The English School

Dr. Ibrahim KoncakDepartment of International Relations

Introduction

• Emergence of English School• Methodology• International Society • International Society:

definition, properties, variations

• Types of international society

• International Society between system and world society

• Case Study: Human Rights protection in a divided world

• Conclusion• References

Contributors • Bull, H. (1977-1995), The Anarchical Society: A study of Order in Wolrd Politics • Bull, H, and Watson, A (1984), The Expansion of International Society • Butterfield, H. and Wight, M. (1966), Diplomatic Investigations: Essays in the Theory of

International Relations• Buzan, B (2004), From International to World Society• Clark, I. (2011) Hegemony in International Society • Hurrell, A. (2007), On Global Order: Power, Values and the Constitution of International

Society • Linklater, A. (2005), ‘The English School’ • Ralf, J. (2007), Defending the Society of States• Vincent, R. J. (1986), Human Rights in International Relations • Wheeler, N. J. (2000), Saving Strangers: Humanitarian Intervention in International Society

Introduction

• Occupies the middle ground in IR.• Offers a synthesis of different theories and concepts. • Avoids the explanatory vs. interpretive dichotomy. • Purports to offer an account of IR which combines theory

and history, morality and power, agency and structure.• Boundaries are unclear

Emergence of English School

• Martin Wight's lectures in 1950s.• The British Committee on the Theory of International Politics,

set up in January 1959, by Herbert Butterfield • Diplomatic Investigations Journal (1)Balance of power, international law, international society,

(2)cooperative states system, Systems of States, Evolution of International Society (3) European International Society,

After mid-1990s the school rekindled

Methodology• A classical approach redefined as interpretive methodology in Hedley Bull’s International

Theory: The Case for a Classical Approach. It derives from philosophy, history and law and relies upon the exercise of judgment.

I. The Subject matter of IR: body of general propositions about the ‘global political system vs. positivist pursuit of the formulation of ‘testable hypotheses’

II. The importance of historical understanding: It is insufficient to know facts, historical depth is needed. Historical context is important to understand.

III. There is no escape from values: values are important to select which topic to study, the pursuit of political influence was likely diminish the prospects of generating research.

IV. IR is fundamentally a normative enterprise: IR theorist doing normative inquiry needs to stay close to the state practice.

International Society • States form an international society (From International to World Society

(2004).• System, society and world society are ‘elements’ in Weber’s words ideal-types,

exist in world politics, can only be known through interpretive design.• Rather than ‘operationalizing’ concepts and formulating ‘testable’ hypotheses,

the emphasis upon contending concepts is driven by a search for defining properties which mark the boundaries of different historical and normative orders.

• “International society comes into being when group of states, conscious of certain common interests and common values, form a society in the sense that they conceive themselves bound by a common set of rules in their relations one another, and share in the working of common institutions (Bull, 1977,1995)”.

Elements of International Society

• Mutual recognition of sovereign member states to each other. Recognition is the first step in the construction of an international society.

• The history of the expansion of international society is a story of a shifting boundary of inclusion and exclusion. From 1843 to 1942 China was part of the state system but was not a member of international society. Why?

• States act through the medium of their representatives or office holders. • Diplomatic and foreign- policy elite are the real agents of international society. • Diplomatic culture; realm of ‘ideas and beliefs held in common by official

representatives of states’

Elements of International Society (cont)

• Sovereign states. • Multinational companies (MNCs).• International Nongovernmental Organizations (INGOs).• Intergovernmental Organizations (IGOs) • The element of mutual recognition is not a sufficient

condition for international society, the actors must have some minimal common interests such as trade, freedom of travel, or the need for stability.

Types of international society

• The maintenance of international order• Pluralist international society; pluralist rules and norms ‘provide a structure of

coexistence’. • Solidarist international society; the collective enforcement of international rules

and the guardianship of human rights.• Solidarism is an extension of international society, not its transformation. • There is a duty on the members of international society to intervene forcibly to

protect those rights though there is risk of undermining international order by enforcing human rights.

• After the post-Cold War period, emerged normative debate within the English School; a pluralist- solidarist divide.

International Society between system and world society

• System: an arena where there was interaction between communities but no shared rules or institutions (Bull, 1977,1995).

• System plays three important roles in the English school;I. The system-society distinction provides a normative benchmarkII. By looking at the formation of the system it is possible to discern

mechanisms which shape and shove int. and world societies. III. The category of the system can usefully be used to capture the basic

material forces in world politics (flows of information and trade, levels of destructive capability, capacities of actors to affect their environment).

International Society between system and world society

• Systemic interactions remain a possible future arrangement if the dominant actors in international society cease to comply with the rules and act in ways which determine the international security.

• Major nuclear confrontation may cause the society collapse back into system.

• General war and balance of power are two instances where the system impinges upon society.

World society • The third element in the English School triad is world society, it refers to shared

interests and values ‘linking all parts of the human community’ Bull,1977). • World society refers to human rights, indigenous people’s claim to autonomy, the

need of transnational corporations to penetrate the shell of the sovereign states, the claim to retrospective justice by those who speak on behalf of the former colonial powers.

• Human rights are the center of the classical English School’s conception of world politics.

• Indicators of evolving world society; International humanitarian law, justice, rights, and fundamental freedoms, universal norms of racial equality, the prohibition on torture, and the right to development.

Case Study: Human Rights protection in a divided world

• The extension and protection of human rights have been a source of division as a marker of the emergence of a solidarist international society.

• The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, December, 10, 1948. However, it took time to constrain the behavior of states.

• In 197s, a step-change occurred in the power of human rights regime; the growing legalization of human rights norms; the emergence of human rights international nongovernmental organizations; the increased priority to human rights in the foreign policies of key Western states.

• The Helsinki Final Act of 1975; respect for human rights, freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief.

Case Study: Human Rights protection in a divided world

• Though there had been considerable improvement, still Rwanda 1994, Srebrenica 1995 atrocities and genocide events occurred and international society was late or silent.

• The R2P framework; Canada sponsored International Committee on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS) worked out R2P ‘responsibility to protect’.

• The principle finding of ICISS was to develop the idea of ‘sovereignty as responsibility’ thereby shifting the language of human protection from the right of the intervener to the responsibility of the host state. What if host state cannot fulfill the responsibility?

• Four crimes of genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and the crime against humanity.

Conclusion

• The English School situates contemporary debates on world politics in longer historical perspective; system. international society, world society.

• It is more universal than West oriented as takes into consideration the different approaches of global organizations and regional ones towards norms and values.

• Reorientation of IR to ‘global IR’ vs. the power of the ‘hegemon’ (realism), the logic of capitalism as conflict (Marxism) and cooperation (liberalism) to explain world politics.

• Global order is reproduced through complex patterns of socialization and resistance.

References

• Tim Dunne, Milja Kurki, Steve Smith(2016), The English School,International Relations Theories: Discipline and Diversity (Third edition), Pages: 107-126

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JC27GMQoM08• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEUNzAKZuxQ• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3WJZND3z8M