Adrian Pabst

The secularism of post-secularity: religion, realism and the revival of grand theory in IR

How to theorise religion in International Relations (IR)? Does the concept of post-secularity advance the debate on religion beyond the ‘return of religion’ and the crisis of secular reason? This article argues that the post-secular remains trapped in the logic of secularism. First, a new account is provided of the ‘secularist bias’ that characterises mainstream IR theory: (a) defining religion in either essentialist or epiphenomenal terms; (b) positing a series of ‘antagonistic binary opposites’ such as the secular versus the religious; (c) de-sacralising and re-sacralising the public square. The article then analyses post-secularity, showing that it subordinates faith under secular reason and sacralises the ‘other’ by elevating difference into the sole transcendental term. Theorists of the post-secular such as Jurgen Habermas or William Connolly also equate secular modernity with metaphysical universalism, which they seek to replace with post-metaphysical pluralism. In contrast, the alternative that this article outlines is an international theory that develops the Christian realism of the English School in the direction of a metaphysical-political realism. Such a realism binds together reason with faith and envisions a ‘corporate’ association of peoples and nations beyond the secularist settlement of Westphalia that is centred on national states and transnational markets. By linking immanent values to transcendent principles, this approach can rethink religion in international affairs and help revive grand theory in IR.

Brexit, Post-liberalism and the Politics of Paradox

The Realignment of Western Politics Britains vote to leave the EU is part of a tectonic shift in Western politics. An alliance of socialists and conservatives rejected the status quo of remote bureaucracy, mass immigration, and multiculturalism in favor of more self-government and the protection of settled ways of life. (Arguably the EU is a misguided object of their discontent and the political geography of Brexit is more complex, as I show below.) A similar realignment is underway in European countries such as Austria, Italy, the Netherlands, and France, where it could see anti-EU parties force similar referenda or even…

‘A habitual disposition to the good’: on reason, virtue and realism

Amidst the crisis of instrumental reason, a number of contemporary political philosophers including Jurgen Habermas have sought to rescue the project of a reasonable humanism from the twin threats of religious fundamentalism and secular naturalism. In his recent work, Habermas defends a post-metaphysical politics that aims to protect rationality against encroachment while also accommodating religious faith within the public sphere. This paper contends that Habermas’ post-metaphysical project fails to provide a robust alternative either to the double challenge of secular naturalism and religious fundamentalism or to the ruthless instrumentalism that underpins capitalism. By contrast with Habermas and also with the ‘new realism’ of contemporary political philosophers such as Raymond Geuss or Bernard Williams, realism in the tradition of Plato and Aristotle can defend reason against instrumental rationality and blind belief by integrating it with habit, feeling and even faith. Such metaphysical–political rea...

The Crisis of Capitalist Democracy

Introduction Is the neo-liberal era since the mid-1970s synonymous with a corporate capture of the state and the passage to “post-democracy”? And if so, might the failure of neo-liberalism since the onset of the international economic crisis in 2007 and the state-sponsored bailout of global finance presage a return to the primacy of democratic politics over “free-market” economics commonly associated with the post–World War II period? At the time of this writing, it is premature to analyze the aftermath of the Great Recession (2007–09), which could yet mutate into a twenty-first-century Great Depression. However, the current…

Postliberalism: The New Centre Ground of British Politics

Brexit and support for anti-establishment insurgencies suggest that British politics is moving away from the old left–right opposition towards a new divide between the defenders and detractors of progressive liberalism. As this article suggests, progressive liberalism differs significantly from both classical and new liberalism. It fuses free-market economics with social egalitarianism and identity politics. Both the hard left and the radical right reject this combination and want to undo a number of liberal achievements. British politics is also moving in a postliberal direction. In the economy, postliberalism signals a shift from rampant market capitalism to economic justice and reciprocity. In society, it signals a shift from individualism and egalitarianism to social solidarity and fraternal relations. And politically, it signals a shift from the minority politics of vested interests and balkanised group identity to a majority politics based on a balance of interests, shared identity and the embedding of state and market in the intermediary institutions of civil society. This article argues that postliberalism is redefining Britains political centre ground in an age where neither progressive liberalism nor reactionary anti-liberalism commands majority support. First, it charts the ascendancy of progressive liberalism over the past quarter-century. Second, it contrasts anti-liberal reactions with postliberal alternatives, before exploring why earlier iterations of postliberalism failed to gain traction with the political mainstream. Third, it provides a discussion and critique of Theresa Mays postliberal conservatism, notably the tension between free-market globalisation and free trade, on the one hand, and the support for national industry and the indigenous working class, on the other.

Political Economy and the Constitution of Europe's Polity: Pathways for the common currency beyond ordo-liberal and neo-functionalist models

The Eurozone crisis has been variously described in financial or in fiscal terms, caused either by an over-leveraged banking system or by unsustainable budget deficits and national debt – or indeed both at once. But perhaps with the exception of Greece, neither holds true for individual euro-members or for the common currency area as a whole. The combined banking and sovereign debt crisis is symptomatic of a more fundamental set of structural problems such as trade imbalances, productivity differentials and the disconnection between financial flows and investment in productive activities that require a systemic analysis. By contrast with much of modern economics and political science that rest on rational choice and methodological individualism, this chapter seeks to develop an alternative political economy that can conceptualise the constitution of Europe’s polity – the complex economic, political and social space in which the Eurozone is inscribed. From this political economy perspective, I argue that the euro-area is characterised by the primacy of harmonisation over mutualisation – a legacy of the neo-functional model of integration and the ordo-liberal model of coordination, which privilege joint procedures and common rules rather than the sharing of risks, rewards and resources. Mutualisation – the search for cooperative arrangements based on a balance of interests – offers an as yet unrealised potential to transform the Eurozone in line with the constitution of Europe’s polity. The chapter charts a path beyond the current debate that portrays the European Monetary Union (EMU) either as a misconceived experiment which should be abandoned in favour of national currencies (e.g. Pissarides 2013; Flassbeck and Lapavitsas 2015a and 2015b), or as a project beset by design failures which require centralisation (e.g. Marsh 2013; Sinn 2014), or as an arrangement which can work better with a different policy mix (e.g. Sandbu 2015). My chapter runs as follows. First of all, the current crisis of the Eurozone can only be understood as part of a particular economic, political and social domain in which EMU is embedded. The domain in question is not limited to a set of institutions and rules within which markets, states and individuals interact (Buchanan 1990) but extends to political and social structures that embed both cooperation and conflict at – as well as across – different levels (Ornaghi 1990; Pabst and Scazzieri 2012). As an analytical framework, the approach to the political economy of constitution followed in this essay explores the multi-level dependencies that characterise economic integration within and between national states and transnational markets (Pabst 2014; Pabst and Scazzieri 2016; cf. Polanyi 2001). Second, ordo-liberalism shares with the proposed ‘political economy of constitution’ the idea that the economic field is not self-standing but rather part of the overarching social field, which encompasses society and the state. However, ordo-liberal thinkers view the social domain as grounded in the constitutional-legal order that subordinates social ties to state laws and market contract. By bracketing social relationships out of the picture, the effect of ordo-liberal policies – creating the ‘framework conditions’ (Rahmenbedingungen) for perfect competition – is to disembed the economy from society and to re-embed political and social ties in predominantly contractual relations, which ignores the Eurozone’s structural problems. Third, the dominant logic of European integration since the 1957 Rome Treaties has been neo-functionalism, which posits spill-over effects from economic interdependence to political unity (e.g. Haas 1961; Sandholtz and Stone Sweet 1997). Analogous to the concept of path dependency, neo-functionalism explains why European integration has privileged monetary integration over both a fiscal and a political union. Coupled with the influence of ordo-liberalism, this has constrained EMU crisis management and official proposals for reform. Fourth, the European polity within which EMU is inscribed is neither a federal super-state nor a free-trade area but rather a political system sui generis (e.g. Hix 2005; Zielonka 2006 and 2008). This system consists in hybrid institutions, overlapping jurisdictions, multiple membership, polycentric authority and multi-level governance. As a unique polity, Europe contains a certain set of opportunities and constraints for political and economic cooperation. These opportunities and constrains provide the resources for a different exit from the Eurozone crisis and they can embed EMU in the political and social relations which provide the trust and cooperation on which a viable common currency depends. Section 2 provides a brief outline of the wider causes of the Eurozone crisis. Section 3 develops a political economy of constitution as an analytical architecture to describe and explain the wider domain in which the Eurozone is inscribed. Section 4 examines ordo-liberal principles and policy prescriptions that underpin the creation of EMU and the Eurozone crisis management/resolution since early 2010. Section 5 provides an account of the (neo-)functional logic that has shaped the process of integration and the building of the European polity. Section 6 suggests a number of alternative pathways for the Eurozone. The final section provides some concluding reflections.

Is Liberal Democracy Sliding into ‘Democratic Despotism’?

Post-democracy and cognate concepts suggest that the postwar period of democratisation has given way to a concentration of power in the hands of small groups that are unrepresentative and unaccountable, as exemplified by the rise of multinational corporations and their influence on democratic politics. This article goes further to argue that this does not fully capture the triple threat facing liberal democracy: first, the rise of a new oligarchy that strengthens executive power at the expense of parliament and people; second, the resurgence of populism and demagogy linked to a backlash against technocratic rule and procedural politics; third, the emergence of anarchy associated with the atomisation of society and a weakening of social ties and civic bonds. In consequence, liberal democracy risks sliding into a form of ‘democratic despotism’ that maintains the illusion of free choice while instilling a sense of ‘voluntary servitude’ as conceptualised by Tocqueville.

After the Scottish No: The Crisis of Liberal Democracy and the Case for “Mixed Government”

Introduction: Dilemmas of Democracy The referendum on Scotlands independence has highlighted a number of tensions and contradictions that characterize contemporary Western liberal democracy. On the one hand, the two-year campaign re-energized politics and re-engaged the citizenry after decades of popular alienation and anger. A public debate unfolded that revealed not only a surprisingly knowledgeable electorate and an unprecedented mobilization, including a younger cohort, as 16- to 18-year-olds were for the first time given the right to vote. It was also conducted in a civil and generally good-natured manner. Most importantly of all was perhaps the engagement with many of the…

Athens, Jerusalem, and Rome: A Reply to Luciano Pellicani

Introduction In his polemic against revealed religion, Luciano Pellicani makes two fundamental claims that are historically and philosophically misguided. First, he asserts that the Puritans sought to establish a medieval collectivist theocracy, not a modern market democracy. Second, he maintains that the U.S. “culture war” between enlightened secular liberalism and reactionary religious conservatism ultimately rests on the perpetual battle between Athenian reason and the faith of Jerusalem. Accordingly, Pellicani argues that Americas commitment to principles such as individual freedom, religious tolerance, or the constitutionally enshrined separation of Church from State represented Enlightenment emancipation from the constricting…

Fellowship of Love: Martin Luther King's Legacy and the Renewal of the Labor Tradition

Labor—Lennon or Luther The year 1968 marked a turning point in the history of America and the wider West. The postwar settlement showed signs of strain as economic reconstruction ground to a halt and the Cold War confrontation began to take its toll. Youth protests and the Vietnam War polarized society and fueled the flames of the culture wars, pitting progressive liberals against conservatives. Millions of citizens lost trust in their system of government and their politicians, as was exemplified by President Lyndon B. Johnsons fall from grace. With the assassinations of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and…