Imagining Society: Constructivism and the English School
| Author | Christian Reus-Smit |
| DOI | 10.1111/1467-856X.00091 |
| Published date | 01 October 2002 |
| Date | 01 October 2002 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Vol. 4, No. 3, October 2002, pp. 487–509
Imagining society: constructivism
and the English School
CHRISTIAN REUS-SMIT
Abstract
This article critically examines the current relationship between constructivism and the
English School. Scholars in each school have worked largely with stereotypes of the other,
and this has greatly impeded productive dialogue and cross-fertilization. A more fruitful
strategy is to treat both schools as bounded fields of debate, as rich and diverse realms of
internally contested thought. Constructivism is characterized by three key axes of debate:
between sociological institutionalists, Habermasian communicative action theorists, and
Foucauldian genealogists; between unit-level, systemic, and holistic theorists; and between
interpretivists and positivists. The English School is also divided between pluralists and soli-
darists, between those who identify the school with international society theory and those
who see it as inherently multifaceted, and between those who emphasize interpretive or
eclectic methodologies. Opening up each approach in this way enables us to identify new,
more fruitful axes of dialogue between the two perspectives.
Introduction
The last decade has witnessed a renaissance in ‘social’ theorising about
international relations. In the American core of the discipline, neo-realists
long denied that relations between states had any social content, and
neo-liberals, while acknowledging the existence of an international society,
© Political Studies Association 2002. Published by Blackwell Publishers, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF and
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487
Christian Reus-Smit
understood social interaction among states as little more than strategically
induced institutional co-operation. This rationalist condominium was chal-
lenged, however, by the advent of constructivism in the 1990s. Construc-
tivists see international relations as deeply social, as a realm of action in
which the identities and interests of states and other actors are discursively
structured by intersubjective rules, norms and institutions. This develop-
ment was paralleled in the United Kingdom and Europe by the rejuvena-
tion of the English School, by the ‘rediscovery’ and further elaboration of
the ideas pioneered by Martin Wight, Hedley Bull, John Vincent and
others. Never having yielded to American rationalism, the English School
had long emphasised the social aspects of international life, such as the
way in which culture conditions the identities of states, and how social
dynamics underlie the institutions that sustain international order. Not sur-
prisingly, constructivists and English School scholars have frequently iden-
tified each other as fellow travellers, as having complementary projects at
the ‘social vanguard’ of the field.
This article critically examines the current relationship between con-
structivism and the English School. I begin by arguing that although impor-
tant points of convergence have been identified and emphasised, scholars
in both schools have worked largely with stereotypes of the other, and this
has greatly impeded productive dialogue and cross-fertilisation. Construc-
tivists have almost exclusively focused on the ‘ontological’ aspects of
English School theory, ignoring altogether its crucial ‘normative’ aspects.
For their part, English School scholars have defined constructivism largely
in terms of the writings of Alexander Wendt, thus giving constructivism
an unnecessarily statist and positivist profile. A more fruitful strategy,
I suggest, is to treat both schools as bounded fields of debate, as rich
and diverse realms of internally contested thought. Constructivism, for
instance, is characterised by three key axes of debate: between sociologi-
cal institutionalists, Habermasian communicative action theorists and
Foucauldian genealogists; between unit-level, systemic and holistic theo-
rists; and between interpretivists and positivists. The English School is also
divided between pluralists and solidarists, between those who identify the
school with international-society theory and those who see it as inherently
multifaceted, and between those who emphasise interpretive or eclectic
methodologies. Opening up each approach in this way enables us to iden-
tify new, potentially rewarding axes of dialogue. In particular, acknowl-
edging the English School’s normative reflections on the relationship
between order and justice can help constructivists to develop more secure
foundations for the subterranean normativity that motivates much of their
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Constructivism and the English School
work. And recognising the communicative and holistic strands of con-
structivism can enable English School theorists to move beyond the unsus-
tainable and increasingly unproductive debate between pluralists and
solidarists.
The dialogue of stereotypes
Constructivism and the English School are often said to bear striking
family resemblances, a view encouraged by their mutual concern for the
social dimensions of international life. Realist critics have been quick to
tar both with the same brush, criticising them for overemphasising ‘logics
of appropriateness’ in relations between states. ‘The English School and
some other constructivist analyses’, Stephen Krasner contends, ‘understand
institutions as generating agents that reinforce or enact, as a result of
normative socialization into a common civilization, a particular set of
principles, norms, and rules’ (1999, 71). This sense of a common orienta-
tion has been promoted by constructivists and English School scholars
themselves. When plotting international relations theories against individ-
ualist/holist and materialist/idealist axes, Wendt places constructivism and
the English School in the same holist/idealist quadrant, subsuming all
theories in this quadrant under the general rubric of ‘Constructivism’
(1999, 31–32; also Finnemore 1996a; and Reus-Smit 1999, 5). Tim Dunne,
prominent among the new generation of English School theorists, argues
that there is ‘an affinity between the international society tradition and the
work of constructivists like Alexander Wendt. Both assume the centrality
of states, and both interrogate the meaning of international system/society
according to the intersubjective practices through which it is constituted’
(1995, 384 and 1998, 187–190).
There is much that is intuitively plausible about this discourse of con-
vergence. It is true that constructivism and the English School share much
in common, particularly interests in the cultural bases of state identity, the
rule-governed nature of international society, and the variable forms of life
under anarchy. None of this should be at all surprising, as constructivists
have explicitly drawn inspiration from Wight, Bull and others, and new
members of the English School have often self-consciously aligned with
constructivism to invest the old lineage with new theoretical credibility.
This having been said though, the discourse of convergence has, in large
measure, been based on a series of partial or distorted representations.
Scholars on both sides have read the literature of the other to find what is
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Christian Reus-Smit
both comfortable and convenient, consciously or unconsciously ignoring
other significant strands of thought.
When referring to the English School, constructivists focus narrowly on
its core ontological propositions. We learn from constructivist depictions
of the English School that states can come together to form international
societies, and that international life is norm- and rule-governed. In the
words of Jepperson, Wendt and Katzenstein, from the perspective of the
English School ‘the international system is a “society” in which states, as
a condition of their participation in the system, adhere to shared norms
and rules in a variety of issue areas’ (1996, 45). Martha Finnemore
reiterates this representation when she notes that although members of
the English School ‘vary in their claims about the “thickness” and content
of international society, these scholars agree that at its core lies some prin-
cipled rules, institutions, and values that govern both who is a member of
the society and how those members behave’ (Finnemore 1996a, 18). In
outlining the intellectual roots of my own work, I too have claimed a moti-
vating ‘interest in Hedley Bull’s idea that sovereign states can not only form
international systems but also international societies’ and in the notion that
‘modern states share certain elementary interests and values and have
constructed rules and institutions to express further those goals’ (Reus-
Smit 1999, xi).
While these representations are accurate—in the sense that the English
School does indeed stress the existence of society among states and the
importance of norms and rules in structuring state identity and conduct—
they are partial at best. Obscured altogether is one of the most prominent
aspects of English School scholarship—the normative inquiry into the
relationship between order and justice in international relations. From the
foundational writings of Bull (1977 and 1984) and John Vincent (1974
and 1986) to recent works by Robert Jackson (2000), James Mayall (2000)
and Nicholas Wheeler (2000), scholars of the English School have consis-
tently explored the potential for moral action in a world of sovereign
states, fueling an ongoing debate between pluralists...
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