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The function of political philosophy is to help to form, sharpen, and critically ground the fundamental understandings that we build up somehow in our minds. Partial theories then elaborate, complicate, and contribute immediate relevance. The first without the second can be sterile; the second without the first can easily produce either chaos or a pseudo-scientific scholasticism.Waltz[i]

The function of political philosophy is to help to form, sharpen, and critically ground the fundamental understandings that we build up somehow in our minds. Partial theories then elaborate, complicate, and contribute immediate relevance. The first without the second can be sterile; the second without the first can easily produce either chaos or a pseudo-scientific scholasticism.

After nearly a hundred years of systematic academic research in International Relations, since the founding of its first chair, in Aberystwyth, there is a body of knowledge, a body of theory and exegesis, that one can point towards if one is asked what distinguishes IR as a discipline, or what IR is, as an academic pursuit. While there may not have been a distinct theory of international relations, as Martin Wight argued, there is a mountainous body of it today.[ii] What IR is, what its impetus, subject-matter and vicissitudes may be, are to be found in this growing and albeit pluralistic literature.

As one wades through the history of this literature one does not find a Kuhnian pattern of paradigm change, or even a single core question, but rather an intellectual garden, with various species of theory, all reaching, often fighting, for the sun.[iii] One also sees, amidst family resemblances, a topography of ideas and questions forming sub-gatherings in English and other schools of international thought. And, furthermore, looking in the dirt, in the historical memory of the literature, one finds the seeds and intellectual germs of those theories and questions which have fallen, withered or dwell beneath the broad leaves of taller theoretical flora.

Sitting in this sunny and flourishing garden, one begs the question, as to what exactly draws these species and groupings of ideas, questions and theory together, the old, the new and the as yet to sprout. While, there is no evidence of a master gardener’s hand, patterns of ideas and questions emerge; a serious theme wanders through it. The question, what is International Relations, may seem dreary, tired and possibly irresolvable, but, it is a question which every student considers, when opening their mind to that curious garden.

I think it was the thorough and deep consideration of this question (what is IR, what coheres and distinguishes its business?), which provided the frame of mind the great thinkers like Kenneth Waltz and C.A.W. Manning needed to make their immense theoretical contributions.[iv] Moreover, it is a helpful question to consider, if IR, as an academic enterprise, is to be an inter-generational pursuit, since the question throws light on the nature of the great prizes of knowledge for which we collectively strive.

The Academic Pursuit of IR

K.J. Holsti argued an ideal discipline, if not every discipline, then, at least the discipline of International Relations, is, or should be, defined and guided in its collective activity, by a single core question or problematique.[v] This is interesting, since many disciplines do seem to be cohered by a deep and important question; Sociology, for example, by the question of society’s nature, Anthropology by the question of the meaning of being human, and so on. It is also interesting how the chief questions of Political Science and International Relations enfold and disperse. If one considers the causal forces or agents in politics within the state or between states, one finds that patterns and connections of behavior overlap between domestic and international politics. Furthermore, if one begins to question the state or the states system, as the preeminent form of political organization, the intellectual provinces of Political Science and International Relations dissolve into Political Theory. Yet, before we carefully consider what exactly IR’s core thematic question may be, there are at least four notable alternatives to Holsti’s position worth exploring.

One idea is that the discipline of IR, is, like Medicine, a general discipline, composed of a variety of related questions, which form a sort of intellectual division of labour, in the general pursuit of international political health. In this thinking, while every IR student, following basic introductions, quickly specializes their knowledge and skills, their various pursuits are mutually dependent for solving complex real world political problems. By analogy, a person, at least today, cannot be in the same moment an equally competent anesthesiologist, surgeon and nurse, but requires, to perform medical operations, a coordination of specialists.

A second, related but distinct notion, articulated in a fashion by Alfred Zimmern, is that there are various inter-disciplinary questions and skills relevant to the study of IR, and that these various questions and skills can be and need be mastered by the IR expert or specialist, with an eye on practicing statecraft, diplomacy or policy.[vi]

The first two alternative positions are related by the notion espoused by C.A.W. Manning, that the gathering of questions relevant to the study of IR, together, due to their intellectual interrelations and practical topics of mutual concern, form an activity, a discipline, that is more than the sum of its parts; where in place of a core question stand core questions of mutual support, the study of which constitutes an undergraduate programme.[vii]

A third view, which Holsti questioned, is that the various theoretical questions categorized under the label International Relations or International Politics are so divergent that no one scholar can master and contribute to them all, nor do they, in all, form an activity greater than the sum of their parts. This is the view that IR, as an academic pursuit, is at best a field of studies, not a discipline with a core body of knowledge concerning a common object of........

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