Linker, Andrew tor) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume I. Florence, KY, USA: Rouledg, 2000. p 1655. pets ebrary conlibebranyanddbd Doc? t=20024644 page411 65 “TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN” Anti-foundationalism, critical theory and international relations* Chris Brown! From Afienin 2502) (1998 pp. 213-286 ‘Once upon a time, intemationat relations theory or ~ “international theory” ~ ‘was rogarded by its exponents as a mode of discourse separated from the wider realm of social and political thought by virtue of its distinctive subject matter, the relations of sovereign states, and the, allegedly, a-temporal nature of the ‘generalisations it produced. In the words of Martin Wight, “fijetemational polities is the real of recurrence and ropetition...”” a terrain where the pro- ‘gressivist assumptions so important to other modes of social thought have no purchase." However, in the last two decades ot 50, this approach to internation- al relations theory has been effectively undermined. A number of scholars of international relations have consciously approached the problem of theory with a view to breaking dowa the fences that previously hemmed in the subject. while, from the other side of the bartier, a number of political theorists have addres- sed topics which previously would have been thought of as falling within the remit of “intemational” theory. it no longer makes much sense to ask whether scholars such as Brian Barry, Charles Beitz, Mervyn Frost, Onora O'Neill, Terry Nardin and Michacl Walzer arc political theorists, social theorists or international relations theorists ~ they are clearly addressing the same the ‘Thanks fer comments and inspiration to Molly Cochran Richard Disney, Mark Hoftian, Nick Rengge, Tisja Vayrynen and an anonymous referee, und to Brian Barty for teling me aboot the astern sage who, hen sake (or hs cosmlogy, elle. “The world rests on gant wre". Ou wat doce ti ute ses? On aaother tude. And that turtle? is trles all the way down". "chris trove is Prefessorof Polis tre Univers of Southampton, Hh Souhangton, S08 SNe 1655Linklater, Andrew itor) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume I. apitinteebrary.comiibebraryandled Doc? el-2002464page™412 ‘Florence, KY. USA: Routledge, 2000p 1656 CRITICAL CONCEPTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE IV rest is biography”. International relations theory is no longer confined to its own, self-imposed, ghetto, ‘But all is not as it should be. As international relations theorists break down the walls of the ghetto —helped by their fiends on the other side ~ and stream into the metropotis of social and political thought, expecting to merge into the life of the city and help shape its future, x disconcerting sight meets theic eyes. Some of the most distinguished residents ofthe city have fled, or turned their talents to attacking their previous home inthe company of straigers from other civies and other countries, while other notables have found themselves forced to defend postions thought unassailable for two and a half millennia. In short, we ~ ‘one-time international relations theorists ~ have joined a city under siege and riven by civil war. Moreover, neutrality is no longer possible: sides must be chosen and positions staked out, especially since “international relations” is one of the major artlegrounds chosen by the insurgents. ‘The insurgents and besigers assign to themselves a variety of labels such as “ertical theory” (and “Critical Theory”), “post-structuralism”,“intetextual- iy” and “post-modernism, and one ofthe most confusing aspects ofthe current siwation is the way in which both adherents and opponents of the now leam- ing sometimes use these terms as synonyms, but sometimes — and T think cor- recily ~ make crucial distinctions between them. A lirst step in making sense of all this is to sort out this terminology and, since there is no universally accepted way of doing this, itis necessary to be stipulative. 1 propose to adopt here the following, two-stage, approach. Fist, it seems to me that a common feature of the new approaches is the belief that all the varieties of social and political thought dominant in the West since the Eolightenment~ the discourses ‘of modemity, pethaps ~ ae in evsis: “eritical theory” is used here as a gener term for all approaches which share this belief. “There are, however, a number of ways in which to cope with the ctsis of modem thought, indeed « number of ways to define this crisis, and it is here, at this second stage, that distinctions are necessary between Critical Theory (uppercase “Cand “T”) and post-modernism, between “intertextuaity” and “dialogism’” and so on. Such distinctions are necessary ~ rather than simply useful = because these various modes of discourse (theory here is a question- begging term) represent radically different, indeed contradictory, approaches 19 the crisis. One aspires to Critical Theory precisely in order to avoid the traps ‘of post-modernism; conversely, post-modernism is a response t0 the failure of Critical Theor. Its not possible tobe a Critical Theorist and a post-modernist ~ although, using my initial definition, post modemists are critical theorists It follows from these definitions that the examination of critical theory and international relations | propose to make here ought also to be conducted in two stages. First, Twill examine the crisis to which ertical theory is the response:! will then look at a selection ofthe diferent variants of critical theory, chosen in order to give a cense of the wide range of responses available, International relations will be one facus of this work but, in keeping withthe outof-the-ghetto 1656gee ebrary.conlibcbraryanddbd’Doc?id=200216 page 413 Linklater, Andrew Bilitor) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Vole IV. Florence, KY, USA: Routledge, 2000p 1657. “TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN mentality celebrated above. I will not exclude consideration of interesting work simply because it has, as yet, no obvious “intemationat” dimension, nor will 1 include work which seems to me not to be of great substance simply because its Proponents have identified such a dimension ~ thus. to make a polemical point early on and nail atleast a pair of colours o the mast, Richard Rorty is discussed (because | view his work as of great suhstance, even though he has na overt international agenda) while Paul Virlio is not (because I do not regard his work as being of real significance, even though he does address topies with an overtly international angle). However, this isto jump the gun: frst, What is the nature of the “crisis? What erisis? Perhaps the simplest stating point is to conduct a series of “before and after” comparisons, examining the ways in which thinkers of different periods have set ‘up their positions. For example, when, towards the end of the eighteenth century, Kant inquired into the nature of moral judgement, he claimed to find an adequate response to the scepticism of David Hume in the notion of the “categorical imperative”: the moral law is embedded in the minds of all rational beings, its content is universal and unavoidable. But modes Kantian such ax fohn Rawls is forced ~ with some discomfort ~ to be a modem Humean at the same time because he ean find no such foundation for his theory of justice; instead he tases Hume's description of a “theory of moral sentiments” (my emphasis) to describe his work.* A few years after Kant, Hegel rejected the idea of a univer- sal rationality and morality, historicising these notions, and instead told the story of the emergeace of the modern, ethical, rational state and the subjective- ly free private individual in terms of the coming to self-knowledge of Geist. ‘Modern Hegetians such as John Charvet and Mervyn Frost el asin development, but in an explicitly secularised, demiythologised version, because the notion of self-realising spirit can no longer be expressed in terms that make sense, Or, finally and moving away from named individuals, consider the different connotations of the term “‘science” in the 1890s and the 1990s. Then, the difference between scientitic and other knowledge was clear. Science emerged out of a correspondence between theory, observation and realty; all the rest was superstition. Now, under the influence of Kubn and others we can no longer distinguish between theory and observation with any degree of confidence, and, thus. the distinction between science and pseudo-science is hotly contested. What is common to each of these examples is the disappearance of the srowids of knowledge. Modem thought scems to be inherently “anti foundationalist”. The “before” thinkers specified above believed that their work ‘was groundable in certain knowledge; the “after” thinkers know that this is not §0. Does this matter? Perhaps not. Many thinkers seem perfectly happy to carry on as before, the ungrounded nature of their thought not causing them to 1657tg ebrary.comlibiebraryanddbdDacid-2002464&page $14 Linklater, Andrew Editor) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume 1. Florence, KY, USA: Rouledge, 2000p 1638 CRITICAL CONCEPTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE IV hhave more than the occasional twinge of concem that there is nothing beneath their feet, A critical theorist would say that such thinkers are like those cartoon characters whose momentum allows them to run off cliffiops and walk om ai but who fall the moment they become conscious of their situation, Possibly uncencemed non-foundationalists remain unwortied because of theit faith in the power of reason and rationality to operate even when ungrounded, But here another dimension of the crisis comes into focus ~ reason itself, as conventionally understood, seems under threat. There are several issues involved. In part, the point is politcal; in the twentieth century the instrumental rationality of the West has so often found itself at the service of dubious causes that it has become itself politically suspect. And, in epistemological terms, one cof the most commion features of twentieth century thought is the view that rationality means different things in different contexts that reason can only operate within Kubnian “paradigms”, or Foucauldian “grids” or Gadamerian “horizon, However, in order to be worried about reason and rationality it is not necessary to subscribe to any of these critiques. The fundamental point was expressed best by the judicious Max Weber at the conclusion of his The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism? He describes there the way in ‘which the freely chosen, rational “worldly asceticism” of the Puritan which was once a liberating force, has now created a world in which all are bound by ties every bit as restricting as those of the world that we have lost. The concern for external goods which fuelled this universal “rationalisation” was, for the Paritan saint, alight cloak that could be thrown aside at any rioment. “But fate decreed that the cloak should become an iron cage”.* The new oppressor is that which thas liberated us from the old oppression — a familiar enough story. Modern western rationality has created 2 disenchanted wortd, ‘Weber's thought was deeply influenced by the work of Nietzsche, and in the ‘writings ofthis great thinker many of the themes of the contemporary erisis and of the critical theory it has produced ean be discerned. Nietzsche's stress on the deep, but largely unrecognised, significance of the “death of God” prefigures twentieth century anti-toundationalism. His perspectivistaltemative to episte- mology anticipates much of the radical philosophy of science of this century — “... physies too is only an interpretation and arrangement of the world ... and not an explanation of the world”.” And, perhaps most of al, the story of the Last Men in Zarathustra’s Prologue is the most devasting account in literature of the impoverished world created by an excessive dependence on the supposedly liberating force of rationality. ‘The earth tas become small and upon it hops the Last Man who makes, ‘everything small... “We have discovered happiness” say the Last Mew and Dlink... They stil work, for work is entertainment. But they tnke eare the ‘eterisinment does not exhaust them.... Who stil wants to rule? Who obey? Both are 100 much of a bunen, No Hesdsman and one herd. Bveryone wants the 1658Linklater, Andrew (Stor) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume IY. ight ebrary.comlibiebraryandbd/Dac*id-2002464&page~$15 Florence, KY, USA: Routledge, 2000p 1653. “TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN” same thing, everyone isthe sume: whoever thinks otherwise goes voluntarily ito the madhonse.* ‘What comes most clearly out of Nietzsche's writings is that the crisis in thought that his work identifies constitutes a genuine danger. Unless we have a response to the crisis, unless we are able to bring about a transvatuation of all values, the collapse of the foundations of the old warld order~ in shorthand, the death of God will lead to the destruction of everything worthwhile. A similar thought is expressed, less clearly, in an essay of Heidegger's, The Question Concerning Technology, in which he sees modern technology. broadly defined, taming everything, including human beings, into tools, set up as a “standing reserve" to be used where appropriate ~ the human subject disappearing in the process.” It is important to stress the sense of danger that modern critical thoorists have inherited from these thinkers, because many of the turn taken by critical thought can only be understood in the context of this fear. Critics of critical theory who regard ideas such as intertextuaity and deconstruetfon as itresponsibly silly games played for their ow sake, or who face critical theotists, ‘with the charge of irrationality or relativism may well have a point, but the force of the eritique is lessened dramatically if, as is sometimes the ease, the critic seems blissfully unaware of the deep sense of foreboding that underpins the best of this work." It may be that there are better way’ to resist the coming of the Last Men than by (some versions of) eritical theory, but that there is « real danger here which requires a radical response ought not to be denied. ‘Assume, forthe sake of argument, that modem Wester thought is in etisis, ‘and assume that this crisis is not going to disappear if ignored, that some sort of specific response is called for other than a simple reassertion of the old values of the Enlightenment project. What kind of response? It seems to me to be helpful to identify a number of distinctive approaches, which form two sets, ‘The first set pits reconstruction against deconstruction; reconstructors attempt to build new foundations for thought, deconstructors glory in the free play of non-foundationalist thought. These are two extreme responses, and I will argoe ‘below that neither is satisfactory. The approaches within the second set are less opposed in theory but equally opposed in (political and social) practice. Relativism, genealogy, » stress on difference and otherness are features common to writers such as Connolly, Bakitin, Foucault, Sylvester and Rorty, and yet they ‘make of these themes quite sharply different packages of ideas, f will argue that itis out of these packages that a viable critical theory can, perhaps, be found, ‘Building new foundations ‘The most important attempt to overcome the crisis of twentieth century thought by an effort of reconstruction is to be found in Critical Theory, by which term is specifically meant the work of the Frankfurt School (based on that University’s inter-war Institute for Social Research) and its most important moder 1659Linker, Aven (Bidwr), INTERNATIONAL. RELATIONS Volume TY, Florence KY. USA: Reuedge, 2000. 1660. 200246Hepage416 intp tse ebrary.com/tbtebraryandibd Doc? CRITICAL CONCEPTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE IV representative, Jurgen Habermas."' Critical Theory is located at the point at which the nineteenth century project of human liberation — based on Enlightenment notions of the power of reason and Post-Enlightenment ideas about the trajectory of human history — comes up against the twentieth century critique of rationality and progress. The classic Frankfort text, Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer’s Dialectic of Enlightenment, is @ root and branch attack ‘on the doctrine of progress and the supposedly liberating effects of science end tationafity, culminating in an attack on advertising and the “culture industry” which has made enlightenment a matter of mass deception."? This profoundly pessimistic work ~ written in 1944 when the Institute was in exile in the United States ~ is a key text in defining the crisis in twenticth century thought and represents an abandonment of the older project of liberation by thinkers whose ‘own intellectual formation was firmly placed within that project ‘The work of Habermas, a Frankfurt alumnus and the leading Critical Theorist of the last quarter century, is explicitly designed to recover this project of Fiberation, albeit without the Marxism that the original Critical Theorists took to beat its heart. For the most part, “early” and “middle” Habermas developed his Critical Theory in opposition to the positivist notions of science and rational- ity attacked by Adorno and Horkheimer, but also in opposition t0 the noo- emancipatory hermeneutics of, for example, Hans-Georg Gadamer."? His aim was to create a basis for knowiedge which is neither positivist nor a-potitically hermeneutic, and he approached this task by distinguishing different “knowl- edge-constitutive interests” which develop out of different aspects of human society. The interaction between society and its material environment develops ‘an interest in prediction and control, met by the positivist empirical amalytical sciences, Human beings communicate with one another in ways which cannot be inderstood by these sciences, and this generates an interest in the historical hermeneutic sciences. But on top of these two familiar categories Habermas goes on to write of Critical Theory ~ this emerges out of society seen as the site of power and domination, which generates an imerest in freedom, emanci- pation from domination, and the achievement of rational autonomy. The two pre- vious knowledge-constitutive interests ereate sciences which are subject to the critiques of Dialectic of Enlightenment, but there is a third interest, an interest in liberation, which creates another kind of science. Critical Theory, and this science is not simply 2 new form of oppression. It has been possible to present this complex material quite swiftly because, for the purposes of this essay, what is significant is not so much the argument that Habermas offers but the foundations upon which it is constructed. “Late” Habermas addresses this topic explicitly. Habermas wants to argue that notion of Critical Theory is rationally defensible, Critical Theory is constituted by an interest in emancipation but this cannot mean that any theory that promotes emancipation is “true”. For Habermas, emancipation means the achievement of rational autonomy, and this means that some independent criterion of validity — some theory of truth ~ is wequited. This cannot be sitnply 1660KY, USA: Routledge, 2000. p 1661 Linklater, Andrew dtr) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume IV. Floren ‘ptt chrary.comlibcbraryanddbed Doc?id-2002464page-417 “TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN. “correspondence to reality” or some other notion of truth as representation because in the case of Critical Theory current notions of reality may stand in the way of emancipation. Habermas mist find a notion of truth that is not simply pragmatic but which avoids the traps that he and eatfier Critical theorists have done so much to identify His answer is that truth is established by rational consensus. What is tue is what is agreed by consensus to be true, but this consensus must have specific rational features because, for Habermas, if any consensus can establish truth the. notion loses all meaning. By a rational consensus Habermas understands it to ‘be one that would be achieved purely on the basis of argument, with no extra- logical or extra-rationsl considerations — such as status, farce or prej being allowed to connt, The context where this kind of argument would be possible he describes as an “ideal speech situation’”. What is crucial to this ‘claim is that Habermas believes that an ideal speech situation is not an artificial, intellectual construct, but on the contrary something that is built into the nature of language itself. ‘The use of language, he argues, implies the objective existence of certain nds of “validity claims”. Any sentence we ulter necessarily involves a claim that what is said is menningful, cue, justified and sincere — even an explicit intent to deceive would be meaningless if these validity claims were not not- mally implicit in speech. Habermas” point is that unless the claim of “truth” cel be validated ~ atleast in principle — human speech woutd be meaningless. Human speech is not meaningless, therefore there must be the possibility of truth, Although it is probably impossible to achieve the conditions required for completely free language use in an ideal speech situation, nonetheless this goal underlies all actual use of language. Moreover, the ideal speech situation is not simply a description of a context in which truth could be established. It also provides a picture of a particalar Kind of society, one in which individuals ‘would lead completcly free, unconstrained lives, equal, and totally open in their communications and relations with one another. Habermas believes thatthe fully emancipated human society which Critical Theory is designed to bring about is actually built into the very nature of human speech. ‘A number of critical theorists in international relations make at east a partial claim to be Critical Theorists in my sense of the term, employing some of these notions in their work, Robert Cox uses Habermasian idess in his contrast between “problem-solving” and “critical” theory, and Andrew Linklater’s ap- pronch tocriticalintemational theory explicitly employs the notion of knowledge- constituting interests." Mark Hoffman’s ongoing study of the inter-paradigm debaie in international relations draws on Haberinas’ thought quite extensively, as does Mark Neufeld in his work on reflexivity and intemational relations theory." However, at Jeast in the ease of Cox, the substantive content of this ‘work seems to owe litle to Habermas; instead what is presented is for the most part a mix of Gramscian politics. Leninist theories of imperialism and neo- ‘Marxist dependency theory ~ in general, his work is far more explicitly Marxist 1661Linklater, Andrew tor) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume I age ebrary.comiiebraranddbel Doc? et-200246Aepoge=418. Florence, KY. USA: Roiledg, 2000. 1662. CRITICAL CONCEPTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE IV than that of Habermas. Something similar mightbe said of Linklater's major study Beyond Realism and Marxism: Critical Theory and tntemational Relations ~ although even in this book the influence of Kant is clear and, obviously, noa- ‘Marxist but in his more recent work on “inclusion” and “exclusion” and the nature of community he taps a vein of Critical Theory which is more closely linked to Habermas’ concerns.” ‘When Habermas first developed these notions it was in opposition to positivist notions of knowledge which either denied the relevance of hitman liberation, or, inte Marxist variant, saw liberation as 2 by-product of the working through of impersonal laws of history. Nowadays the enemy has changed, and Habermas is self-consciously representing the Enlightenment values of rationality and the sovereignty of the human subject, increasingly under attack from post-moder- nists and post-structuralists. In The Philosophical Discourses of Modernity ~ an extended series of lectures on the subject ~ he characterises these critics as irrationalist and inherently conservative, their critiques of the notion of r ality and subjectivity serving only to reinforce the status quo." However, these characterisations do not answer the case against Habermas’ position. Is the openness of a society based on ideal speech either an attainable or even a desirable goal? The idea that human relations could be based on com- plete transparency as between individuals — the idea that, in principle, human communication could be free from distortion ~ seems to deny the essential ambiguity of inter-personal relation, the inability of any person ever to under stand another without the possibility of error. To believe in the desirability of transparency comes close to commitment t0 the elimination of difference, to a denial thatthe Other could be accepted as Othes. Habermas’ notion of equality seems to be the equality of identity not difference. The absence of consensus in social theory may simply reflect the essential ambiguity of human existence, the inherent contestablity of the theories we generate in the real world of political action. Connolly's criticism that in the ideal speech situation we find only “the idealised speech of stoies frozen out of effective participation in political life” ‘may not do justice to Habermas” own involvement in public life, but itbrings out accurately the artificiality of the latter's position." Whether necessarily implied by the use of language or not, ideal speech seems incapable of performing the foundational role assigned to it in Habermas’ thought. Jn summary, it is difficult to see that Critical Theory provides an answer to the crisis in modern thought identified above. Habermas’ aim is clear — it is to produce a modem account of liberation and emancipation that is grounded in ‘ways that are not susceptible to the critiques of foundationalism launched by Nietzsche and his heirs. But the idcal speech situation and the notion of un~ distorted communication cannot perform this task. It presupposes that which is contested, the meaningfulness of human speech and action, and it lays down a set of criteria that disregards the inhicrent messiness and ambiguity of human existence, Habermas redescribes the Enlightenment project but not in such a ‘way as to avoid the critiques that project has attracted, including the ertigues 1662Linklater, Andrew Editor) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume I. igthttebrary.comilbebraryanddbd/Dac?id-2002464&page419 Florence, KY, USA: Routledge, 200. p 1663. “TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN produced by other Frankfurt scholars. Habermas believes that the consequences of the Failure of his project would be to allow a free hand to writers he would characterise as the irrationalists of post-structuralism and post-modemism ~ the new “Young Conservatives”. 1 argue later on that this is not so, but, in the meantime, the work of the latter needs to be examined, Post-steucturalist international relations ‘A number of the most prominent critical theorists working in international relations draw inspiration from the work of French post-structuraists such as Barthes and Derrida.” Writing about this work poses real problems. It is not so much thet itis difficult per se: itis dificult, extraordinarily ruanced and thas hard to summarise, but this is not the most basic problem. More fundamental is the fact that this kind of work is attempting to bring to the surface. features of discourse which normally ate allowed to remain submerged; it is, therefore, peculiarly resistant to sentences which begin “Post-structaralism (or intertex- tality or whatever) is...” to complete such sentences is to subvert the project. A characteristic Feature of this kind of writing is thet it involve defemiliarisa- tion ~ an attempt to turn the familiar into the unfamiliar and vice versa — and this feature is annulled rather than explicated by a narrative that clarifies and famitiaises, Post-sructuralists themselves recognise the problem. Derrida suggests that some things have to be written “under erasure” ~ that is to say crossed out (because they do not mean quite what is intended) but still legible under the deletion (because there is no better way of making the point).”! There is no way around this problem. The best way to cope with it is 10 reverse the procedure of the previous section and concentrate rather more heavily on the actual writings of international relations scholars such as Der Derian and Ashley, than on their ‘mentors, but before doing this some brief and inadequate preliminaries on post structuraiism in general are unavoidable => French post-structuralism, as the name suggests, developed out of French structuralism, and this in turn was a generalisation ofthe structuralist linguistics of the first half of this century associated particutarly with Saussure.”* The basic idea of structural linguistics is that languages operate as relations of difference. ‘The word “eat” has no necessary relation to a small furry quadmuped; any set of sounds could be used here, Instead of thinking of the signifier “cat” as representing a signified itis better to think of its meaning as emerging from its relationship to other signifiers in a language. Meaning emerges not from the relationship between a signifier and the signified, but in the relationship between signifirs. ‘Generalise this argument beyond language, push it close to the edge of absurdity, and you have a version of the crisis of foundations described in the second section of this essay. Instead of thinking of a text as representing its object and meaningful in terms of its correspondence to this object (as is 1663Linklater, Anvew or). INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume 1, haps ebrar.comfibebranyanddhd Doc? d-20024644spage120 Florence, KY, USA: Roulede, 2000. 164, CRITICAL CONCEPTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE IV suggested by “correspondence” theories of truth, the object of knowledge — the “transcendental signified” ~ disappears altogether. Instead a text can only be considered in relation to other texts, that is to say as an “intertext”, However, itis not simply the object of Knowledge that disappears in this way of looking A the world, the Knowing subject also disappears. If texts can only be read imentextually, then the figure of the supposed “author” of the text becomes sedundant. The slogan “there is nothing outside of the text” makes the point clearly, perhaps too clearly." There are deep implications here not simply for how sie understand texts, but for how we understand what, if anything, it means to be human, “Man” is.no longer atthe centre of discourse, or of anything else ‘The subversion of the Enlightenment goat of man asthe maker of history and bringer of liberation could not be more complete Unlike structrslists, who concentrate simply on the structural features of texts, poscstrucuralisis do consider content, but in ways different from conventional criticism, ‘Their link with structuralism involves the continuing disappearance of object and subject and this allows for a freedom of interpretation, the limits of which, if any, are difficult to lay down in advance. Demrida's “deconstructions” are designed to show that all toxts are polysentic and self-subverting, the truth they attempt 10 convey being no more than @ Nietschean “mobile umny of metaphors”. For those still wedded to Enlight- enment notions of rationality it would be an understatement wo say that this procedure is probferatic, but at this point itmay make sense to shift the argument and look at specific attempts to think these thoughts in an international context ‘An intertext is a chain of texts, Which texts are relevant in which context? Obviously this cannot be determined in advance by reference t a link between the object of Knowledge and a knowing subject, because intertextuaity is pre- mised upon denying such « link, Questions of genre or apparent appropriate- ness cannot be presumed. The idea, for example, that diplomacy as an activity is to be understood in tenns of a pregiven account of what it is to be a diplomat - an account based on supposedly authoritative texts such as the memoirs of statesmen ~ is precisely what is subverted in James Der Derian’s pathbrecking study. On Diplomacy: A Genealogy of Western Estrangement.* The mytho-diplomatic rote of angels in bibical texts are as “relevant” a the diplomatic archives ofthe great powers, and categories such as Ant-diplomacy and Techno-diplomacy emerge out of the intertext from unconventional sources, The same author's examinaifons of espionage and terrorism again draw upon texts fiom a variety of genres, and refuse to make a distinction between, say, spy fiction and official sources.** ‘All this is done with considerable wit and much insight, bt itis impossible to avoid the obvious question ~ if the chain of texts is not predetermined does this ‘mean that any text can be read in the light of any other text, and if so, what is the tuasis upon which the texts that form this particular imertext are chosen? In practice something interesting happens hore. In his account of the “intrigue” imertext Der Derian makes a point of stressing that spy stories draw on 1664Ips ebrary comlibebraryanddbd Doc td200246¢&page421 Linklater, Andrew Eton). INTERNATIONAL. RELATIONS Volume IV. Florence, KY, USA: Routledge, 2000. 1665. “TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN contemporary spy scandals, and that, conversely, actual spies seem to read alot of spy fiction. This is fine, but it does seem to subvert itself by introducing a transcendental signified, ie. the “real world” of terror and espionage that the fictional texts are clearly meant to illuminate, If these texts are interesting because they tell us something about the real world then it is good that we should have our attention drawn to them; what is not clear is why we should abandon such modernist notions as the identification of “influence” or “eontiibuiory factors” in favour of the post-sructuralist language of in- tertextualiy. It may be that there is a heuristic role for intertextality here ~ that if Der Derian had not taken his approach we would not have seen these connections ~ but the claim that post-siricturalism makes goes further than heuristics. The claim is that intertextuaity “works” without reference to criteria extemal to the intertext and, in those cases at least, this does not seem to be sustainable. ft is perhaps significant that in his iater work — collected in Antidiptomacy” — Der Derian shifts bis ground somewhat; without explicitly dropping the idea of an intertext, his sources of inspiration shift to writers such as Baudrillard and Vitti, for whom interiextuality is not a central concern.”* Intertexuality examines a chain of texts. Deconstruction “is” a way of reading a particular text, in which itis demonstrated that the “author” falls to xluce the logical, rational, construction of thought that was intended.” In ‘Living on Borderlines: Man, Post-structuralism and Wer" Richard Ashley attempts a deconstruction of Kenneth Waltz's classic text Man, The State and War." In a long and complex study, be argues that this is not a *monologival”™ text whose meaning Waltz is able to control, but a polysemic intertext whose meanings shift back and forth between a reading ia which “'man” is privileged as the sovereign provider of order and a reading in which the privileged role is assigned to “war” as the definer and constituter of man. ‘A brief account of this argument, much fess a evtique, simply cannot be provided because its complexity defies summary. However, even without such 4 summary oF critique, it is possible and legitimate to ask questions about the status, nature and purpose of this reading. Clearly Ashley cannot claim that is is a “truo" reading of Man, The State and War — this would imply a monologi- ccal reading of the text, which is explicitly excluded as 2 definitive feature of modernist social thcory"?— bat, on the other hand would any reading of this text ‘do? Some of the more imaginative of Derrida’s American literary ettical fol- lowers seem {0 want to resist any limits on the tree play of interpretation, but, Ashley's concern for “painstaking critical analysis” suggests that he would want to resist the idea that Waltz’s text could be about whatever we want itt be about. It has to be presumed that, while not claiming that his reading of Waltz is true, he would want to argue that iti, in some sense, better than others available, ‘or atleast that i illuminates the text in interesting ways ~ if he did not want (0 make this claim, itis dificult to see why he would have produced this text. The problem is, how is the reader to assess this elaim? Is this a claim that can be “assessed” or are we obliged simply to take his reading or leave it? 1665Linklater, Andrew Elton) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume I ‘Florence, KY. USA: Routledge, 2000.0 1666. geteeebrary.comiibcbraryandedDoc?il-200246 page 422 CRITICAL CONCEPTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE IV Ashley writes of “post-stucturalist social theory” and of post-structuralist discourse as “theoretical” but this isa different enterprise from modern social theory, and itis noc the role of post-stucturalist international relations to provide an altemative to conventional, i, modern, intemational relations theary."* The role of post-structuralist readings isto bring to the surface the contradictions to be found in non-post-sructuralist theory, working from a perspective that is neither within nor without the “regime” of modernity ~ hence the “bordetlines” of his title. In his concluding remarks, Ashley defends the practice of werking on the margins from the accusation of irresponsibility” but, from the perspective of emancipatory theorists such as Habermas or Charles Taylor. Ashley remains volnerable to the charge of conservatism. It is difficult to see what effect Ashley's deconstruction of Waltz will have, could have, or even is supposed to have on the dominance of neorealism in international relations theory. It is instructive to compare the fete of this text with Ashley's earlier, and non-post- structuralist critique of neorealism, “The Poverty of Neorealism”."° This text was at the centre of an extended debate fo which some of the key figures in the discipline ~ Waltz, Gilpin, Keohane, Ruggie, Cox ~ contributed, in the course of Which it could reasonably be said that the hold of neorealism in the discipline ‘was perceptibly weakened.”” As of now (1994) no such effect could be said to have followed on Ashley's later intervention. Post-tructuralist approaches to international relations which draw heavily on the notions of intertextuaity and deconstruction act as mirror-images of the Ciitical Theory examined in the previous section. Critieal Theoty attempts to cope with crisis by rebuilding foundations but without being able to find the grounds for such a construction project. The authors discussed in this section react to this and other failures to rebuild by attempting to do without notions sch as relevance and representation altogether. However, in practice, they are unable to live within the constraints they have set themselves, or, in so far as they do take these constraints seriously, they are in danger of being locked into an essentially sterile scholasticism. However. these two extremes should not be seen as exhausting the possibilities of critical theory, There are other approaches, even other post-modemisms. which make a serious attempt to understand the ‘world withont falling back on modernist assumptions, The next section will be devoted (o these approaches. Ourselves and others ‘One of the featares of the crisis of modemity is the potential loss of the distinctive privileged status of the West in our thought. One of the supposed achievements of the Enlightenment was the universality of its thought; modern science originated in the West (albeit drawing on Indian and Arabic roots) bat its methods and findings were applicable everywhere: the Kantian “Categorical Imperative” was identified by a German philosopher but the moral law governed everyone, everywhere; even if Hegel's historiist account of the modem, rational 1656Linklater, Andrew Bor) INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume IV Florence KE. USA. Routledge, 2000p 1667, apse ebray.comllibebraryanektedDoc?id-200246 page 423 “TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN™ state meant that it could only have originated in Europe, this again was an achievement of universal application, as was fo be the communist society whose coming was signposted by Marx in his supposedly materialist rewriting of Hogel. The distinctive feature of European thought wos believed to be its non- European, because universal, nature. Equally, the fact that this thought was largely produced by men was thought to be of no significance, The gender of the creators of universal truths cannot affect their universality. This sense of self-confidence has largely gone. Our knowledge of other ‘cultures, and of the limits to our own knowledge, has undermined the privileged position of European thought —and the development of a better understanding of ‘gender has specifically dethroned European mar. This is potentially destabilis- ing, Paul Ricoeur has put the point well. ‘When we discover that there are several cultures instead of just one and consequently at the time when we acknowledge the end of a sort of cultural ‘monopoly, be illseey or rea, we ate threatened with destruction by our on discovery. Suddenly it becomes possible that there are just orhers that we curses ae an “other” among oeher.™* ‘The diagnosis seems accurate, but the prognosis? Should we see this state of alfairs as threatening? IF so is there anything we can do about it, short of attempting to defend the ramparts of the old order, in the manner of Habermas who is still clearly committed to the old European claim to have defined emancipation? In what follows, T distinguish two reactions; a celebration of ‘otherness and ambiguity in the works of Bakhtin, Todorov and, mote tentatively. Foucault and Sylvester, and the self-consciously post-modern defence of bourgeois liberalism of Richard Rorty. In each case we will be examining critical theorists who are content to see themselves as, at least, om the roa to the production of theory, in contrast to the (already discussed) unwillingness of writers such as Asbley to make this claim. ‘The Russian critic MM. Bakhtin stresses the value of The Dialogic Imagination — the title of his most important work. ‘The novel is the paradigm of such an imagination because it contains a constant interaction of meanings, cof points of view, of otherness, resisting any reduction to a single position, a ‘monologue.”® He develops the notion of “heteroglossin”’; the proposition that the social historical, et., conditions governing at any one time insures that sen- tences uttered at that time will have meanings different trom those uttered at any other time, Such a notion seems close to Derrida’s though, but in Bakin’s case it leads towards “dialogism”’, a notion which is part epistemological, part ethical, with its commitment to the interplay of points of vie ‘What these ideas might mean for social theory is brilliantly demonstrated by Bakhtin's follower, Tsvetan Todorov, in his extraordinary study The Conquest of America, which is an account of how the Western conquerors of the New World came to terms with the “Othemess” they encountered there. ‘The civilisations 1667‘nip ie ebrary.comilbebraryanddnd/Doe?id-2002464&page~424 Linklater, Andrew (Bilton), INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume IV. Florence, KY, USA: Routledge, 2000p 1668 CRITICAL CONCEPTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE IV they met were “Different” and the story Todorov tellsis of the two reactionsto this difference which, between them, encompassed the possibilities then allowed by ‘Wester thought, while excluding a third and better approach. The conguistadores themselves experienced difference as inferiority, and conquered in the name of 4 superior civilisation, raping, murdering, pillaging and spreading disease — 4epopulating a continent — under the banner of the suppression ofthe tyranny of human sacrifice, the paradigm of an unbearable Otherness. The defenders of the Indians ~ priests such as Las Casas—abnorred the practices of the conguistadores, and condemned them in the name of a universelism that recognised the Indian as ‘being with an immortal soul to be saved: the Indians were defended by giving them a place within the schemas ofthe West, and identity as potential Christians, ‘These two approaches ~-the prescrvation of difference within a superiorfinferior relationship and the assertion of equality by the elimination of difference - have teen a recurrent feature of the meoting of Western andl non-Westem societies through the centuries of empire. The District Officer and the Missionary, the East India Company and the Society for the Abolition of the Slave Trade, these binary pairs have been the way in which the West has coped with Otherness. ‘What this excludes is the possibility of Difference without hierarchy, an equality that recognises and celebrates difference. Todorov’s point is that even the most sympathetic of the defenders of the Indians were unable to conceive ‘of an opposition to the berbarism of the conguistadores which would allow the preservation of othemess. One way or another, as inferiors ot ay equals, the Indians had to be brought within the frameworks of the West. Todorov is Pointing to the failure of the Spaniards to develop a dialogic understanding of ‘what was happening ~ a failure repeated throughout the history of Empire. A similar story could be told ~ not here for reasons of space — about the role of ‘gender in Westem social thought, and the movement from a desire to assert the equality of women within a male dominated world to the assertion of an tinderstanding of femininity that allows for the category of different and equal. ‘What is important here is that we can do better than the conquerors of the Now World. The collapse of the privileged status of Western thought opens the way for dialogism: we can leam things about ourselves by studying our history and reading our literary inheritance once we have removed the monological tendencies past readings have assigned to these genres. L take it that this was the ‘im of the later work of Michel Foucauit.“” What he was concerned to challenge was the modernist story of “man” as a being with a nature that is shaped and ‘repressed by society, At one level this is “true” story — his work on diseipline and surveillance demonstrates the ways in which the self is constrained by power/knowledge ~ but at another level itis profoundly tnisleading, in so far as it implies the existence of an unrepressed self under the layers of conditioning. Foucault's studies are designed to undermine this notion. His account of the sexual practices ofthe classical Greeks attempts to shake the notion that there is somewhere a natural self ~ even those aspects of the self we consider to be most basic have to be understood as created, Categories we consider fundamental, 1668wer, Andrew( Editor). INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volune IV. ki Florence, KY, USA: Rouladge, 2000. 1669. hhipsteebrary camlibereryancdbd Dac?d 20024644 page 125 “TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN” such a the distinction between homosexuality and heterosenuality, ae not 19 be found, or emerge in a different way, with the Greeks — a point parallel to Adkin’s revelation that the Homerie Greeks did not distinguish between psychology and physiology. Foucault puts this attack on the notion of sexual repression in a wider context as part of his examination of the ‘technologies of the self", His three volume The History af Sexuality is about the art of living and the desire to master oneself and others. ‘Clearly Bakhtin and Foucault are not saying the same thing, but they are both theorists of idemtity and ditference; they are both signposting the end of a conception of “man” that has been basic to the thought of modernity, and, perhaps most important, they have both demonstrated that critical theory does not necessarily have to live on borderlines. These writers ate post-modernist in every sense of the term — and Foucault, at least, could quite reasonably be described as a post-structuralist— but they manage to combine post-modernism with a point of view, a positive theoretical understanding of the world in a way that deconstruction and intertextuality seem to preclude. A similar combination sts, and in ‘The relationship between anti-foundationalist thought and feminism is complicated. A characteristic feature of feminist discourse isto draw a distinction between feminist empiricism, feminist standpoint and feminist post-modern ism." Feminist empiricism employs the norms of positivist research to replace “ad” science with “good” seience: this work is clearly foundationatist in inspiration. Standpoint feminism, on the other hand, has some affinities with the emancipatory projects of Critical Theory. Standpotnt thinking insists that all knowledge represents a point of view (thus denying Enlightenment universalism) and asserts that the point of view (standpoint) of women provides a privileged foundation upon which knowledge can be built 10 the point of view of men — the argument here is best understood as analogous to the Marxist claim thatthe oppressed are better equipped to understand the nature of social relations than the oppressors.“ However, in terms ofthe discussion here and in the previous section of this essay, it is feminist post-modernism that poses the most interesting questions, Here can be seen many of the opportunities — and drawbacks — outlined above. The postmodernist perspective authorises feminists t0 deconstruct received notions of gender, and to deprivilege masculine accounts of the world, tbat at the same time, this is a weapon that turns on those who wield i. As Sylvester puts it citing Ferguson, “how can we simultaneously put women at the center and decenter everything ineluding women?””* The post-modern tum here provides the basis for deconstruction but not for reconstruction. Keohane’s (in)iamous ‘comment that “[the] postmodemist project is a dead-end in the study of international relations ~ and that it would be disastrous For feminist international relations theory to pursue this path” needs to be read in this context."7 In Feminist Theory and International Relations in a Postmodern Era, Sylvester recognises this probiem and offers a possible sotation by distinguishing carefully 1669‘gt brary comlibiebranyanddbdDoc?id-2002464&page 425. Linklater, Andrew (Sd), INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume IV. Florence. KY, USA: Routledge, 2000p 1670 CRITICAL CONCEPTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE IV between feminist post-modernism and post-modern feminista."* Feminist post- modernism is as described above, while post-modem feminism “feombines} clements of scepticism, partictlarly about the social formation of subjects, with elements of a standpoint feminism that has us acknowledging and interpreting ‘what subjects say”. There is clearly asense in which this formulation dedges the seal issues zaised by post-moslern/post-strictural thought and allowsthe scholar 0 have things both ways. However. this kind of paradox and ambiguity may be a price worth paying forthe preservation ofthe ability to continue what Sylvester, surely correctly, identifies as the prime task of “acknowledging and interpreting what subjects say”. Certainly she is coorect in thinking that Elshtain's Women and War ~ still the mst impressive work of feminist international relations scholarship — works within the paradoxes of post-modern feminism. >? Sylvester employs her post-modern feminist perspective to interrogate the various debates in the discipline of international relations and to establish her ‘own “homesteads” in the area of security and cooperation, most notably by characterising, and broadly endorsing, the politics of the Greenham Common Peace Camp in England, and the work of women's producer cooperatives in Zimbabwe." As with the work of Foucault, Bakhtin and Todorov, the point of view she promotes is clearly directed towards a new kind of polities and a rejec- tion of the main tenets of “bourgeois liberalism’. Is this a necessary feature of post-modern etitical theory? The final waiter to be examined in this essay ans- \wers this question by describing himself as a “post-modem bourgeois liberal” °° Richard Rorty’s intellectual background is radically different from that of the other writers examined above. On the one hand, he is an American pragmatic, a follower of William James and John Dewey, an anti-foundationalist who reaches this position from James’ definition ofthe true as “the name of whatever proves itself to be good in the way of belief” rather than from Nietzschean perspectivism — although he argues thet these two positions are not shat far apart? On the other hand, he employs the style of reasoning of analytical philosophy, but in order to ereate “post-analytical philosophy”. His major work ~ Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature — isan all out attack on correspondence theories of the truth, and, indeed, on any theory of knowledge. Itis the idea that knowledge “wnirrors” nature that Rosty believes he has undermined ~ of, ‘more accurately, that he believes undermines itself, In the final chapters of this book, Rorty contrasts mainstream “systematic” philosophers who generalise on the basis of some successful line of inquiry, attempting to reshape all knowledge on its model, with “edifying” philosophers who resemble eack other only in 50 far as they exhibit distrust of these procedures. The edifiers “kept alive the his- toriist sense that this century's superstition was the last century's triumph of reason” They are ultimately parasitic on the systematisers, but the voices of these sceptical relativist figures aro central to the contribution of philosophy to the “conversation of mankind”: an Oakeshottian trope endomsed by Rorty.** Rorty’s anti-foundationalism is undiluted, but his style of reasoning is familiar, eassuring and comforting for those brought up on Anglo-American 1670Lintlater, Andrew tor). INTERNATIONAL. RELATIONS Vohame 1. hatte ebrarycomiiebraneandded Dac =2002464spage~427 Florence. KY. USA: Rouledge, 2000. 1671. “TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN analytical philosophy and unhappy with the “Continental” style of much post-modernism. “Reassuring” and "“comforting” could also be used a8 adjec- tives to describe his polities. His self-description as a post-modem bourgeois liberal is quoted above, Elsewhere he terms hinaself a “ibera ironist”."” What does this mean? It may be helpful here to return to a text employed above in this essay, and much used by Rosty — Adomo and Horkhelmer’s Dialectic of Enlightenment. Rorty's reading of this work is that it demonstrates that the various elements of the Enlightenment project do not cohere. The tourrdations of the social institutions of the liberal Enlightenment rest on an account of ration- ality that no longer works, that has undermined itself. Rorty accepts the diagnosis, the Key question is, what follows from this? For Adomo and Horkheimer it isa deep pessimism of the lft; for Habermas itis a desire to find new foundations in the ideal speech situation; for most post-modems, as we have seen, itis a new politics altogether, a polities in which the institutions of the liberal state are denied their status as for a within which human liberation is possible. Rorty rejects all these options. Instead he believes itis possible to support the social insti ices of liberalism, while rejecting the epistemological foundations upon which ithas been assured that these institutions res. Rorty argues that we need to redescribe liberal institutions, to find new metaphors to replace those that the undermining of the Enlightenment world view has left without force, but that this need not involve a wholesale rejection of liberalism. Our redescriptions must be “ironic”, that fs to say, aware oftheir contingent character, their ungrounded nature ~ thus avoiding the difficulties involved in Critical Theory’s attempt to find new foundations for is liberal positions ~ but they ean still be “liberal” — in contrast to the ironic formulations of, say, Foucault, who sees liberal institutions standing in the way of the sort of ungrounded desire for total autonomy that he seems to espouse. Rorty sees Foueault’s position as unattainable within any conceivable set of political institutions, where, necessarily, the claim to autonomy of one individual will always be limited by the claims of ethers. In the public sphere, the simple liberal desire to diminish suffering is the only goal that can be endorsed. “There is no inferential connection between the disappearance of the transcendental subject ~ of ‘man’ as something having a nature which society ‘can repress or understand ~ and the disappearance of human solidarity” argues Rony, in the face of a widespread consensus to the contrary. The text continues “fblourgecis liberalism seems to me to be the best example of this solidarity we have yet achieved ...” and this, of course, is even more controversial.** Rorty’s polities are eclectic and communitarian. He endorses Oakeshot’s idea of a “practice” as something that operates within a community, and adopts the Hegelian position that there is no frame of reference outside of the community, no relevant notion of humanity, which would allow us to ask ourselves whether ours is a moral society. The contrast between our private interests and the public interests of the community remains, but “it is impossible to think that there is something that stands to my community as my community stands to me, some tonLinklatr, Andrew Eaton). INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS Volume IY Florence, KY, USA: Feauledg, 2000p 1672 ptt. ebrary.comlibcraryancdded Doc?d-200246 page 128 CRITICAL CONCEPTS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE IV larger commonity called “humanity” which has an intrinsic nature". This need ‘not prevent us from, for example, promoting human rights internationally ~ but we must realise tha it is a “human rights culture” we are promoting, not rights in any ontologically grounded sense of the term. Roty’s position is that when we realise that communities are human creations, not something given by nature, but something made by our identi- fication with them, that identification will be stronger not weaker, Fis ts a naturalised, demythologised, liberal Hegelianism, which he argues works better for being anti-foundetionalis. Most modem Hegelians are vulnerable to the charge of relativism, and, given that for the most part they teject the idea of Geist, lack Hegel's own defence against this charge. Rorty, om the other hand, simply refuses to take the charge of relativism seriously. His point is that this, charge only makes sense on the assumption that there is some defensible, non- relativist, position on issues such as human rights and the proper structure of political institutions for a society. This is an assumption that he believes to be Wholly false ~ naturally enough, given the attack on correspondence theories of truth in his magnum opus. Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. OF course, from his point of view, there is no non-relativist argument in Favour of solidarity with one’s community; there is no non-relativist argument in favour of any proposition, because any such argument wonld imply the possibility of dis- ceming a “transcendental signitied”. ‘The post-modern side of his liberalism denies Rotty the satisfaction of fecling that his support for notions such as universal hutman rights ean be grounded in some account of how the world really is, am account that would Provide assurance that those who deny basic rights are destined to get their comeuppance if they do not mond their ways." His point is that no such assurance is available. All we can do is to promote an enlarged sense of fellow feeling by appealing to the “sentiments” through story telling, drama and any other thetorics appropriate to a sentimental education. For many, all this will be very uncomfortable, but, as William Connolly argues, in @ review evo- catively titled “The Mirror of America.” for the most part, Rorty “comforts and tranguillises”: Rorty’s endorsement of Wester science, teclmotogy, capitalism and bourgeois society is, for Connolly, altogether too complacent. Rorty assumes, for example, that liberal capitalism is irrelevant to the problems of most inhabitants of the planet, an assumption that simultaneously denies the possibility that liberal society might have something to say to all mankind, and the other possibility that capitalism might have something to do with ereating at Teast some of the world’s problems. The sense that “security and sympathy] have been enjoyed by Americans and Europeans ~ the people who dreamed Up the human rights culture — much more than they have been enjoyed by anyone else”®* need not necessarily lead to complacency, but could easily do 50. ‘These criticisms hit the mark — particularly coming from a writer who is loser to being a liberal ironist than most of Rorty's erties ~ but they do not tora