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285 Pages·2020·1.706 MB·English
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The Closure of the International System How Institutions Create Political Equalities and Hierarchies cambridge studies in international relations Lora Anne Viola The Closure of the International System As global governance appears to become more inclusive and demo- cratic, many scholars argue that international institutions act as motors of expansion and democratization. The Closure of the International System challenges this view, arguing that the history of the international system is a series of institutional closures, in which institutions such as diplomacy, international law, and international organizations make rules to legitimate the inclusion of some actors and the exclusion of others. While international institutions facilitate collective action and common goods, Viola’s closure thesis demonstrates how these gains are achieved by limiting access to rights and resources, creating a stratified system of political equals and unequals. The coexistence of equality and hierarchy is a constitutive feature of the international system and its institutions. This tension is relevant today as multilateral institutions are challenged by disaffected citizens, non-Western powers, and established great pow- ers discontent with the distribution of political rights and authority. lora anne viola is a professor of Political Science, researching and teaching on international organizations, international relations theory, and US foreign policy. She is co-editor of Historical Institutionalism and International Relations (Oxford University Press, 2016). She is a recipi- ent of the American Political Science Association’s Alexander L. George Article Award, as well as research funding from the German National Science Foundation. Cambridge Studies in International Relations: 153 The Closure of the International System editors Evelyn Goh Christian Reus-Smit Nicholas J. Wheeler editorial board Jacqueline Best, Karin Fierke, William Grimes, Yuen Foong Khong, Andrew Kydd, Lily Ling, Andrew Linklater, Nicola Phillips, Elizabeth Shakman Hurd, Jacquie True, Leslie Vinjamuri, Alexander Wendt Cambridge Studies in International Relations is a joint initiative of Cam bridge University Press and the British International Studies Association (BISA). The series aims to publish the best new scholarship in international studies, irrespective of subject matter, methodological approach or theoretical per- spective. The series seeks to bring the latest theoretical work in International Relations to bear on the most important problems and issues in global politics. 153 Lora Anne Viola The Closure of the International System How Institutions Create Political Equalities and Hierarchies 152 Cecelia Lynch Wrestling with God Ethical Precarity in Christianity and International Relations 151 Brent J. Steele Restraint in International Politics 150 Emanuel Adler World Ordering A Social Theory of Cognitive Evolution 149 Brian C. Rathbun Reasoning of State Realists and Romantics in International Relations 148 Silviya Lechner and Mervyn Frost Practice Theory and International Relations Series list continues after index The Closure of the International System How Institutions Create Political Equalities and Hierarchies Lora Anne Viola Free University of Berlin University Printing House, Cambridge CB2 8BS, United Kingdom One Liberty Plaza, 20th Floor, New York, NY 10006, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia 314–321, 3rd Floor, Plot 3, Splendor Forum, Jasola District Centre, New Delhi – 110025, India 79 Anson Road, #06-04/06, Singapore 079906 Cambridge University Press is part of the University of Cambridge. It furthers the University’s mission by disseminating knowledge in the pursuit of education, learning, and research at the highest international levels of excellence. www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781108482257 DOI: 10.1017/9781108612562 © Lora Anne Viola 2020 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 2020 A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Viola, Lora Anne, author. Title: The closure of the international system : how institutions create political equalities and hierarchies / Lora Anne Viola. Description: Cambridge ; New York, NY : Cambridge University Press, 2020. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2019053234 | ISBN 9781108482257 (hardback) | ISBN 9781108711760 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: International agencies--Decision making. | International organization--Decision making. | Equality of states. | Sovereignty. Classification: LCC JZ4850 .V56 2020 | DDC 341.2--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019053234 ISBN 978-1-108-48225-7 Hardback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. For Rosemarie and Tullio Viola Contents Acknowledgments page viii 1 False Promises of Universalism: The Interdependent Logics of Equality and Inequality in the International System 1 2 The Closure Thesis: Social Closure, Club Dynamics, and Stratification in the International System 42 3 “The Master Institution”: Diplomacy, Practices of Closure, and the Emergence of an International System in Early Modern Europe 88 4 “Dwarves and Giants”: International Law, Sovereign Equality, and the Monopolization of Sovereign Rights 119 5 “In Larger Freedom”: International Organizations between Sovereign Equality and Inequality 163 6 What Remains of the Promise of Equality? 220 References 237 Index 269 vii Acknowledgments Although it was not planned that way, I believe this is an auspicious moment to be publishing this book. Its appearance coincides with a lively new scholarly debate about hierarchy and inequality in international relations, at a time when the post–Cold War enthusiasm for the liberal international order is being questioned and with an academic environment that seems to have permanently moved beyond the paradigm wars that were still dominant a decade ago. Even more, rising powers and populism are pushing questions of who belongs, and with what rights, to the center of the international political debate. I see this book as fundamentally addressing questions of political rights, and I conceive of it as being in dialogue with the many excellent studies on international hierarchy and those reconsiderations of the liberal international order that have been published in the last few years. The graphic on the cover of this book, an artistic depiction by Dierk Schmidt from his research project “The division of the earth: tableaux on the legal synopses of the Berlin Africa conference,” is an evocative contribution to these themes because it asks how geo-politics can be represented in images that communicate legal- institutional exclusion as a historical product of the West’s political and aesthetic modernity. In writing this book, I have incurred a double debt – to those who helped me develop its first iteration and to those who contributed to my thinking when I decided to pick it up again. And, of course, to those who have been by my side throughout. My sincere thanks go to my intellectual mentors at Columbia University and the University of Chicago, whose training launched me on the path of research, writ- ing, and critical thinking. In particular, Alex Wendt, Duncan Snidal, and Carles Boix each contributed immensely to my own intellectual development, and this project has something of each of them in it. I am especially grateful for Duncan Snidal’s friendship, support, and incisive reasoning, which has come in so many forms and at so many viii Acknowledgments ix different points in my career. Duncan continues to be my exemplar of how to be a scholar-mentor. This book, in many ways, bears the imprint of the University of Chicago. My fellow graduate students in the University of Chicago political science department, and especially the culture of PISP (Program on International Security Policy) and PIPES (Program on International Politics, Economics, and Security), provided an incred- ibly stimulating intellectual environment. For their generous moral support, companionship, and ideas in what were formative years, I particularly thank Jonathan Caverley, Todd Hall, Anne Harrington, Anne Holthoefer, Jenna Jordan, Mara Marin, Valerie Morkevicius, Michelle Murray, Sebastian Rosato, Keven Ruby, John Schuessler, Milan Svolik, and Joel Westra. I want to especially thank Mara for her friendship. From Chicago I moved across the ocean, and I owe a large debt of gratitude to Michael Zürn, who invited me to Berlin in the first place and who has opened many opportunities to me ever since. He provided me with material and institutional support, excellent advice, and useful feedback, and he gave me an intellectual home at the Berlin Social Science Center (WZB). My time at the WZB was the begin- ning of many friendships and fruitful collaborations; in particular, I want to thank Martin Binder, Matthias Ecker-Ehrhardt, Anna Holzscheiter, and Thomas Rixen. My stay at the European University Institute (EIU) in Fiesole as a Jean Monnet Fellow was critical for beginning to rethink this project. For this opportunity, for his support, and also for many sharp and witty conversations, I thank Philipp Genschel. I thank Brigid Laffan for the institutional resources she provided during my stay – and for giving me what was probably the best office I will ever sit in, an office with a door to an enchanted garden. My time at the EUI was so productive because of the friendships and stimulating discussions with many people, but especially with Tobias Lenz and Konstantin Vössing. Our conversations spurred me on in this and other projects. Along the way I have received invaluable feedback and sup- port from many other colleagues, many also interested in inequal- ity and stratification, including Christopher Daase, Caroline Fehl, Orfeo Fioretos, Katja Freistein, Alexandru Grigorescu, Eddie Keene, Barbara Koremenos, Dirk Peters, Thomas Risse, Jonas Tallberg, Alexander Thompson, and Bernhard Zangl. I thank Vincent Pouliot

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