and International Relations (London: Routledge, 1998).
42. The influence and growth of feminist scholarship across the humanities and social sciences since the mid-late 1960s awaits its major historian. Provisional assessments can be found in Margaret Walters, Feminism: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005),
43. and Nancy Cott, The Grounding of Modern Feminism (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1987).
44. Major statements of feminist IR scholarship of this sort would normally be held to include Ann Tickner, Gendering World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001);
45. Jean Bethke Elshtain, Women and War (Brighton: Harvester Press, 1987);
46. Cynthia Enloe, Bananas, Beaches and Bases: Making Feminist Sense of International Politics (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1989).
47. For an excellent overview by an important voice, growing in influence, see Kimberly Hutchings, 'Feminist Philosophy and International Relations Theory: A Review'. Women's Philosophy Review, 27 (2001), pp. 31-60. For more post-structurally inclined feminist writers see below.
48. These arguments are perhaps most fully developed in his critique of Kenneth Waltz, 'The Poverty of Neo-Realism' [in R. Keohane (ed.), Neo-Realism and Its Critics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986)]
49. and in his essay 'Living on Borderlines: Man, Post-Structuralism and War', in James Der Derian and Michael J. Shapiro, International/Intertextual Relations: Postmodern Readings of World Politics (New York: Lexington Books, 1989).
50. See Connolly, 'Identity and Difference in Global Polities', in Der Derian and Shapiro, International/Intertextual Relations.
51. See also Connolly's arguments in Identity/Difference: Democratic Negotiations of Political Paradox (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991).
52. The only major statement of Walker's view remains Inside/Outside: International Relations as Political Theory (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993).
53. Der Derian has explored these positions in three major books plus a host of articles, op-eds and other writings plus at least one filmed documentary. For the evolution of his views, see On Diplomacy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987);
54. Anti-Diplomacy; Speed, Spies, Terror and War (Oxford: Blackwell, 1992);
55. and Virtuous War: Mapping the Military Industrial Media Entertainment Network (Diane, 2001).
56. See, for example, Christine Sylvester, Feminist International Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001),
57. Jenny Edkins, Trauma and the Memory of Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003),
58. Cindy Weber, Imagining America at War: Morality, Politics and Film (London: Routledge, 2005). Hutchings' work on feminist IR has been mainly in essays so far (such as the one cited above and the one in the present issue).
59. But see also her studies Hegel: A Feminist Revision (Cambridge: Polity, 2002)
60. and International Political Theory (London: Sage, 1999).
61. Included in his International Institutions and State Power (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1989).
62. The title of his contribution to the forum on Andrew Linklater's, The Transformation of Political Community, in these pages.
63. See Review of International Studies, 25:1 (1999), pp. 147-50.
64. See, particularly, Palan's contribution in this issue.
65. Nicholas Onuf, World of Our Making: Rules and Rule in Social Theory and International Relations (University of North Carolina Press, 1987).
66. Rules, Norms, Decisions: On the Conditions of Practical and Legal Reasoning in International Relations and Domestic Affairs (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).
67. Alexander Wendt, 'Anarchy is What States Make of it: The Social Construction of Power Politics', International Organization, 46:3, pp. 391-425.
68. For Katzenstein's view of 'constructivism', see his edited book The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996).
69. For Wendt, of course, most importantly, Social Theory of International Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003).
70. For an overview, see Rouen Palan (ed.), Global Political Economy: Contemporary Theories (London: Routledge, 2000).
71. See, for example, Fred Halliday, Rethinking International Relations (London: Macmillan, 1994);
72. Van Der Piji, Transnational Classes;
73. and Rosenberg, The Empire of Civil Society: A Critique of the Realist Theory of International Relations (London: Verso, 1994).
74. See, for example, Jan Art Scholte, Globalizalion (London: Palgrave, 2000, 2nd edn. 2005);
75. Richard Higgot and Morton Ougard (ed.), Towards a Global Polity (London: Routledge, 2002);
76. Zygmunt Bauman, Globalization: The Human Consequences (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1998),
77. Saskia Sassen, Globalization and its Discontents (New York: The Free Press, 1998).
78. See especially, amongst a large and growing literature, Held, Democracy and Global Order (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995);
79. Held, McGrew, Goldblatt and Perraton, Global Transformations: Politics, Economics, Culture (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1999);
80. and Held and McGrew, Globalization and Anti-Globalization (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2002).
81. Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer, The Dialectic of Enlightenment (London: Verso, 1997).
82. The quote appears to be anecdotal. For discussions of Adorno's ethical thought, see Martin Jay, Adorno (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984), and Kate Schick, 'Outside International Ethics: Adorno, Suffering and Hope' (University of St Andrews, September 2006, mimeo).
83. For an excellent overview, see Held, Introduction to Critical Theory.
84. The criticism is our own, but compare, for example, Robert Cox, Production Power and World Order: Social Forces in the Making of History (New York: Columbia University Press, 1987)
85. with Cox's 'Reflections and Transitions', in Robert Cox, The Political Economy of a Plural World (London: Routledge, 2002),
86. and Craig Murphy, Global Institutions.
87. Cox has recently explicitly suggested that counter-hegemonic struggles might embrace racial, cultural or gender emancipation (see, for example, Cox, 'Reflections and Transitions'). In practice, though, even critical IPE rarely engages with feminist concerns - see Georgina Waylen, 'You Still Don't Understand: Why Troubled Engagements Continue between Feminists and (Critical) IPE', Review of International Studies, 32:1 (January 2006), pp. 145-64.
88. For this exchange, see William Wallace 'Truth and Power, Monks and Technocrats: Theory and Practice in International Relations', Review of International Studies, 22:3 (1996), pp. 301-21,
89. and Ken Booth, 'Discussion: A Reply to Wallace', Review of International Studies, 23:3 (1997), pp. 371-7.
90. For instance, he points to the weaknesses of neo-Gramscian theory in understanding the global constitution of class in a context in which there are as many conflicts of interest as there are points of contact between the workers of the world.
91. This is very much the Marx Hutchings discusses as Derrida's 'hauntological' Marx, later in this issue.
92. Ronen Palan 'Tax havens and the commercialisation of state sovereignty', International Organization, 56:1 (2002), pp. 153-78.
93. See also Global Institutions where Murphy points to the role of middle-class intellectuals, in contact with more radical social movements, in creating more solidarist global governance from the top down.
94. See his exchange with Nancy Fraser in the final section of Craig Calhoun (ed.), Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1997).
95. One of us, at least, would suggest that there is a far wider literature on the developing world that IR has yet to fully engage with than simply postcolonial literature (for some emerging correctives to this, see for example Anthony Payne, The Global Politics of Unequal Development (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2005),
96. and William Brown, 'Africa and International Relations: A Commentary on IR Theory, Anarchy and Statehood', Review of International Studies, 32 (2006), pp. 119-43).
97. One does not have to be 'orthodox' to question the postcolonial or 'post-development' approach-see for example Jan Neverdeen Pieterse, 'My Paradigm or Yours? Alternative Development, Post Development, Reflexive Development', Development and Change, 29:2 (1998), pp. 343-73.