Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-29T23:56:42.924Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Theorizing Politics, Politicizing Theory, and the Responsibility That Runs Between

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 May 2009

Piki Ish-Shalom
Piki Ish-Shalom
Affiliation:
Department of International Relations, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

What are social science theorists' responsibilities for the effects of their theories in the real world? I maintain that politicians and ideologues place theories in their political agendas without necessarily heeding their actual content. Hence, the ramifications of theories in the real world are mostly the result of political uses and, at times, political abuses. Consequently, theorists cannot be held morally responsible for these. They do, however, bear the obligation to examine if there are some intrinsic features of theorization and theory that render these susceptible to public misinterpretation and vulnerable to political abuse. Pointing to the rhetorical capital inherent in theories, and supported by examples involving democratic-peace theory and its political destinies, I conclude that, to discharge this task, social science theorists should substitute the prevailing objective ethic with a normative one.

Type
Research Article
Information
Perspectives on Politics , Volume 7 , Issue 2 , June 2009 , pp. 303 - 316
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 2009

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

Ashley, Richard K. 1986. The poverty of realism. In Neorealism and its Critics, ed. Keohane, Robert O.. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Ashley, Richard K. 1987. The geopolitics of geopolitical space: Toward a critical social theory of international politics. Alternatives 12 (4): 403–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Babst, Dean V. 1964. Elective governments—A force for peace. Wisconsin Sociologist 3 (1): 9–14.Google Scholar
Berger, Peter L., and Luckmann, Thomas. 1967. The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge. New York: Anchor Books.Google Scholar
Boot, Max. 2003. “What Next? The Bush Foreign Policy Agenda beyond Iraq.” Weekly Standard, May 5, 27–33.Google Scholar
Borer, Douglas A. 2006. Rejected by the New York Times? Why academics struggle to get published in national newspapers. International Studies Perspectives 7 (3): vii–x.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brock, Lothar, Geis, Anna, and Müller, Harald. 2006. Introduction: The theoretical challenge of democratic wars. In Democratic Wars: Looking at the Dark Side of Democratic Peace, ed. Geis, Anna, Brock, Lothar, and Müller, Harald. Basingstoke, England and New York: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Büger, Christian, and Villumsen, Trine. 2007. Beyond the gap: Relevance, fields of practice and the securitizing consequences of (democratic peace) research. Journal of International Relations and Development 10 (4): 417–48.Google Scholar
Bush, George W. 2006 “President Bush Discusses Progress in the Global War on Terror.” Cobb Galleria Centre, Atlanta, Georgia: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/09/20060907-2.html (accessed 18 October 2007).Google Scholar
Connolly, William E. 1973. Theoretical self-consciousness. Polity 6 (1): 5–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Connolly, William E. 1993. The Terms of Political Discourse, 3rd ed.Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
De-Shalit, Avner. 2006. Power to the People: Teaching Political Philosophy in Skeptical Times. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.Google Scholar
Fleurbaey, Marc. 2001. Egalitarian opportunities. Law and Philosophy 20 (5): 499–530.Google Scholar
Goodin, Robert E. 1998. Social responsibility as a collective social responsibility. In Social Welfare and Individual Responsibility: For and Against, ed. Scmidtz, David and Goodin, Robert E.. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Graham, Keith. 2000. Collective responsibility. In Moral Responsibility and Ontology, ed. van den Beld, Ton. Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers.Google Scholar
Ish-Shalom, Piki. 2006. Theory as a Hermeneutical mechanism: The democratic peace and the politics of democratization. European Journal of International Relations 12 (4): 565–598.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ish-Shalom, Piki. 2007–2008. The civilization of clashes: Misapplying the democratic peace in the Middle East. Political Science Quarterly 122 (4): 533–54.Google Scholar
Ish-Shalom, Piki. 2008a. The rhetorical capital of theories: The democratic peace and the road to the roadmap. International Political Science Review 29 (3): 261–301.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ish-Shalom, Piki. 2008b. Theorization, harm, and the democratic imperative: Lessons from the politicization of the democratic-peace thesis. International Studies Review 10 (4): 680–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackson, Patrick Thaddeus, and Kaufman, Stuart J.. 2007. Security Scholars for a Sensible Foreign Policy: A study in Weberian activism. Perspectives on Politics 5 (1): 95–103.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jedlicki, Jerzy. 1990. Heritage and collective responsibility. In The Political Responsibility of Intellectuals, ed. Maclean, Ian, Montefiore, Alan, and Winch, Peter. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jones, Ward E. 2006. Philosophers, their context, and their responsibilities. Metaphilosophy 37 (5): 623–45.Google Scholar
Kaplan, Lawrence F., and Kristol, William. 2003. The War Over Iraq: Saddam's Tyrany and America's Mission. San Francisco: Encounter Books.Google Scholar
Lepgold, Joseph. 1998. Is anyone listening? International relations theory and the problem of policy relevance. Political Science Quarterly 113 (1): 43–62.Google Scholar
Lucas, J.R. 1993. Responsibility. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Lyne, John. 1998. Rhetoric and scientific communities. In Rhetoric and Community: Studies in Unity and Fragmentation, ed. Hogan, J. Michel. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Mansfield, Edward D., and Snyder, Jack. 2005. Electing to Fight: Why Emerging Democracies Go to War. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, David. 2001. Distributing responsibilities. Journal of Political Philosophy 9 (4): 453–71.Google Scholar
Miller, David. 2004. Holding nations responsible. Ethics 114 (2): 240–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Myrdal, Gunnar. 1969. Objectivity in the Social Research. New York: Pantheon Books.Google Scholar
Netanyahu, Benjamin. 1996. “Address by his Excellency, Binyamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel.” U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington DC: http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getpage.cgi?position=all&page=H7161&dbname=1996_record (accessed 8 Feb. 2007).Google Scholar
Oneal, John R., and Russett, Bruce. 1997. The classical liberals were right: Democracy, interdependence, and conflict, 1950–1985. International Studies Quarterly 41 (2): 267–94.Google Scholar
Payne, Rodger A. 2007. Neorealist as critical theorists: The purpose of foreign policy debate. Perspectives on Politics 5 (3): 503–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Putnam, Hilary. 2002. The Collapse of the Fact/Value Dichotomy and other Essays. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Ray, James Lee. 1997. The democratic path to peace. Journal of Democracy 8 (2): 49–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reiter, Dan, and Stam, Allan C.. 2002. Democracies at War. Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scanlon, T.M. 1998. What We Owe to Each Other. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Schafer, Mark, and Walker, Stephen G.. 2006. Democratic leaders and the democratic peace: The operational codes of Tony Blair and Bill Clinton. International Studies Quarterly 50 (3): 561–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Searle, John R. 1995. The Construction of Social Reality. New York: The Free Press.Google Scholar
Shenhav, Shaul R. 2005. Thin and thick narrative analysis: On the question of defining and analyzing political narratives. Narrative Inquiry 15 (1): 75–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, Steve. 2004. Signing our world into existence: International relations theory and September 11. International Studies Quarterly 48 (3): 499–515.Google Scholar
Smith, Tony. 2007. A Pact with the Devil: Washington's Bid for World Supremacy and the Betrayal of the American Promise. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Szacki, Jerzy. 1990. Intellectuals between politics and culture. In The Political Responsibilities of Intellectuals, ed. Maclean, Ian, Montefiore, Alan, and Winch, Peter. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wallerstein, Immanuel. 1979. The Capitalist World-Economy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wallerstein, Immanuel. 1984. The Politics of World-Economy: The States, the Movements and the Civilizations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Walt, Stephen M. 2005. The relationship between theory and policy in international relations. Annual Review of Political Science 8: 23–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Waltz, Kenneth N. 1986. Reflections on theory of international politics: A response to my critics. In Neorealism and its Critics, ed. Keohane, Robert O.. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Waltz, Kenneth N. 1997. Evaluating theories. American Political Science Review 91 (4): 913–17.Google Scholar
Weber, Max. 1949. The Methodology of the Social Sciences, trans. ed, and. Edward A. Shils and Henry A. Finch. Glencoe, IL: Free Press.Google Scholar
Widmaier, Wesley W. 2004. Theory as a factor and the theorist as an actor: The “pragmatist constructivist” lessons of John Dewey and John Kenneth Galbraith. International Studies Review 6 (3): 427–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Young, Iris Marion. 2004. Responsibility and global labor justice. Journal of Political Philosophy 12 (4): 365–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar