Justin Rosenberg

Why is There No International Historical Sociology

Historical sociological studies in IR face a challenge similar to that discussed by Martin Wight in ‘Why is There no International Theory?’ Classical social theorists conceptualized ‘society’ in the ontological singular, leaving their successors with a ‘domestic analogy’ problem which has dogged attempts to provide a social theory of International Relations. Overcoming this problem requires an expansion of the premises of social theory to incorporate those general features of social reality which generate the phenomenon of ‘the international’. This expansion can be achieved using Leon Trotskys idea of ‘uneven and combined development’. Specifically, the existence of ‘the international’ arises ultimately from the ‘unevenness’ of human sociohistorical existence; its distinctive characteristics can be derived from analysis of the resultant condition of ‘combined development’; and its significance, thus sociologically redefined, entails a reconceptualization of ‘development’ itself — one which removes the source of the ‘domestic analogy’ problem for historical sociology.

Basic problems in the theory of uneven and combined development. Part II: unevenness and political multiplicity

Where does ‘the international’ come from? What accounts for its existence as a dimension of the human world? This article attempts an answer, in three steps, using the idea of ‘uneven and combined development’ (U&CD). First, a depth model is constructed, comparing different ways of linking uneven development with international relations. Thus far, it turns out, these ways have all presupposed the fact of political multiplicity, rather than explaining it. In search of explanation, the article turns, secondly, to the compelling historical sociological argument of Barry Buzan and Richard Little. This locates the origins of geopolitics in the late prehistoric shift from hunter-gatherer to settled agricultural existence, together with associated processes of social differentiation and proto-state formation. Buzan and Littles explanation appears at first to pre-empt the need for the concept of U&CD. Yet closer inspection reveals that unevenness and combination play a key role in their empirical account without, however, being theorized. The third step of the argument therefore seeks to show how these are necessary parts of the process of social change which Buzan and Little describe. And in this way it emerges that the origins of ‘the international’ do indeed lie in the uneven and combined character of historical development.

Interview with Ken Waltz

1. Personal and academic background F.H. It would be very interesting if you could say something about your own personal and academic background. What were the experiences that led you to write Man, the State and War ?

The ‘philosophical premises’ of uneven and combined development

Recent debates over Leon Trotskys idea of ‘uneven and combined development’ (U&CD) have focused on its potential in the field of International Relations, but they have not established the source of this potential. Does it derive from the philosophical premises of dialectics? The present article argues that the idea of U&CD in fact involves an innovation as fundamental for Marxist dialectics as for other branches of social theory. And it also argues that in formulating this innovation, Trotsky provided a general solution to some of the most basic problems in social and international thought. The argument is set out in three parts. The first part reconstructs Trotskys own account of dialectical premises and their implications for social explanation. The second shows how the concept of U&CD departs from this, in ways that presuppose the tacit addition of a further ontological premise. Finally, part three analyses the locus classicus of the concept – the opening chapter of Trotskys History of the Russian Revolution – showing how it is this additional premise which underpins the central achievement of the idea: its incorporation of ‘the international’ into a theory of history.

What's the matter with realism?

International relations, as an academic discipline, is not known for its strength in the area of theory. It has no immediate equivalent to the rich contrasts of perspective generated in sociology by the legacy of Max Weber, Marx and Durkheim—a lack so felt that Martin Wight once wrote a paper called ‘Why is there no International Theory?’ His own answer was, in part, that there is nothing further to theorize after the discovery of the repetitive mechanisms of the balance of power. This was a sad conclusion for such an acute and creative mind to reach. But it does illustrate a central feature of IR theory. For the balance of power, it can be argued, is the limit of any Realist theory of international relations. And Wights conclusion was perhaps more an index of the dominance of a Realist orthodoxy than a relection of the inherent properties of ‘the international’.

International relations in the prison of Political Science

In recent decades, the discipline of International Relations (IR) has experienced both dramatic institutional growth and unprecedented intellectual enrichment. And yet, unlike neighbouring disciplines such as Geography, Sociology, History and Comparative Literature, it has still not generated any ‘big ideas’ that have impacted across the human sciences. Why is this? And what can be done about it? This article provides an answer in three steps. First, it traces the problem to IR’s enduring definition as a subfield of Political Science. Second, it argues that IR should be re-grounded in its own disciplinary problematique: the consequences of (societal) multiplicity. And finally, it shows how this re-grounding unlocks the transdisciplinary potential of IR. Specifically, ‘uneven and combined development’ provides an example of an IR ‘big idea’ that could travel to other disciplines: for by operationalizing the consequences of multiplicity, it reveals the causal and constitutive significance of ‘the international’ for the social world as a whole.

Basic problems in the theory of uneven and combined development: a reply to the CRIA forum

At last: a serious intellectual debate about ‘uneven and combined development’ (U&CD). For those of us who believe that this idea holds great promise, this is a welcome moment indeed. With Neil Davidson’s (forthcoming) book-length study now on the horizon, with others pushing the idea in new directions, and with yet others taking it up across a variety of intellectual settings, it seems that the long night of silence which has enveloped Trotsky’s remarkable—and remarkably neglected—idea is finally coming to an end. The current debate fits the moment, not just in the high quality of the contributions, but also in its focus on fundamental questions of definition and meaning. Regarding these questions, each of the four pieces is differently located on a spectrum of interpretation. Sam Ashman (2009) makes a strong case that U&CD reflects the unique dynamism of capitalist society, and that any attempt to extend its reference beyond that would only blur the specificity of capitalist modernity. Davidson (2009) agrees, but he pushes the argument about specificity even further. Deploying his unrivalled grasp of Trotsky’s writings on the question, he argues that U&CD pinpoints a subset—in both space and time—of the experience of capitalist development: the sudden eruptions of urbanization and industrialization which late developers typically, but temporarily, exhibit as part of their transition to capitalism. Jamie Allison and Alex Anievas (2009), on the other hand, have staked out a position slightly to the other side of Ashman. They agree with her that the phenomenon of U&CD comes into its own only with capitalism. But they also propose that a carefully calibrated extension of the idea could solve problems in social and international theory that reach beyond the analysis of capitalist development alone. And, finally, well beyond them in turn, sits Robbie Shilliam (2009), beckoning us all onto wilder shores indeed: not capitalism and its predecessors, but race, and its role in constituting the modern world is the object to which U&CD must be applied.

Secret origins of the state: the structural basis of raison d'état

The Italian city-state system occupies a special place in the canon of orthodox international relations. For, as Martin Wight says, ‘it was among the Italian powers that feudal relationships first disappeared and the efficient, self-sufficient secular state was evolved, and the Italian powers invented the diplomatic system’. And of course this was not all they invented. In addition to the earliest modern discourse of Realpolitik (‘Machiavelli’, Carr tells us, ‘is the first important political realist’), it is in the Italian city-states that we find the first routine use of double-entry book-keeping, of publicly traded state debt, of marine insurance, of sophisticated instruments of credit (such as the bill of exchange), of commercial and banking firms coordinating branch activity across the continent, and so on. Here, too, the citizen militias gave way earliest to the mercenary armies that would later characterize European Absolutism; and within the town walls, a population given over increasingly to commerce and manufacture elaborated new forms of urban class conflict.

The elusive international

This piece responds to the critical commentaries offered in this forum. I re-state the core aspects of the thesis and emphasize four themes related to theory in response to the critics: (1) Levels of Theory, (2) Locations of Theory, (3) Disciplines of Theory and (4) Ideologies of Theory.

Confessions of a sociolator

Following recent critiques of ‘the social’ in international theory, this text revisits a contribution the author made to ‘the social turn’ in 1994. While C. Wright Mills’ The Sociological Imagination appears to survive the recent critiques, the passage of time has nonetheless revealed a quite different weakness in the author’s use of it: namely, its neglect of ‘the international’ as an object of theory. This neglect, which is indeed common to almost all ‘social theory’, is now being corrected in the growing literature on ‘uneven and combined development’.