Abstract
Since the inception of International Relations (IR) within university departments, its disciplinary status has been the subject of constant debate. Yet, the current literature on ‘the state of the discipline’ silences this debate either through IR’s assumed disciplinarity or conflation of debates about theory with the existence of IR. This Forum moves beyond this literature by explicitly engaging whether IR is a discipline or not and by enquiring how this status matters. Contributors rely on the sociology and philosophy of social science to call into question or affirm the disciplinarity of IR to argue whether IR is as a subfield of Political Science, a full-blown and autonomous discipline, or a hybrid field of interdisciplinary studies. Furthermore, contributors reveal the implications of the different disciplinary statuses regarding the academic institution, interdisciplinary possibilities and modes of organizing IR. Overall, these contributions aim to engage rather than close the disciplinary debate, creating further space for reflection.
Keywords
Introduction
According to Yosef Lapid, ‘it is important to highlight the distinction between theory, paradigm and discipline as alternative targets for dialogic enrichment in international relations’. 1 This assertion encapsulates the stance adopted by this Forum. Through focusing on the concept of ‘discipline’, this Forum involves an exploration into the contestations that have emerged surrounding disciplinary identity of International Relations (IR). This Forum seeks to show that each different disciplinary or non-disciplinary designation carries with it a series of connotations and expectations, enables practices and generates effects within and beyond the scholarly community. The question of IR’s identity frames both how scholars represent themselves and the borders of what is conceived to be valid knowledge and what it is not.
Previous ‘disciplinary’ debates in IR have often focused on ‘theory’, meaning that the identity (and arguably existence) of IR is often premised on theoretical activity. The recent special issue of the European Journal of International Relations (EJIR) ‘The End of International Relations Theory’ exemplifies this tendency. Despite the reflexive nature of that special issue, the contributions were based on a foundational assumption; that IR is a discipline. The debate did not reflect on ‘what is IR’ in terms of its disciplinary standing and instead presumed its disciplinary identity. In fact, many of the contributions to the special issue went so far as to conflate IR theory with ‘the discipline’. The ‘end of IR theory?’ debate merged at times into a debate surrounding the end of the academic activity that is IR. 2 While theory is integral to any academic discipline, we argue that it is one component, among many sustaining a discipline.
While the EJIR debate, and even the first or second or third and fourth debates accepted the premise of disciplinarity, many within IR have fiercely opposed this designation and advocated the use of different ‘labels’ to characterize IR. 3 As such, the objective of this Forum is to reveal the struggle over the status of IR and to make lively what has largely remained static and silent of late by debating: What is or should IR be? Discipline? Inter-discipline? Or substantive focus? Each participant was asked to reflect on whether or not IR is a ‘discipline’ and to unpack their definitions of ‘discipline’. Each contributor was also asked to highlight the perceived implications of adopting certain designations, thereby commenting on the stakes involved in employing specific understandings of IR. What follows is a diverse set of perspectives that seek to spark future debates. The perspectives are not exhaustive and the question of IR’s status is left open for further discussion.
The contributors to this Forum advocate diverging positions with regard to IR’s disciplinary debate, ranging from advocacy of IR as a discipline, to questions about what is understood by disciplinarity, to doubt about disciplinary status. The contributors come from different geographical, cultural and professional standpoints. They shape their respective understandings of what disciplinary labels do on the way IR is perceived, practised and structured within and beyond the scholarly community. One of the aims of the Forum is to highlight that the disciplinary question and the ensuing debate has a number of ramifications, which depending on one’s position will be viewed in either a positive or a negative light. In that sense, the following contributions highlight implications of this debate with regard to dimensions such as its collective institutional standing, ability to contribute to issues relevant in and outside of the academic sphere, and the representational and political power implied in the notion of ‘discipline’.
While the experiences captured in this Forum are largely European and North American we hope that this Forum will operate as a reference point for future debate that seeks to discuss this question with increasingly diversified perspectives. This debate and its continuation is of timely importance and requires further discussion due to the way IR continues to expand institutionally and diversify globally because it is often not clear what is exactly being broadened or at what cost. It is these questions that this Forum seeks to address in order to capture a number of current perspectives and institutional insights and to show that much rests on the debate about IR’s disciplinary identity.