Interpretivists in the English School: Aren’t we all?
| Published date | 01 June 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/17550882221134959 |
| Author | Charlotta Friedner Parrat |
| Date | 01 June 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Debate |
https://doi.org/10.1177/17550882221134959
Journal of International Political Theory
2023, Vol. 19(2) 221 –241
© The Author(s) 2022
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DOI: 10.1177/17550882221134959
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Interpretivists in the English
School: Aren’t we all?
Charlotta Friedner Parrat
Swedish Defence University, Sweden
Abstract
This article is a reply to Bevir and Hall, who recently argued in this journal that the
English School needs to reflect more on its philosophy. They are right. Yet, their
preferred distinction between a structural and an interpretivist strand of the School is
not a constructive way forward. This is because their distinction between a structural
and an interpretivist strand of the school is too stark, their chosen dimensions for
sorting through the School are arguably not the most fruitful, and the inclusion of the
English School’s normative agenda must remain independent of whether one is inclined
to start from structure or from agency. After elaborating these points, the article
moves on to suggesting a number of other philosophical issues which would be more
relevant for the English School to work through. It ends with an empirical illustration of
what an integrated English School approach, inspired by structuration, could look like.
Keywords
English School, interpretivism, philosophy of science, structuration
‘[E]ven insiders sometimes find it hard to describe, let alone spell out [the English
School] approach to the field’ (Bevir and Hall, 2020a: 121). How, indeed, can we philo-
sophically make sense of a theoretical tradition, the earliest proponents of which chose
formulations such as this one: ‘Assuming, if we must, that for the purpose of internal
domestic social thinking the state, though theoretically a reality, is in reality no more than
an idea – what now is its status in the context of its inter-relatedness with other states’
(Manning, 1962: 27)? Dunne (1995: 379) in the mid-1990s categorised the English
School as constructivist and structurationist. In principle, we have moved on since then.
Yet, as Bevir and Hall (2020a) have argued recently in this journal, the English School
still needs to reflect more on its philosophy. They have a point, but their preferred
Corresponding author:
Charlotta Friedner Parrat, Department of War Studies and Military History, Swedish Defence University,
Box 27805, Stockholm 115 93, Sweden.
Email: charlotta.friednerparrat@fhs.se
1134959IPT0010.1177/17550882221134959Journal of International Political TheoryFriedner Parrat
research-article2022
Debate
222 Journal of International Political Theory 19(2)
distinction between a structural and an interpretivist strand of the School is overstated. In
addition, integration rather than division is characteristic of the English School, and also
a more fruitful strategy when it comes to advancing its particular research agendas, as
well as the study of international relations overall.
To put my discussion of the English School into context, I want to start this article
with a word on what the English School is not. It is not exclusively a history of thought.
Although the study of past thinkers and their approach to world issues is an important
and integral part of the School, its primary concern is with understanding world affairs,
current and historical. The ideas which it studies are therefore primarily those of the
practitioners of international politics, not those of the observers. Now, to some extent
these will necessarily overlap, and more so the further back in history we look, but the
distinction is nevertheless important to uphold in engaging with Bevir’s and Hall’s rather
far-reaching suggestions of how to refurbish the School. I take care to point this out, both
because Bevir and Hall have previously published extensively on the history of thought
(Bevir, 1999; Hall, 2012; Hall and Bevir, 2014); and because there are some indications
that those levels converge in their argument about the English School (Bevir and Hall,
2020b: 157–160).
To this, Bevir and Hall may want to reply that their hermeneutic approach to analysis
does not accept the separation of observer and observed (Finlayson, 2007: 548); and that
the suggestion of differentiating between the two levels is what actually marks a ‘mod-
ernist social science’. But it is a difference which has at least sometimes been upheld by
the authors themselves (Hall, 2017), and which is mainly upheld within the English
School. For instance, in the same special issue that Bevir and Hall edited, O’Hagan
makes clear the inherent differences in studying apples or oranges; or in studying states-
people or what thinkers and analysts have previously thought about statespeople: ‘This
article does not focus on the role of civilization at the level of the practices and utterances
of actors. Rather, it employs an interpretivist approach to explore how English School
scholars themselves engage with the concept of civilization to render the narrative of the
globalization of international society’ (O’Hagan, 2020: 204). Similarly, Jackson’s (2020)
contribution is a history of thought. Both of these articles focus on what previous genera-
tions of English School scholars have written, not on understanding dilemmas or tradi-
tions faced by practitioners (although Manning admittedly straddled the line, Jackson’s
critique clearly engages with Manning as a scholar). Navari’s (2020b: 257) contribution
is a more straight-forward intervention on how the English School works, or perhaps
should work, but still contains an important history of thought component, including the
dilemma Bull probably faced when moving from Australia and India back to the UK,
which led him to re-evaluate his views on international society.
The conflation of political analysis with history of thought affects Bevir’s and Hall’s
substantial arguments about the English School. First, their suggestion to replace what
the English School often calls ‘structures’ with traditions works for the history of thought
in the School, but not as easily for political analysis. This becomes clear when reading
some of Bevir’s and Hall’s previous work on international thought. ‘Traditions’, they
write, ‘live on, change, or die, in the minds of individuals’ (Hall and Bevir, 2014: 828)
Then, these individuals may encounter a dilemma, which forces them to ‘re-evaluate
their inherited beliefs’ (Hall and Bevir, 2014: 829) and change their minds. But this all
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