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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 October 2009
It is my contention that theories of international relations derive from or can be reduced to two basic arenas of discourse, which I term pluralist and structuralist in their central preoccupations.
1. ‘Pluralism’ subsumes under one heading both the ‘realist’ idea of each state against the others and the ‘internationalist’ notion that world affairs are predicated upon an international society. These are the ‘Hobbesian’ and the ‘Grotian’ traditions respectively, so-called by Wight, M. in ‘Western Values in International Relations’, Diplomatic Investigations, Butterfield, H. and Wight, M. (eds.) (London, 1967)Google Scholar, and developed by Bull, H., The Anarchical Society (London, 1976), pp. 24–6Google Scholar; ‘Martin Wight and the Theory of International Relations’, British Journal of International Studies, ii (1976)Google Scholar.
2. This falls within the European tradition of ‘universalist’ doctrines; the ‘Kantian’ construct of Wight and Bull. In using this term, I might add, I do not deliberately allude to that anthropological school of ‘structuralism’ associated particularly with the works of Levi-Strauss. There is, however, a parallel in that anthropological structuralists look for underlying phenomena, for basic ‘structures’ that explain external occurrences, rather than confining themselves to a description of ‘surface particulars’ alone, or explaining such structures in turn in terms of social functions as a prominent school of sociological analysis is wont to do. In attempting to uncover the social logic of global industrialization, to see how this is reflected in the surface practice and appearance of world affairs, we witness the same instinct at work. See Giddens, A., Studies in Social and Political Theory (London, 1977)Google Scholar.
3. Hobsbawm, E., Industry and Empire (London, 1968), p. 1Google Scholar.
4. Landheer, B., On the Sociology of International Law and International Society (The Hague, 1966), p. 7CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
5. Kubalkova, V. and Cruickshank, A., ‘A Double Omission’, British Journal of International Studies, ii (1977), p. 295Google Scholar.
6. There are a number of pluralist positions. The view I have sketched is not universally shared in all its features by pluralist theorists. There are, furthermore, important differences between the American and continental schools. This difference is not discussed here, but see the works of the English pluralists, in particular — J. N. Figgis, F. Maitland, H. Laski and G. D. H. Cole. Also Hsaio, K. G., Political Pluralism (London, 1957)Google Scholar; Magid, H. M., English Political Pluralism (New York, 1941)Google Scholar; Nicholls, David, The Pluralist State (London, 1975)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; The Bias of Pluralism, Connolly, W. E. (ed.) (New York, 1969)Google Scholar.
7. See e.g. Warren, Bill, ‘Imperialism and Capitalist Industrialisation’, New Left Review, 81 (1973), p. 4Google Scholar, for a particularly clear statement of this position.
8. Ibid. p. 10.
9. Ibid. pp. 20, 35. For a list of the devices conferred by formal political independence which ‘must’ in the end sustain economic advance (undifferentiated), see p. 12.
10. Emmanuel, A., ‘Myths of Development versus Myths of Underdevelopment’ New Left Review, 85 (1974), p. 77Google Scholar.
11. Loc. cit.
12. Adelman, I. and Morris, C. T., Economic Growth and Social Equity in Developing Countries (Stanford, California, 1973).Google Scholar
13. Krippendorff, E., ‘Towards a Class Analysis of the International System’ Acta Politica, (1975), pp. 7–8.Google Scholar For Wallerstein's tripartite picture, see his ‘The Rise and Future Demise of the World Capitalist System: concepts for comparative analysis’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, v (1974)Google Scholar.
14. Riad, Hassad, L'Egypte Nasserienne (Paris, 1964), p. 41Google Scholar.
15. On the concept of ‘production by invitation’ see Wallerstein, I., ‘Dependence in an Interdependent World: the limited possibilities of transformation within the capitalist world economy’, African Studies Review, xvii (1974), pp. 14–15Google Scholar.
16. Ibid. p. 6. Its essential features include ‘the creation of a single world division of labor, production for profit in this world market, capital accumulation for expanded reproduction as a key mode of maximizing profit in the long run, emergence of three zones of economic activity (core, semi-periphery, and periphery) with not merely unequal exchange between them but also persistent merchandise trade imbalances, a multiplicity of state structures (strongest in the core, weakest in the periphery) and the development over time of two principal class formations (a bourgeoisie and a proletariat) whose concrete manifestations are however complicated by the constant formation and reformation of a host of ethnic-national groupings’. Wallerstein, I., ‘The Three Stages of African Involvement in the World-Economy’, The Political Economy of Contemporary Africa, Gutkind, P. and Wallerstein, I. (eds.) (Beverly Hills, 1976), pp. 30–31Google Scholar.
17. I. Wallerstein, ‘Dependence in an interdependent world’,op. cit. p. 7.
18. Wallerstein, I., ‘Class and Class Conflict in Africa’, Monthly Review, xxvi (1975), p. 37Google Scholar.
19. Mazrui, A., ‘Modernization and Reform in Africa’, Economics and World Order, Bhagwati, J. (ed.) (New York, 1972), p. 294Google Scholar.
20. Tucker, R., Nation or Empire? (Baltimore, 1968), p. 123Google Scholar; see also The Radical Left and American Foreign Policy (Baltimore, 1971)Google Scholar, and Cohen, B. J., The Question of Imperialism (New York, 1973)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
21. Sione Tupounina, ‘The State in Post-Colonial Societies: Some theoretical notes,’ unpublished m/s, p. 30.
22. Rosecrance, R. and Stein, M., ‘Interdependence: myth or reality?’, World Politics, xxvi (1973), pp. 1–27CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Young, O., ‘Interdependencies in world polities’, International Journal (1969), esp. pp. 730–4Google Scholar; Deutsch, K., ‘The impact of communications upon international relations theory’. Theory of International Relations, Said, A. (ed.) (New Jersey, 1968)Google Scholar; Waltz, K., ‘The Myth of National Interdependence’, The International Corporation: A symposium, Kindleberger, C. (ed.) (Boston, 1970)Google Scholar.
23. Luard, E., Types of International Society (New York, 1976), p. 50Google Scholar. Choosing a number of such societies that have occurred in history — in China, ancient Greece, the European age of soverigns, of dynasties, of nationalism — he compares them from the point of view of a number of defining sociological features — the nature of their elites, elite motivation and political methods, the pattern of stratification, the structure of their interactions, the roles performed by individual unit members, their styles of social control, their institutions and basic ideologies.
24. Ibid. p. 50.
25. e.g. Galtung, J., ‘A Structural Theory of Aggression’, Journal of Peace Research, i (1967), pp. 95–119Google Scholar.
