Suchergebnisse

AbstractThis article takes as its starting point the failure of the so-called normative
wing of the English School to theorise the foundational determinants of value
from which international society derives its normative character. In other
words, they have not adequately thought through 'the law behind the
law'; that is, the underlying basis of obligation in international
life. Thus, English School theorists are able to describe and to explain various
norms but they cannot make sense of the reasons why any of these norms should be
regarded as obligatory. Failure in this regard is attributable in large part to
the way in which pluralist and solidarist conceptions of international life are
typically understood as representing conflicting moral claims. This article
seeks to move beyond these seemingly incommensurable claims, and the debate to
which they give their names, by putting forward an account of obligation that
reconciles the unity of human community and the freedom of international society
in a single, intellectually coherent argument. The article concludes by arguing
that a normative version of English School theory formulated in this way opens
space for thinking through much of what still confounds the English School,
including the normative character of political economy, the existence of a
rational order of values, and the ever elusive meaning of world society.