Sovereign myths in international relations: Sovereignty as equality and the reproduction of Eurocentric blindness
| Author | Xavier Mathieu |
| DOI | 10.1177/1755088218814072 |
| Date | 01 October 2020 |
| Published date | 01 October 2020 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1755088218814072
Journal of International Political Theory
2020, Vol. 16(3) 339 –360
© The Author(s) 2018
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DOI: 10.1177/1755088218814072
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Sovereign myths in
international relations:
Sovereignty as equality and
the reproduction of
Eurocentric blindness
Xavier Mathieu
Aston University, UK
Abstract
The concept of sovereignty still generates a considerable amount of debate in the
discipline of International Relations. Using myth as a heuristic device, I argue that part of
this confusion results from a mythical understanding of ‘sovereignty as equality’. Following
the myth, sovereignty is seen as playing an equalising role in international relations, while
international inequalities are depicted as existing despite the norm of sovereignty (and not
as a result of it). The myth of sovereignty as equality thus enables international relations
scholars to separate the inequalities instituted and legitimised by sovereignty from the
concept itself. As a consequence, sovereignty is considered as normatively desirable since
it is the best tool to offset inequalities. This article argues that the myth rests on three
interlinked building blocks and that its maintenance can be explained by its normative
appeal (more than by its dubious analytical value). Indeed, even those scholars who
reproduce the myth acknowledge that international relations do not conform to it. As
such, an effective critique of sovereignty requires both factual disproval (to reveal what
the myth contributes to hide) and the construction of an alternative, more desirable myth.
Keywords
Equality, Eurocentrism, international relations theory, myth, sovereignty
Introduction
The discipline of international relations (henceforth IR) is characterised by a constant dis-
satisfaction with one of its central concepts: sovereignty. In his history of the discipline,
Corresponding author:
Xavier Mathieu, Aston University, Aston Triangle, Birmingham B4 7ET, UK.
Email: x.mathieu@aston.ac.uk
814072IPT0010.1177/1755088218814072Journal of International Political TheoryMathieu
research-article2018
Article
340 Journal of International Political Theory 16(3)
Schmidt has shown that the discourse of anarchy that was central to the development of IR
is intertwined with a discourse of sovereignty, and therefore with debates around the pre-
cise meaning and implications of the concept of sovereignty. As he observes,
The recent attention that scholars have begun to direct toward the elusive concept of sovereignty
is an indication of the fundamental importance that this principle continues to have for the study
of international relations. The disciplinary history of international relations clearly reveals that
the discourse about sovereignty was really what animated the political discourse of anarchy.
(Schmidt, 1998: 240–241)
Interrogations about sovereignty and its meaning have thus been a central topic for IR since
its inception. The supposedly recent ‘return’ to debates about sovereignty in IR scholarship
is therefore only the last occurrence of a long-term concern in the discipline.1
For a majority of scholars, such dissatisfaction with sovereignty – reflected in the
extensive literature being written on the concept – emerges from the fact that sovereignty
is intrinsically complex. In 1948, Morgenthau (1973 (1948): 315) was already noticing
that ‘despite the brilliant efforts of a few outstanding scholars, there is much confusion
about the meaning of the term, and about what is and what is not compatible with the
sovereignty of a particular nation’. Providing a definition of the concept is widely
acknowledged to be an elusive task: the evolution of sovereignty since ‘its first recorded
usage in the thirteenth century renders quixotic the attempt to find a single, specific, his-
torically valid formulation’ (Philpott, 2001a: 16). History is thus seen as an obstacle for a
concept ‘arrived at over centuries of experience, and reflecting the complex situation in
which nations currently function in the world order’ (Heller and Sofaer, 2001: 24).
Definitions also escape scholars because of the number of subjects sovereignty relates to
(Fowler and Bunck, 1996: 400; James, 1986: 2–3). The result is ‘a substantial intellectual
quagmire’ (James, 1986: 3): sovereignty is seen as an ‘ill-defined and amorphous notion’
(Helman and Ratner, 1993: 9) and ‘extremely, and perhaps purposefully, misleading’
(Jackson, 2003: 788).2 This assessment is still widely shared by IR scholars: for Kalmo
and Skinner (2010) ‘Pointing out, or deploring, the ambiguity of the idea has itself become
a recurring motif in the literature on sovereignty’ (2010: 1). Recently, debates about the
Responsibility to Protect and its relation to sovereignty have provided another example:
scholars have extensively discussed what is or is not compatible with sovereignty (see, for
example: Glanville, 2014; Lafont, 2015; Luck, 2009; Moses, 2014), a conversation that
seems to re-enact the ‘human rights versus sovereignty’ debates (Barkin, 1998; Chopra
and Weiss, 1992; Krasner, 1999; Reus-Smit, 2001; Thompson, 2006). In all these discus-
sions, sovereignty is regularly identified as the main issue to be clarified.
As an answer to some of the intellectual puzzles surrounding sovereignty, this article
argues that, contrary to a common perception, the concept itself is not to blame. Instead, it
is the myths constructed around and about sovereignty that lead to the difficulties faced by
a large number of IR scholars. The concept of sovereignty is indeed understood as provid-
ing an equal, unbiased and culturally neutral access to the same status to all the states which
fulfil some supposedly universal standards. This means that sovereignty is seen as playing
an equalising role in international relations because it does not discriminate between states
based on culturally specific values. Sovereignty is therefore not entrenching inequalities
between states; in fact, or so the myth argues, inequalities (and differences) between states
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