Kant’s domestic analogy: international and global order
| Published date | 01 June 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/13540661221133976 |
| Author | Regan Burles |
| Date | 01 June 2023 |
https://doi.org/10.1177/13540661221133976
European Journal of
International Relations
2023, Vol. 29(2) 501 –522
© The Author(s) 2022
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/13540661221133976
journals.sagepub.com/home/ejt
E
JR
I
Kant’s domestic analogy:
international and global
order
Regan Burles
Queen Mary University of London, UK
Abstract
The domestic analogy is an old but persistent problem in theories of international
politics. This paper examines the problem in the work of Immanuel Kant, whose political
writings are often cited as a paradigmatic example of the analogy between individuals
and states. Attention to Kant’s own conception of analogy, however, shows that the
political writings are structured by another “domestic analogy”—between international
and cosmopolitan right. This analogy, I argue, is based on a correspondence between
the systematic unity of the international and the spherical globe, the figure that for Kant
represents the boundaries of world order. International and cosmopolitan right are thus
distinguished on the basis of a geopolitical criterion: the global scope of international
order. This analogy of order, the paper argues, thus works to domesticate world politics
through the structural form of international order. To the extent that contemporary
theories of international relations rely on this conception of order, they accept Kant’s
answer to the problem of perpetual peace. The paper concludes by drawing broader
conclusions from the analysis about the domestic analogy, international order, and
world politics.
Keywords
Domestic analogy, Immanuel Kant, international order, international system,
cosmopolitanism, globe
The relationship between international and world order is being reconsidered across the
human sciences in the context of ongoing patterns of violence and inequality and mas-
sive changes to earth systems linked to political and economic globalization. My analysis
looks at one early and influential account of this relationship—Kant’s ideas about
Corresponding author:
Regan Burles, Queen Mary University of London, London E1 4NS, UK.
Email: regan.burles@qmul.ac.uk
1133976EJT0010.1177/13540661221133976European Journal of International RelationsBurles
research-article2022
Article
502 European Journal of International Relations 29(2)
international and cosmopolitan right—through the problem of the domestic analogy.
Kant’s theory of international politics is commonly read as a paradigmatic example of
the domestic analogy, that is, the analogy between individuals in a pre-civil condition
and states in an international system. On this model, the international system represents
the problem of disorder to which cosmopolitan or global unity based on domestic institu-
tions is the answer. Kant’s writings are ambivalent, however, about whether states and
individuals can be considered analogous. Moreover, commentaries on Kant rarely con-
sider Kant’s own conception of analogy or his claim in Perpetual Peace that cosmopoli-
tan right can be understood by analogy with international right. Doing so, I argue, shows
that Kant’s political thought is characterized not only by an analogy between individuals
in a “state of nature” and states in an international system—but also by an analogy
between international order, which Kant conceives as a system, and the globe, which
Kant theorizes through the figure of the sphere. The analogous form of order displayed
by both systematic unity and the figure of the spherical globe—a reciprocal relation
between parts and whole—suggests a new formulation of the problem of the domestic
analogy in Kant’s political thought.
This reformulation is consequential for debates on international relations and world
politics today in several respects. First, the analogy between international and global
order suggests that for Kant an international system of states is an answer to rather than
an expression of the problem of the domestic analogy conventionally understood. The
unity represented by the European system of states is for Kant the start of the historical
development of a civil condition among states that will gradually encompass the whole
earth. This analogy thus suggests, second, that international and cosmopolitan right are
differentiated on the basis of a geopolitical criterion: the global scope of international
order. Together, this means that a global international system—the starting point for the-
ories of international politics today—is the telos of Kant’s developmental, universalising
philosophy of history. For Kant, cosmopolitan political unity in the form of a global
international system is the ultimate end of nature and of human political organization on
earth. Kant’s analogy between international and cosmopolitan right thus indicates a
domestication of world politics through the structural form of international order.
This has several implications for present-day debates on world order. First, it helps
explain the ambivalences in Kant’s own work and the numerous commentaries on the
domestic analogy in Kant’s political thought. The analogical relationship between sys-
tematic unity and the sphere shows how both the analogy between individuals and states
and international and cosmopolitan right are part of a single universalizing philosophy of
history that culminates in a global international system. This means that approaches that
contrast a global or cosmopolitan order with an international one are unlikely guides for
the future development of alternative forms of world politics, given the analogical rela-
tion between them in Kant’s work. Second, it suggests that critical engagement with
Kant’s political thought requires greater analytical attention to the form of global order
and unity that for Kant determines the boundaries of human political organization on
earth. This is a geometrical ideal of order given in the figure of the sphere, approximated
in the idea of systematic unity, and shared by a range of theories of international order
that are otherwise at odds. Contesting the terrain on which these debates play out thus
entails addressing the geopolitical dimensions of contemporary international relations,
To continue reading
Request your trial