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Commonsense and the Theory of International Politics PDF

163 Pages·1984·14.992 MB·English
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COMMONSENSE AND THE THEORY OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS By the same author THE DEFENCE OF WESTERN EUROPE (editor) THEORIES OF PEACE AND SECURITY (editor) CONTEMPORARY STRATEGY Uoint author) COMMONSENSE AND THE THEORY OF INTERNATIONAL POLITICS John C. Garnett Woodrow Wilson Professor of International Politics University of Wales ~ MACMilLAN © John C. Garnett 1984 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London WIP 9HE. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. First published 1984 by MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world ISBN 978-0-333-35131-4 ISBN 978-1-349-17504-8 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-17504-8 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 04 03 02 01 00 99 98 97 96 To Margaret Contents Acknowledgements Vlll Introduction IX 'Classical' and 'Scientific' Theory 2 General and Partial Theories 27 3 Theory and Practice 51 4 Normative Theory 76 5 Facts, Values and Concepts 102 6 The University Teaching of International Politics 128 Index 148 VII Acknowledgements My thoughts about the theory of international politics have been influenced and shaped by more scholars, teachers and students than I can remember. But I am particularly grateful to those teachers at the London School of Economics in the late 1950s who first stimulated my interest in theoretical questions. What follows is of course, my responsi bility, not theirs, a result of intermittent reflections on the subject over many years. In the preparation of the manuscript I could not have managed without the research assistance of my colleague .Jane Davis, whose grasp of the apparatus of scholarship saved me from all kinds ofblunders. Both to her and my secretary Doreen Hamer, who uncomplainingly typed various drafts, I offer my sincere thanks. Vlll Introduction This is intended to be a simple book dealing with a complicated subject, but it is not a textbook and it cannot be regarded as an introduction. If it has any appeal at all it will be to those university students who already know a little bit about international politics and who, having grappled with the theoretical literature, have been bewildered by it. What it offers, I hope, is a measure of commonsense about a subject which in recent years has become complicated and esoteric. In a sense, it is an old-fashioned book. It contains nothing of topical interest; it makes no attempt to push forward the frontiers of knowledge, and it reveals no new facts or insights about our current predicament. Indeed, it contains hardly any facts at all, and the reader who wants to improve his data base is wasting his time with these pages. Since the post-war explosion of scholarly interest in international politics, no student can digest even a fragment of the information which already packs the library shelves of university departments of international politics. I am sure that many academics must share the feeling of despair which creeps over me whenever I look at the 'new acquisitions' list. I see no point at all in adding to the problem of indigestion by writing yet another book crammed with contemporary detail. International politics is not a cumulative subject in which the latest book makes all the others obsolete. Indeed, speaking personally, the more I see of the new books, the more I value the old ones. The assumption underlying these pages is that our understanding of international politics is more likely to be improved by reflecting upon and reworking what we already know about the subject, than by topping up our knowledge with either more detailed research or more con temporary analysis. Usually, when professors put pen to paper, they write with confi dence and authority. Not unreasonably, their readers expect them to know what they are talking about. But in writing almost every one of these pages I have been acutely aware of my inadequacies and lack of qualifications. I am not a historian and yet I have ventured into historiography; I am not a philosopher, and yet I have not hesitated to IX X Introduction dabble in philosophical areas where cleverer men than I have feared to tread. I know that I have been operating at the very edge-perhaps, my critics will say, beyond the edge - of my academic competence. My defence is that the field of international politics is parasitic on so many academic disciplines that professional competence in all of them is impossible. A reasonable acquaintance with the relevant aspects of the underpinning disciplines of economics, history, law, philosophy, politi cal science, etc., is the best that a student of international politics can hope for. And so I hope that specialist colleagues in those areas into which I have so recklessly blundered will forgive my ignorance. Each of the following chapters deals with a different aspect of international theory, and each is reasonably self-contained in the sense that it should make sense to someone who has not read those which lead up to it. But the chapters are linked, not only in the sense that one builds up another, but also in the sense that the book as a whole represents an internally consistent view of the subject. I would not want to claim that it represents a distinctive approach to international relations theory, but a discerning reader may become aware of certain unifying threads running through and linking all of the chapters. They have all been written out of a conviction that explanation and not prescription is the only proper role of the political scientist; they all emphasize the importance oflanguage in political analysis, and they all reflect my scepticism about the 'scientific' nature of international politics. J.C.G.

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