David Mitrany on the international anarchy. A lost work of classical realism?
| Author | Lucian M Ashworth |
| Published date | 01 October 2017 |
| Date | 01 October 2017 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1755088217714010 |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1755088217714010
Journal of International Political Theory
2017, Vol. 13(3) 311 –324
© The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/1755088217714010
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David Mitrany on the
international anarchy. A lost
work of classical realism?
Lucian M Ashworth
Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada
Abstract
Although David Mitrany’s international thought is not usually associated with the concept
of the international anarchy, I argue that his analysis actually compares two forms of
anarchical order. The first form is the order associated with the relations between states,
while the second is his functional alternative to this order. The functional approach is
anarchical in the sense that it remains an order without an orderer. In first analysing the
dynamics and failings of the inter-state order, and then suggesting pragmatic process-
orientated solutions to those failings, I argue that Mitrany follows a similar approach to
his classical realist contemporaries.
Keywords
Classical realism, functional approach, international anarchy, Mitrany
David Mitrany rarely used the phrase anarchy when describing the international political
order. In this sense, he was different from his older contemporaries Lowes Dickinson and
Norman Angell who, after the First World War, used it as a description in several publica-
tions (Angell, 1933; Dickinson, 1916, 1926). Yet, although he did not use the phrase, the
concept of anarchy lies behind much of his thought, both when he was criticising the
current state of the world and when he put forward his own views on the future of global
order. In other words, there are two distinct conceptions of anarchy in Mitrany’s work.
There is the anarchy of the system of sovereign states that he criticises, and there is
the anarchical nature of the functional order that he saw as emerging in the twentieth
century.1 In this sense, he takes a different approach to Dickinson and Angell since in the
Corresponding author:
Lucian M Ashworth, Department of Political Science, Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John’s,
NL A1B 3X9, Canada.
Email: lashworth@mun.ca
714010IPT0010.1177/1755088217714010Journal of International Political TheoryAshworth
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