DOCSLIB.ORG

Martin Wight

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Martin Wight APPENDIX 1 Martin Wight Figure A1.1 Martin Wight in 1961. APPENDIX 2 “Fortune’s Banter” Figure A2.1 A s a m p l e p a g e . Notes Introduction Understanding Fortune and Irony 1 . F r i e d r i c h A . H a y e k , The Counter Revolution of Science. Studies on the Abuse of Reason (New York: Macmillan, 1964), p. 25. 2 . D e n n i s H . W r o n g , Power. Its Forms, Bases, and Uses , 5th printing (New Brunswick, NJ: Transactions, 2009), p. 2. Besides the inevitable, col- lateral, unintended, and/or unforeseen effects, power produces a par- ticular kind of intended and foreseen effect: it modifies others’ behavior obtaining the desired result; cf. Angelo Panebianco, Il Potere, lo Stato, la Libert à (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2004), p. 39. 3 . Robert K. Merton, “The Unanticipated Consequences of Purposive Social Action,” American Sociological Review 1, no. 6 (1936): 894. In his Social Theory and Social Structure (Glencoe: Free Press, 1957), p. 68, Merton indicates the study of the unintended consequences of social action as one of the major tasks of the social sciences. Raymond Boudon’s The Unintended Consequences of Social Action (London: Macmillan, 1982) is devoted to this task. On this epistemological connection, see Ray Pawson, “On the Shoulders of Merton: Boudon as the Modern Guardian of Middle-Range Theory,” in Mohamed Cherkaoui and Peter Hamilton, eds., Raymond Boudon: A Life in Sociology , 4 vols. (Oxford, UK: Bardwell, 2009), 4:317–34. Reviewing Boudon’s volume in Social Forces 63, no. 2 (1984): 613, Eric Leifer noted, “This English version of Boudon’s original 1977 book is of uneven quality.” I will use the original one. 4 . Edward H. Carr, What Is History? (London: Macmillan, 1961), p. 46. 5. Martin Wight, “Necessity and Chance in International Relations,” Papers of Martin Wight, file 3, undated sketch. The Papers of Martin Wight (hereafter referred to as MWP and reference number) are located at the British Library of Political and Economic Sciences, London. 6. Needless to say, similar problems have been investigated in many fields of study. For instance, Boudon thought that the main purpose of sociology must be the causal explanation of enigmatic social phenomena. He was determinate in showing how actions and interactions at the micro-level 120 ● Notes can produce aggregated outcomes at the macro-level that nobody expects or wishes, or “perverse effects”; cf. Raymond Boudon, Effets Perverse et Ordre Social (Paris: Puf, 1977). 7 . Martin Wight, “Obliquities of Causation,” undated sketch, MWP 3. 8 . Of course, at a more complex level there are “microfoundations” of politics, which lie behind political decisions; cf. Angelo Panebianco, L’Automa e lo Spirito. Azioni Individuali , Istituzioni , Imprese Collettive (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2009). 9 . Martin Wight, “War and International Politics,” The Listener , October 13, 1955, p. 584, transmitted on BBC Third program on October 6, 1955, at 8:45. See The Times , same date, p. 4. Cf. Martin Wight, Power Politics , ed. Hedley Bull and Carsten Holbraad (Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1978), p. 136. 1 0 . W i g h t , “ W a r a n d I n t e r n a t i o n a l P o l i t i c s ” , p . 5 8 4 . 11 . Cf. Garret Hardin, “The Tragedy of the Commons,” Science 162, no. 3859 (1968): 1243. 12 . Martin Wight, “History and the Study of International Relations,” MWP 112, p. 3. 1 3 . H e d l e y B u l l , The Anarchical Society. A Study of Order in World Politics , 2nd ed. (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1995), p. 308. 14 . Michael Howard, “Lost Friend,” in Coral Bell and Meredith Thatcher, eds., Remembering Hedley (Canberra: ANU E Press, 2008), p. 128. 1 5 . B u l l , Anarchical Society , p. 308. 16 . Hedley Bull, “What Is the Commonwealth?,” World Politics 11, no. 4 (1959): 587. 1 7 . I b i d . , p . 5 8 7 . 18 . David Collingridge and Colin Reeve, Science Speaks to Power: The Role of Experts in Policy Making (London: Frances Pinter, 1986), p. 32, emphasis added. “Scientism is not scientific method in politics; it is an idealistic attempt to overcome the limitations and uncertainties of politics through an analogy that confuses the genesis, the verification and the application of the theories of the natural sciences”; Bernard Crick, The American Science of Politics. Its Origins and Conditions (Berkley: University of California Press, 1964), p. 224. 19. Obviously, “to see before” means different things for different persons. For someone, it seems to be “the attempt to apply a theory to limn the future” because “prediction is one test of a theory.” For someone else, a good theory of politics “furnishes a model in which future observa- tions and consequences of actions in the outside world can be predicted.” Others think that “theories can also help policy makers anticipate events”; see, respectively, Kenneth Waltz, “International Politics, Viewed from the Ground,” International Security 19, no. 1 (1994): 199; Karl W. Deutsch, “On Political Theory and Political Action,” American Political Science Review 65, no. 1 (1971): 65; and Stephen Walt, “The Relationship Notes ● 121 between Theory and Policy in International Relations,” Annual Review of Political Science 8 (2005): 31. 20 . For a defense of the scientific study of the future, originally elaborated in 1964, see Bertrand de Jouvenel, The Art of Conjuncture , trans. Nikita Lary (Piscataway: Transaction Publisher, 2012). 2 1 . B u l l , Anarchical Society , p. 308. 2 2 . M a r t i n W i g h t , “ C h r i s t i a n P o l i t i c s , ” MWP 52, p. 4a. This manuscript seems to have been written several years after “Fortune’s Banter,” not before 1968. 1 Wight’s Intent: Text, Context, and Method 1 . A r i s t o t l e , Poetics , trans. William H. Fyfe (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1932), 1452a.20. 2 . Ecclesiastes , 9:11, KJ21. 3 . “ D e a t h s , ” The Times , July 17, 1972, p. 22. 4 . This is Christopher Hill’s eloquent appraisal in his “History and International Relations,” in Steve Smith, ed., International Relations: British and American Perspective (Oxford, UK: Blackwell, 1985), p. 130. To my knowledge, only two monographs, both derived from doctoral dissertations, have so far been written on this thinker: Ian Hall, The International Thought of Martin Wight (New York: Palgrave, 2006) and Michele Chiaruzzi, Politica di Potenza nell’Et à del Leviatano. La Teoria Internazionale di Martin Wight (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2008). 5 . Raymond Aron, M é moires (Paris: Julliard, 1983), p. 456. 6 . Ibid. From the incomplete and abridged English edition, this passage was cut out, as many others, including the lines on Carl Schmitt’s let- ter to Aron and Golo Mann’s review in Die Zeit ; cf. Raymond Aron, Memoirs , trans. George Holoch (New York: Holmes & Meier, 1990), pp. 301–3. Perhaps another publisher will someday have more respect for the integrity of Aron’s life. 7 . Martin Wight, “Tract for the Nuclear Age,” The Observer , April 23, 1967, p. 30. The argument is that the political classics have been the fruit of meditation in times of political crisis yet the age of the World Wars did not bear such fruit, until Aron, we may add today. 8 . Butterfield to Wight, December 22, 1958, MWP 248. 9 . H e d l e y B u l l , The Anarchical Society. A Study of Order in World Politics , 2nd ed. (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1995), p. xiii. 10 . Richard Devetak, “Introduction,” in Michele Chiaruzzi, “The Three Traditions in History: A Dialogic Text,” Global Change, Peace & Security 22, no. 1 (2010): 122. 11 . Report of the discussion of the British Committee, September 1959; quoted in Brunello Vigezzi, The British Committee on the Theory of 122 ● Notes International Politics (1954–1985): The Rediscovery of History , trans. Ian Harvey (Milan: Edizioni Unicopli, 2005), p. 48. 1 2 . R o g e r E p p , r e v i e w o f International Theory by M. Wight, International Journal 48, no. 3 (1993): 561. 13 . Quoted in Hedley Bull, “Introduction: Martin Wight and the Study of International Relations,” in Martin Wight, Systems of States , ed. Hedley Bull (London: Leicester University Press, 1977), p. 15. 14 . Karl von Clausewitz, On War , ed. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984), p. 86. 1 5 . A r n a l d o M o m i g l i a n o , Storia e Storiografia Antica (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1987), p. 21. For a slightly different translation and the whole text in English, see the appendix in Daniel R. Schwarz, Reading the First Century. On Reading Josephus and Studying Jewish History of the First Century (T ü bingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013), pp. 182–9. 1 6 . H a n s - G e o r g G a d a m e r , Truth and Method (London: Bloomsbury, 2004), p. 474. 1 7 . F r i e d r i c h N i e t z s c h e , Dawn: Thoughts on the Presumptions of Morality , trans. Brittain Smith (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011), pp. 6–7. But there is, in contrast, a fragility of words: “Words strain, crack and sometimes break, under the burden / Under the tension, slip, slide, perish / Decay with imprecision, will not stay in place / Will not stay still”; Thomas S. Eliot, “Burnt Norton,” in his Four Quartets (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1943), section 5, lines 13–16, pp.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • The Problem of Harm in World Politics: Implications for the Sociology of States-Systems
    The problem of harm in world politics: implications for the sociology of states-systems ANDREW LINKLATER* In the 1960s Martin Wight and his colleagues on the British Committee on the Theory of International Politics wrote several papers on the great states-systems, including the ancient Greek and Chinese systems, medieval international society and the modern international order. A book on the sociology of states- systems was anticipated—a successor to Butterfield and Wight’s Diplomatic investigations—but the project was not completed.1 It would have been the first volume of its kind in international relations and its impact on the discipline would have been immense in a period in which several major works on historical sociology were published by leading sociologists.2 In more recent times, students of international relations have called for large-scale historical– º sociological accounts of world politics, and several works have demonstrated what the field can contribute to the broader project of historical sociology.3 As a result, the ‘sociology of states-systems’ now occupies a more central place in the study of international relations than it has at any other time. From that ‘first period’, Martin Wight’s System of states stands out as the central work which did most to set out a grand vision of the comparative sociological analysis of states-systems. On the twenty-fifth anniversary of its * This article is based on the Martin Wight Memorial Lecture delivered at the London School of Economics in November 2001. The author is grateful to Ian Clark, Tim Dunne, Hidemi Suganami and Nicholas Wheeler for their comments on an earlier draft.
    [Show full text]
  • Interpreting Diplomacy: the Approach of the Early English School Written by Ian Hall
    Interpreting Diplomacy: The Approach of the Early English School Written by Ian Hall This PDF is auto-generated for reference only. As such, it may contain some conversion errors and/or missing information. For all formal use please refer to the official version on the website, as linked below. Interpreting Diplomacy: The Approach of the Early English School https://www.e-ir.info/2016/02/14/interpreting-diplomacy-the-approach-of-the-early-english-school/ IAN HALL, FEB 14 2016 This is an excerpt from System, Society and the World: Exploring the English School of International Relations. The Second Edition is available now on Amazon (UK, USA), in all good book stores, and via a free PDF download. Find out more about E-IR’s open access books here. In its first phase, which is normally dated from about 1959 to 1984,[i] the scholars who came to be labelled the early English School (ES), including Hedley Bull, Herbert Butterfield and Martin Wight, did not devote much effort to spelling out their preferred approach to international relations, let alone a research method. To make matters worse, the style and focus of their works varied, making it harder to distil an approach or method than it sometimes is when dealing with other schools of thought in International Relations (IR).[ii] But there are similarities in the essays and books produced by the early ES, and there were common commitments, and this chapter tries to tease them out. In general, the early ES took an ‘interpretive’ approach that concentrated on the beliefs of individual actors in international relations, assuming that explaining and evaluating their actions depends on interpreting the meaning they had for the actors who performed them.[iii] This approach entailed, as Herbert Butterfield and Martin Wight wrote in the preface to Diplomatic Investigations, a focus on ‘the diplomatic community’, which they – in contrast to some later ES thinkers – took to be synonymous with ‘international society’ and ‘the states-system’.[iv] Butterfield, Wight, et al.
    [Show full text]
  • Inventing International Society
    INVENTING INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY Inventing International Society A History of the English School Tim Dunne Lecturer in International Politics Department of International Politics University of Wales Aberystwyth in association with Palgrave Macmillan First published in Great Britain 1998 by MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN 978-0-333-73787-3 ISBN 978-0-230-37613-7 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/9780230376137 First published in the United States of America 1998 by ST. MARTIN'S PRESS, INC., Scholarly and Reference Division, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 ISBN 978-0-312-21545-3 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Dunne, Timothy, 1965- Inventing international society : a history of the English school I Timothy Dunne. p. em.- (St. Antony's series) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-312-21545-3 (cloth) I. International relations-Philosophy-History. 2. International relations-Study and teaching-Great Britain-History. I. Title. II. Series. JZ1242.D86 1998 327.1'01--dc21 98-17291 CIP ©Tim Dunne 1998 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1998 978-0-333-64345-7 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London WlP 9HE.
    [Show full text]
  • Introduction 1 the West, Civilizations and International Relations Theory
    Notes Introduction 1. The thesis in Huntington’s original 1993 essay in Foreign Affairs was elaborated upon most fully in his 1996 book The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. 2. The term ‘International Relations’ in capitals will be used to refer to the academic discipline, whereas the term ‘international relations’ in lower case will be used to refer more generally to the realm of world politics. 3. See, for instance, Deudney and Ikenberry (1993/94), Fukuyama (1989) and Mahbubani (1992) and their respondents, and more recently Coker (1998), Gress (1997), and McNeill (1997a). 4. See Walker (1984a) for a discussion of universalist and pluralist dialectic in dis- cussions of culture and world politics. See also Eagleton (2000) and Parekh (2000). For discussions of the evolution of civilization as a concept, see Braudel (1980), Elias (1978), Febvre, (1973), Robinson (1969), Springborg (1993) and Williams (1983). 5. See, for example, Brown (1992; 1995; 2000), Cochrane (1999) Linklater (1998) and Morrice (2000). 6. There is one further sense in which the West appears in the OED definitions, the ‘wild West’ as in the United States. Interestingly, used in this sense, the West is represented as a territory lacking in order and civilization. Note also Springborg’s observation that in Arabic, the term the West – Gharb – also connotes darkness, the incomprehensible, a frightening place (Springborg, 1994). 7. See Gress (1997) for a discussion of contending traditions that contribute to the civilizational identity of the West. 1 The West, civilizations and International Relations theory 1. Although Gilpin does demonstrate some concern for a possible revolt against the hegemony of Western values resulting in a return to a pre-modern clash of civilization in world politics (Gilpin, 1979: 225).
    [Show full text]
  • Juridical Investigations: Martin Wight As International Lawyer
    chapter 21 Juridical Investigations: Martin Wight as International Lawyer Gerry Simpson* It may seem odd to include a political theorist – and one with no legal training – in a collection of works about significant British international lawyers of the twentieth century. It is, perhaps, even odder to include someone who pub- lished so little work and whose fame as a scholar of international relations (ir) was eclipsed by his pupil, Hedley Bull, as well as by a generation of influ- ential American political realists (e.g. Morgenthau, Niebuhr and Hoffman).1 Yet Wight’s sardonic style and lightly-worn, but deeply felt, historical learning speaks very directly to us as international lawyers reflecting back on a century of professional work in the uk. His preoccupations, such as empire, lawful di- plomacy, enemies of mankind, theoretical tradition, Eurocentrism, interven- tion and ethics, are also ours. Wight’s political theory seems so much more congenial to international law than much of ir scholarship today (though there are important exceptions). One can imagine him as a grand old man de- livering (to a mixed reception) a keynote address at a Third World Approaches to International Law conference in Cairo or engaging in spirited conversation with Philip Allott at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law (biicl) or Chatham House. In this era of the turn to history and the turn to theory, Wight would have flourished, too, as an honorary international lawyer. His historical range, cou- pled with a breadth of references drawn from diplomatic practice, would have left him well placed to enter into dialogue with those who are recasting the * Professor of International Law, London School of Economics.
    [Show full text]
  • The English School on Diplomacy
    DISCUSSION PAPERS IN DIPLOMACY The English School on Diplomacy Iver B. Neumann Netherlands Institute of International Relations ‘Clingendael’ ISSN 1569-2981 DISCUSSION PAPERS IN DIPLOMACY Editor: Spencer Mawby, University of Leicester Managing Editor: Jan Melissen, Netherlands Institute of International Relations ‘Clingendael’ Desk top publishing: Birgit Leiteritz Editorial Board Karin Aggestam, Lund University Geoff Berridge, University of Leicester Erik Goldstein, Boston University Donna Lee, University of Nottingham Paul Sharp, University of Minnesota, Duluth ABSTRACT Dominant schools of International Relations theorising such as neo-realism and neo- liberalism have bracketed the study of diplomacy in favour of abstract studies of the states system and the functioning of specific institutions such as the UN. Among the discipline’s research programmes, the English School specifically lists diplomacy as one of five broad institutions which constitute its chosen subject matter. This Discussion Paper details the School’s findings and concludes that interest in the subject appears to be declining. Two fairly recent studies by Der Derian and Reus- Smit, which are written at the margins of the school, seem to point the way forward by crossing key School insights and historical findings with more overriding general concerns in the social sciences. Diplomacy should be studied concretely, as a specific practice which is carried out by human beings acting inside a web of historically emergent norms and organisations. Inasmuch as these norms and organisations seem to be changing, so does diplomacy. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Iver B. Neumann, D.Phil. ([email protected]) is on leave from his job as research professor at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs to work as a policy planner in the Norwegian Ministry of International Affairs.
    [Show full text]
  • Martin Wight, Western Values, and the Whig Tradition of International Thought Ian Hall Published Online: 04 Apr 2014
    This article was downloaded by: [Australian National University] On: 04 April 2014, At: 15:08 Publisher: Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK The International History Review Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rinh20 Martin Wight, Western Values, and the Whig Tradition of International Thought Ian Hall Published online: 04 Apr 2014. To cite this article: Ian Hall (2014): Martin Wight, Western Values, and the Whig Tradition of International Thought, The International History Review, DOI: 10.1080/07075332.2014.900815 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07075332.2014.900815 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the “Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content.
    [Show full text]
  • Exploring the English School of International Relations
    1 2 3 Published by e-International Relations (Bristol, UK) April 2013 System, Society & the World: www.e-IR.info Exploring the English School of Published under a Creative Commons License: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 You are free to copy, distribute, transmit and adapt this work under the International Relations following conditions: You must attribute the work to the author and licensor (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). You may not use this work for commerial purposes. If you alter, transform, or build upon this work, you may distribute the resulting work only under the same or similar license to this one. Edited by: Any of the above conditions can be waived if you get permission from the copyright holder. Contact [email protected] Robert W. Murray Where the work or any of its elements is in the public domain under applicable University of Alberta, Canada law, that status is in no way affected by the license. In no way are any of the following rights affected by the license: Your fair dealing or fair use rights, or other applicable copyright exceptions and limitations; The author’s moral rights; Rights other persons may have either in the work itself or in how the work is used, such as publicity or privacy rights. Notice — For any reuse or distribution, you must make clear to others the license terms of this work. The best way to do this is with a link to this web page: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ Front cover image: Palais de Nations by Kevin Gessner Volume prepared for publication by e-International Relations 4 5 System, Society & the World: Contents Exploring the English School of International Relations Since its reorganization in the early 1990s, the English School of international relations Introduction (IR) has emerged as a popular theoretical lens through which to examine global Robert W.
    [Show full text]
  • UC GAIA Hall--Text CS5.5.Indd
    Dilemmas of Decline The Berkeley SerieS in BriTiSh STudieS Mark Bevir and James Vernon, University of California, Berkeley, Editors 1. The Peculiarities of Liberal Modernity in Imperial Britain, edited by Simon Gunn and James Vernon 2. Dilemmas of Decline: British Intellectuals and World Politics, 1945 – 1975, by Ian Hall Dilemmas of Decline British Intellectuals and World Politics, 1945 - 1975 ian hall Global, Area, and International Archive University of California Press Berkeley loS angeleS london The Global, Area, and International Archive (GAIA) is an initiative of the Institute of International Studies, University of California, Berkeley, in partnership with the University of California Press, the California Digital Library, and international research programs across the University of California system. University of California Press, one of the most distinguished university presses in the United States, enriches lives around the world by advancing scholarship in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Its activities are supported by the UC Press Foundation and by philanthropic contributions from individuals and institutions. For more information, visit www.ucpress.edu. University of California Press Berkeley and Los Angeles, California University of California Press, Ltd. London, England © 2012 by The Regents of the University of California Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress Manufactured in the United States of America 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of anSi/niSo z39.48 – 1992 (r 1997) (Permanence of Paper).
    [Show full text]
  • Intellectual History and International Relations David Armitage Department of History, Columbia University
    Modern Intellectual History, 1, 1 (2004), pp. 97–109. C 2004 Cambridge University Press DOI: 10.1017/S1479244303000027 Printed in the United Kingdom the fifty years’ rift: intellectual history and international relations david armitage Department of History, Columbia University Georg Cavallar, The Rights of Strangers: Theories of International Hospitality, the Global Community, and Political Justice since Vitoria (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002) Jonathan Haslam, No Virtue Like Necessity: Realist Thought in International Relations since Machiavelli (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2002) Edward Keene, Beyond the Anarchical Society: Grotius, Colonialism and Order in World Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002) Any assessment of modern intellectual history would surely include the renaissance in the history of political thought among its most enduring achieve- ments. The origins of that revival can be traced back to the contextualist revolution in the history of political thought which is associated particularly with the Cambridge historians Peter Laslett, John Pocock, Quentin Skinner and John Dunn. In retrospect, it appears that a crucial impetus for the revolution soon to come was Laslett’s notorious verdict, delivered in 1956, that “[f]or the moment, anyway, political theory is dead”.1 That this judgement offered both a premature epitaph and a salutary provocation became eminently clear in the gene- ration that followed. Those years, marked at one end by Isaiah Berlin’s inaugural lecture, “Two Concepts of Liberty” (1958), and at the other by the publication of John Rawls’s A Theory of Justice (1971), heralded an unparalleled efflorescence of political theory which continues to this day. Likewise, almost the same period, running from Pocock’s The Ancient Constitution and the Feudal Law (1957)to Skinner’sTheFoundationsofModernPoliticalThought(1978),witnessedthebegin- nings of a persistently fertile vein of inquiry into the history of political theory.
    [Show full text]
  • The Three Worldviews of Hobbes, Grotius and Kant Foundations of Modern Thinking on Peace and Security Contextual Change and Reconceptualisation of Security
    PD Dr. Hans Günter Brauch Free University of Berlin, Berlin, AFES-PRESS, Chairman, Mosbach The Three Worldviews of Hobbes, Grotius and Kant Foundations of modern thinking on peace and security Contextual Change and Reconceptualisation of Security 1. The English School: Three worldviews on international relations The international political reality and the threats, challenges, vulnerabilities and risks for pea- ce and security we perceive depend on our worldview, our conceptual models and theoretical concepts but also on our mindsets that are influenced by our traditions, experience and by the media that select the facts and interpret the images of the world that constitute reality for us. Thus, both the scientific concepts we use and the reality we perceive through our conceptual lenses and we interpret with our concepts, models and theories are socially constructed. Martin Wight has distinguished among three traditions or worldviews of the a) Machiavellian or Hobbesian pessimists for whom power is crucial, b) The Grotian pragmatists or rationalists for whom cooperation matters, and c) The Kantian optimists for whom ideas and legal principles are vital. I have argued that the theoretical debates in international relations can be reduced to these three basic worldviews that have reappeared in the four debates since international relations emerged as a scientific discipline in 1919. My goal is twofold: a) to review these three ideal-type worldviews associated with Hobbes, Grotius and Kant; b) and to address the interdependence between fundamental contextual and scientific chan- ges and conceptual innovation both in the social sciences and in the body politic. The basic question behind our project is whether fundamental challenges to the existing inter- national order triggered conceptual innovations.
    [Show full text]
  • Chapter 1 the Enigmatic Martin Wight 1
    Notes Chapter 1 The Enigmatic Martin Wight 1. Throughout this book I have followed the convention that “International Relations” or “IR” refers to the academic field that concerns the study of the relations—political, economic, social, and so on—between states, sub-state actors, international institutions, and so on, and that “international relations” refers to their actual conduct. 2. Tim Dunne, Inventing International Society: A History of the English School (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1998), p. 47. 3. Michael Nicholson, “The Enigma of Martin Wight,” Review of International Studies 7:1 (1981): 15–22. 4. Wight, Power Politics, Looking Forward Pamphlet no. 8 (London: Royal Institute for International Affairs, 1946), p. 66. 5. Ibid., p. 68. 6. Winston S. Churchill, The World Crisis, 1911–1918 (London: Thornton Butterworth, 1923–1931); George F. Kennan, Russia and the West under Lenin and Stalin (Boston: Little, Brown, 1961), p. 164. 7. E. H. Carr, The Twenty Years’ Crisis, 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations (London: Macmillan, 1939). 8. Leslie Paul, The Age of Terror (London: Faber & Faber, 1950); G. F. Hudson, The Hard and Bitter Peace: World Politics since 1945 (London: Pall Mall Press, 1966). 9. Denis Brogan, The Price of Revolution (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1951), p. vii. 10. Plato, The Republic, trans. Allan Bloom, 2nd ed. (New York: Basic Books, 1991), 361–362, pp. 38–40. 11. Wight, “Western Values in International Relations,” in Herbert Butterfield and Martin Wight (eds.), Diplomatic Investigations: Essays in the Theory of International Politics (London: Allen & Unwin, 1966), p. 122. 12. Plato, Republic, trans. Bloom, 496c–d, p.
    [Show full text]