Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2brh9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T03:07:18.276Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The force of prescriptions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 May 2009

Friedrich Kratochwil
Affiliation:
Assistant Professor of Political Science at Columbia University, New York City.
Get access

Abstract

How do norms influence choices in social life? Conceptual distinctions among types of norms and suggestions in the work of Hobbes, Hume, and Durkheim help us investigate in greater detail the “woolly” concept of regimes in international relations. When we disaggregate the “set of explicit and implicit norms, rules, and decisionmaking procedures” in a given issue area and focus on the conceptual links between rules, principles (norms), and actions, we gain an understanding of the role of norms in social life that is more comprehensive than the understanding provided by traditional accounts. Furthermore, placing the present regime discussion within wider philosophical traditions enables us to develop a more critical approach to the building of theory in the social sciences, since the use of norms as explanatory devices challenges the predominant positivist outlook in several important respects.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 1984

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. For an influential neorealist treatise see Waltz, Kenneth, Theory of International Politics (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1979)Google Scholar. The standard reference for the regime approach is Krasner, Stephen, ed., International Regimes (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983)Google Scholar.

2. For an elaboration of this criticism see Susan Strange, “Cave! Hie Dragones,” in Krasner, International Regimes.

3. This is the consensus definition adopted by the contributors to Krasner, International Regimes.

4. Articles by Arthur Stein and Robert Keohane in ibid.

5. Dworkin, Ronald, Taking Rights Seriously (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978), chaps. 2 and 3Google Scholar.

6. Hempel, Carl, “Scientific Explanation,” in Hempel, Aspects of Scientific Explanation (New York: Free Press, 1965), chap. 4Google Scholar; Popper, Karl, The Logic of Scientific Discovery (New York: Harper, 1968)Google Scholar.

7. Aristotle, Politics, bk. I, chap. 2.

8. Heymann, Philip, “The Problem of Coordination: Bargaining with Rules,” Harvard Law Review 86 (03 1973), pp. 797803CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

9. Nardin, Terry, Law, Morality and the Relations of States (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983), pp. 4, 5Google Scholar.

10. I adopt here a social-choice perspective that was imaginatively applied to international relations by Young, Oran in his “Anarchy and Social Choice,” World Politics 30 (01 1978), pp. 242–63CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Young's, Compliance and Public Authority (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1979)Google Scholar. Compare also Hardin, Russell, Collective Action (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1982). Arguing that the effectiveness of conventions in prisoner's dilemma situations requires a larger cognitive element than is the case in coordination games, Hardin shows that conventions can come into existence and guide action either when groups are small or when the overlapping nature of various activities and/or group membership creates the knowledge necessary for norm-conform action. For further discussion see chaps. 11 and 12Google Scholar.

11. Hume, David, The Philosophical Works, ed. Green, Thomas H. and Grose, Thomas H. (rpt. from the 1886 ed.; Aalen: Scientia, 1964), 2: 105.Google Scholar

12. Ibid., pp. 266 and 267f.

13. Whelan, Frederick, “Property as Artifice, Hume and Blackstone,” in Pennock, J. Roland and Chapman, John, eds., Property (New York: New York University Press, 1980), p. 112Google Scholar.

14. Hume, , The Philosophical Works, 2: 280Google Scholar.

15. This matrix is adapted from Luce, Duncan R. and Raiffa, Howard, Games and Decisions (New York: Wiley, 1957), p. 110Google Scholar.

16. See e.g. Robert Keohane, “The Demand for International Regimes,” in Krasner, International Regimes.

17. Rawls, John, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971), chap. 2, sec. 13Google Scholar.

18. On the importance of rule utilitarianism see Harasanyi, John C., “Rule Utilitarianism, Rights, Obligations and the Theory of Rational Behavior,” Theory and Decision 12 (1980), pp. 115–33CrossRefGoogle Scholar; for a critique of utilitarianism, and rule utilitarianism in particular, see Hoerster, Norbert, Utilitaristische Ethik und Verallgemeinerung (Freiburg: Karl Alber, 1971)Google Scholar.

19. This point has been eloquently made by Barry, Brian, The Liberal Theory of Justice (Oxford: Clarendon, 1973), chap. 11Google Scholar, in connection with the Rawlsian choice of (constitutional) principles. Arguing against the assumption that a rational person necessarily would choose to have more of some things rather than less (the primary goods of Rawls), Barry states: “The point which I wish to make here is that, even if it is accepted that primary goods are things each person would (other things being equal) sooner have more of than less of, it does not follow that it is rational to choose, in the original position, principles of general application for the distribution of as much as possible of these primary goods The standard liberal fallacy says, in effect, that if something is a collective good it is ipso facto an individual good; the Rawlsian fallacy says in effect that if something is an individual good it is ipso facto a collective good. It is an illicit move to go from ‘I would prefer more of X to less of X, all else remaining the same’ to ‘I should like society…’” (pp. 116–18). To the extent that McDougal and Lasswell's approach is also based on the assumption that “human dignity” as a goal of the legal order refers to “a social process in which values are widely and not narrowly shared and in which private choice rather than coercion is emphasized,” it is open to the same type of criticism. See McDougal, Myres and Lasswell, Harold, “The Identification and Appraisal of Diverse Systems of Public Order,” in Falk, Richard and Mendlovitz, Saul, eds., The Strategy of World Order, vol. 2: International Law (New York: World Law Fund, 1966), p. 55Google Scholar.

20. The classic work on collective goods is Olson, Mancur, The Logic of Collective Action (New York: Schocken, 1969)Google Scholar. For a recent critical evaluation of the collective good argument see Kimber, Richard, “Collective Action and the Fallacy of the Liberal Fallacy,” World Politics 33 (01 1981), pp. 178–96CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Frohlich, Norman, Oppenheimer, Joe, and Young, Oran, Political Leadership and Collective Goods (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1971)Google Scholar, and Richelson, Jeffrey, “A Note on Collective Goods and the Theory of Political Entrepreneurship,” Public Choice 16 (1973), pp. 7578CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21. This is what Brams and Wittman have called a “non-myopic” equilibrium. The basic idea of this conceptualization is that players can look ahead and anticipate where they might end up if an infinite number of sequential moves and countermoves is allowed. The interesting point here is that nonmyopic equilibria do not coincide with either the Nash or the Stackelberg equilibrium points in PD and Chicken games. “In both these games the ‘cooperative’ outcome is singled out as stable in the non-myopic…sense thus providing a new rationale for its choice by players who are farsighted.” Brams, Steven and Wittman, Donald, “Non-myopic Equilibria in 2 × 2 Games,” Conflict Management and Peace Science 6, 1 (1981), pp. 3862.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

22. Heymann, , “The Problem of Coordination,” pp. 722–23Google Scholar.

23. For an “economic” analysis of legal prescriptions see Calabresi, Guido and Melamed, Douglas, “Property Rules, Liability Rules and Inalienability, One View of the Cathedral,” Harvard Law Review 85 (04 1982), pp. 10891128CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

24. Rawls, Theory of Justice, chap. 1, sec. 4.

25. See Hart's, H. L. A. discussion on that point in The Concept of Law (New York: Oxford University Press, 1961), pp. 8081Google Scholar.

26. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract, bk. I, chap. 3: “Force is a physical power. I do not see what morality can result from its effects.”

27. Ross, Alf, Directives and Norms (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1968), p. 99Google Scholar.

28. Hobbes, Thomas, Leviathan, ed. Macpherson, C. B. (Baltimore: Penguin, 1968), chap. 14, p. 196Google Scholar.

29. See e.g. Hobbes's discussion on the importance of language and the common meanings of terms, and his argument about religion and the need of authoritative regulation of both areas by the sovereign: Leviathan, pt. I, chap. 4 (speech); pt. III, chap. 42 (religion); and pt. II, chap. 18 (right of sovereign to regulate).

30. Durkheim, Emile, Sociology and Philosophy, trans. Pocock, D. F. (New York: Free Press, 1974), pp. 42fGoogle Scholar.

31. Ibid., p. 69.

32. Habermas, Jürgen, Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns, vol. 2 (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1981), p. 79, my translationGoogle Scholar.

33. Durkheim, , Sociology and Philosophy, p. 45Google Scholar.

34. The fundamental distinction between rules and principles is that rules “apply in all or nothing fashion” while principles “have the dimension of weight and importance,” and thus their application usually requires trade-offs between competing values. For a further elaboration see Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously, chaps. 2 and 3.

35. I follow here mainly Flathman's, Richard discussion in his Political Obligation (New York: Atheneum, 1972)Google Scholar.

36. Here Austin's remarks about infelicities are relevant; see Austin, J. L., How to Do Things with Words (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962), p. 18Google Scholar.

37. For a more extended discussion of this point see Mayberry, Thomas, “Laws, Moral Laws and God's Commands,” Journal of Value Inquiry 4 (Winter 1970), pp. 287–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

38. For a further discussion of this point see my Is International Law ‘Proper’ Law?Archiv für Rechts und Sozialphilosophie 69 (1983), pp. 1346Google Scholar.

39. Hempel, , “Scientific Explanation,” and Popper, Karl, Conjectures and Refutations (New York: Harper, 1965), especially chaps. 3 and 10Google Scholar.

40. On the criterion of “refutability” as a criterion for “science” see Popper, Logic of Scientific Discovery. For a critique of the adequacy of this criterion in the social sciences see Habermas, Jürgen, Zur Logik der Sozialwissenschaften (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1970), and Habermas, Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns, especially chaps. 1 and 5Google Scholar.

41. Lakatos, Imre, “Falsification and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes,” in Lakatos, and Musgrave, A., eds., Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), pp. 118fCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

42. See e.g. Feyerabend, Paul, “Against Method,” Minnesota Studies for the Philosophy of Science 4 (1970)Google Scholar.

43. Lakatos, “Falsification and the Methodology.”

44. Pitkin, Hannah, Wittgenstein on Justice (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972), p. 269Google Scholar.

45. Hart, , The Concept of Law, pp. 55 and 56Google Scholar.

46. See for further elaboration Flathman, Political Obligation, chap. 2.