Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-lj6df Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T05:02:40.117Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

International practices

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 February 2011

Emanuel Adler  and
Vincent Pouliot
Emanuel Adler*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Vincent Pouliot*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, McGill University, Montréal, Québec, Canada
*
* E-mails: emanuel.adler@utoronto.ca, vincent.pouliot@mcgill.ca
* E-mails: emanuel.adler@utoronto.ca, vincent.pouliot@mcgill.ca
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In this article, we approach world politics through the lens of its manifold practices, which we define as competent performances. Studying International Relations (IR) from the perspective of international practices promises three key advances. First, by focusing on practices in IR, we can understand both IR theory and international politics better or differently. World politics can be conceived as structured by practices, which give meaning to international action, make possible strategic interaction, and are reproduced, changed, and reinforced by international action and interaction. This focus helps broaden the ontology of world politics, serves as a focal point around which debates in IR theory can be structured, and can be used as a unit of analysis that transcends traditional understandings of ‘levels of analysis’. We illustrate what an international practice is by revisiting Thomas Schelling's seminal works on bargaining. Second, with the help of illustrations of deterrence and arms control during the Cold War and of post-Cold War practices such as cooperative security, we show how practices constitute strategic interaction and bargaining more generally. Finally, a practice perspective opens an exciting and innovative research agenda, which suggests new research questions and puzzles, and revisits central concepts of our discipline, including power, history, and strategy.

Keywords

practice theoryontologysocial theorystrategic interactionsecurity practices
Type
Original Papers
Information
International Theory , Volume 3 , Issue 1 , 18 February 2011 , pp. 1 - 36
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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

Adler, E. (1991), ‘Cognitive evolution: a dynamic approach for the study of international relations and their progress’, in E. Adler and B. Crawford (eds), Progress in Postwar International Relations, New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 43–88.Google Scholar
Adler, E. (1992), ‘The emergence of cooperation: national epistemic communities and the international evolution of nuclear arms control’, International Organization 46(1): 101–145.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Adler, E. (1998), ‘Seeds of peaceful change: the OSCE's security community-building model’, in E. Adler and M. Barnett (eds), Security Communities, New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 119–160.Google Scholar
Adler, E. (2002), ‘Constructivism in international relations’, in W. Carlsnaes, T. Risse and B. A. Simmons (eds), Handbook of International Relations, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, pp. 95–118.Google Scholar
Adler, E. (2005), Communitarian International Relations: The Epistemic Foundations of International Relations, New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Adler, E. (2008), ‘The spread of security communities: communities of practice, self-restraint, and NATO's post-Cold War evolution’, European Journal of International Relations 14(2): 195–230.Google Scholar
Adler, E. (2009), ‘Complex deterrence in the asymmetric warfare era’, in T.V. Paul, P.M. Morgan and J.J. Wirtz (eds), Complex Deterrence: Strategy in the Global Age, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, pp. 85–108.Google Scholar
Adler, E.Bernstein, S. (2005), ‘Knowledge in power: the epistemic construction of global governance’, in M. Barnett and R. Duvall (eds), Power in Global Governance, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 294–318.Google Scholar
Adler, E.Crawford, B. (2006), ‘Normative power: The European practice of region-building and the case of the euro-Mediterranean partnership’, in E. Adler, F. Bicchi, B. Crawford and R.A. Del Sarto (eds), The Convergence of Civilizations: Constructing a Mediterranean Region, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, pp. 3–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Adler, E.Greve, P. (2009), ‘When security community meets balance of power: overlapping regional mechanisms of security governance’, Review of International Studies 39(special issue): 59–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Adler, E.Pouliot, V. (forthcoming), International Practices, New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Adler-Nissen, R. (2008), ‘The diplomacy of opting out: a Bourdieudian approach to national integration strategies’, Journal of Common Market Studies 46(3): 663–684.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ashley, R. (1987), ‘The geopolitics of geopolitical space: toward a critical social theory of international politics’, Alternatives 12(4): 403–434.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barnes, B. (2001), ‘Practice as collective action’, in T.R. Schatzki, K. Knorr Cetina and E. von Savigny (eds), The Practice Turn in Contemporary Theory, New York: Routledge, pp. 17–28.Google Scholar
Barnett, M.N. (1998), Dialogues in Arab Politics: Negotiations in Regional Order, New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Bigo, D. (1996), Polices en réseaux. L'expérience européenne, Paris: Presses de Sciences Po.Google Scholar
Blumer, H. (1969), Symbolic Interactionism: Perspective and Method, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Bourdieu, P. (1990), The Logic of Practice, Stanford: Stanford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bourdieu, P. (2001 [1972]), Esquisse d'une théorie de la pratique, précédé de trios études d'ethnologie kabyle, Paris: Seuil.Google Scholar
Brown, J.S.Duguid, P. (2001), ‘Knowledge and organization: a social-practice perspective’, Organization Science 12(2): 198–213.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brunnée, J.Toope, S.J. (2010), Legitimacy and Legality in International Law: An Interactional Account, New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Büger, C.Gadinger, F. (2007), ‘Reassembling and dissecting: International Relations practice from a science studies perspectives’, International Studies Perspective 8(1): 90–110.Google Scholar
Butler, J. (1990), Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Checkel, J.T. (2005), ‘International institutions and socialization in Europe: introduction and framework’, International Organization 59(4): 801–826.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cook, S.D.N.Brown, J.S. (1999), ‘Bridging epistemologies: the generative dance between organizational knowledge and organizational knowing’, Organization Science 10(4): 381–400.Google Scholar
Corradi, G., Gherardi, S.Verzelloni, L. (2010), ‘Through the practice lens: where is the bandwagon of practice-based studies heading?’, Management Learning 41(3): 265–283.Google Scholar
De Certeau, M. (1990), L'invention du quotidien 1. Arts de faire, Paris: Gallimard.Google Scholar
Der Derian, J. (1987), On Diplomacy: A Genealogy of Western Estrangement, Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Der Derian, J.Shapiro, M.J. (eds) (1989), International/Intertextual Relations: Postmodern Readings of World Politics, Lexington, MA: Lexington Books.Google Scholar
Doty, R.L. (1996), Imperial Encounters: The Politics of Representation in North-South Relations, Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Doty, R.L. (1997), ‘Aporia: a critical exploration of the agent-structure debate in International Relations theory’, European Journal of International Relations 3(3): 365–392.Google Scholar
Evangelista, M. (1999), Unarmed Forces: The Transnational Movement to End the Cold War, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Fearon, J.D. (1997), ‘Signaling foreign policy interests: tying hands versus sinking costs’, The Journal of Conflict Resolution 41(1): 68–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Finnemore, M.Sikkink, K. (1998), ‘International norm dynamics and political change’, International Organization 52(4): 847–917.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foucault, M. (1980), Power/knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings 1972–1977, C. Gordon (ed.), New York: Pantheon.Google Scholar
Foucault, M. (1990), The History of Sexuality: The Care of the Self, London: Penguin.Google Scholar
Foucault, M. (1992), The History of Sexuality: The Use of Pleasure, London: Penguin.Google Scholar
Freedman, L. (2004), Deterrence, Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Friedrichs, J.Kratochwil, F. (2009), ‘On acting and knowing: how pragmatism can advance international relations research and methodology’, International Organization 63(4): 701–731.Google Scholar
Gheciu, A. (2005), NATO in the ‘New Europe’: The Politics of International Socialization after the Cold War, Stanford: Stanford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Giddens, A. (1984), The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory of Structuration, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Goffman, E. (1959), The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, New York: Doubleday.Google Scholar
Goffman, E. (1970), Strategic Interaction, Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Goffman, E. (1977), Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Goldstein, J.Keohane, R. (1993), Ideas and Foreign Policy: Beliefs, Institutions and Political Change, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Guzzini, S. (2000), ‘A reconstruction of constructivism in international relations’, European Journal of International Relations 6(2): 147–182.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haas, P.M.Haas, E.B. (2002), ‘Pragmatic constructivism and the study of international institutions’, Millennium 31(3): 573–601.Google Scholar
Habermas, J. (1984), The Theory of Communicative Action, Vol. 1. (translated by T. McCarthy), Boston, MA: Beacon Press.Google Scholar
Hansen, L. (2006), Security as Practice: Discourse Analysis and the Bosnian War, New York: Rouledge.Google Scholar
Hellmann, G. (2009), ‘Pragmatism and international relations’, International Studies Review 11(3): 638–662.Google Scholar
Hopf, T. (2010), Social Construction of International Politics: Identities and Foreign Policies, Moscow, 1955 and 1999, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Hopf, T. (forthcoming), ‘The logic of Habit in International Relations’, European Journal of International Relations 16(4): 539–561.Google Scholar
Huysmans, J. (2002), ‘Shape-shifting NATO: humanitarian action and the Kosovo refugee crisis’, Review of International Studies 28(3): 599–618.Google Scholar
Jackson, P.T. (2006), Civilizing the Enemy: German Reconstruction and the Invention of the West, Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackson, P.T.Nexon, D.H. (1999), ‘Relations before states: substance, process and the study of world politics’, European Journal of International Relations 5(3): 291–332.Google Scholar
Jervis, R. (1976), Perception and Misperception in International Politics, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Kaplan, F. (1983), Wizards of Armageddon, New York: Simon & Schuster.Google Scholar
Katzenstein, P.J. (2010), ‘A world of plural and pluralist civilizations: multiple actors, traditions, and practices’, in P.J. Katzenstein (ed.), Civilizations in World Politics: Plural and Pluralist Perspectives, New York: Routledge, pp. 1–40.Google Scholar
Katzenstein, P.J.Sil, R. (2008), ‘Eclectic theorizing in the study and practice of international relations’, in C. Reus-Smit and D. Snidal (eds), The Oxford Handbook of International Relations, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 109–130.Google Scholar
Keck, M.E.Sikkink, K. (1998), Activists Beyond Borders: Advocacy Networks in International Politics, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Koivisto, M.Dunne, T. (2010), ‘Crisis, what crisis? Liberal order building and world order conventions’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies 38(3): 615–640.Google Scholar
Krasner, S.D. (1993), ‘Westphalia and all that’, in R.O. Keohane and J. Goldstein (eds), Ideas and Foreign Policy: Beliefs, Institutions, and Political Change, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, pp. 235–264.Google Scholar
Kratochwil, F.V. (1989), Rules, Norms, and Decisions: On the Conditions of Practical and Legal Reasoning in International Relations and Domestic Affairs, New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Kratochwil, F.V. (2007), ‘Of false promises and good bets: a plea for a pragmatic approach to theory building’, Journal of International Relations and Development 10(1): 1–15.Google Scholar
Krebs, R.R.Jackson, P.T. (2007), ‘Twisting tongues and twisting arms: the power of political rhetoric’, European Journal of International Relations 13(1): 35–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krotz, U. (2007), ‘Parapublic underpinnings of international relations: the Franco-German construction of Europeanization of a particular kind’, European Journal of International Relations 13(3): 385–417.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lake, D.Powell, R. (1999), Strategic Choice and International Relations, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Latour, B. (2005), Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network Theory, New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Leander, A. (2009), ‘Practices (re)producing order: understanding the role of business in global security governance’, in M. Ougaard and A. Leander (eds), Business and Global Governance, New York: Routledge, pp. 57–77.Google Scholar
Legro, J.W. (1996), ‘Culture and preferences in the international cooperation two-step’, American Political Science Review 90(1): 118–137.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Liklider, R.E. (1971), The Private Nuclear Strategists, Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press.Google Scholar
March, J.G. (1981), ‘Footnotes to organizational change’, Administrative Science Quarterly 26: 563–577.Google Scholar
Mead, G.H. (1964), Selected Writings, A.J. Reck (ed.), Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Mérand, F. (2008), European Defence Policy: Beyond the Nation State, New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mitzen, J. (2006), ‘Anchoring Europe's civilizing identity: habits, capabilities and ontological security’, Journal of European Public Policy 13(2): 270–285.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moravcsik, A. (2003), ‘Theory synthesis in international relations: real not metaphysical’, International Studies Review 5(1): 131–136.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morgan, P.M. (2003), Deterrence Now, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neumann, I.B. (2002), ‘Returning practice to the linguistic turn: the case of diplomacy’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies 31(3): 627–651.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neumann, I.B., Pouliot, V. (2011), ‘Untimely Russia: Hysteresis in Russian-Western relations over the past millennium’, Security Studies 20(1).Google Scholar
Onuf, N.G. (1989), World of Our Making: Rules and Rule in Social Theory and International Relations, Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Polanyi, M. (1983), The Tacit Dimension, Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith.Google Scholar
Pouliot, V. (2007), ‘ ‘Sobjectivism’: toward a constructivist methodology’, International Studies Quarterly 51(2): 359–384.Google Scholar
Pouliot, V. (2008), ‘The logic of practicality: a theory of practice of security communities’, International Organization 62(2): 257–288.Google Scholar
Pouliot, V. (2010a), International Security in Practice: The Politics of NATO–Russia Diplomacy, New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Pouliot, V. (2010b), ‘The materials of practice: nuclear warheads, rhetorical commonplaces and committee meetings in Russian-Atlantic relations’, Cooperation and Conflict 45(3): 294–311.Google Scholar
Rasche, A.Chia, R. (2009), ‘Researching strategy practices: a genealogical social theory perspective’, Organization Studies 30(7): 713–734.Google Scholar
Reckwitz, A. (2002), ‘Toward a theory of social practices: a development in culturalist theorizing’, European Journal of Social Theory 5(2): 243–263.Google Scholar
Reus-Smit, C. (1999), The Moral Purpose of the State: Culture, Social Identity, and Institutional Rationality in International Relations, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Risse, T. (2000), ‘ “Let's Argue!”: communicative action in world politics’, International Organization 54(1): 1–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rorty, R. (1982), Consequences of Pragmatism, Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Ryle, G. (1984), The Concept of Mind, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Schatzki, T.R., Knorr Cetina, K.von Savigny, E. (eds) (2001), The Practice Turn in Contemporary Theory, New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Schelling, T.C. (1966), Arms and Influence, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Schelling, T.C. (1978), Micromotives and Macrobehavior, New York: Norton.Google Scholar
Schelling, T.C. (1980 [1960]), The Strategy of Conflict, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Seabrooke, L.Tsingou, E. (2009), ‘Power elites and everyday politics in international financial reform’, International Political Sociology 3(4): 457–461.Google Scholar
Searle, J.R. (1969), Speech Acts, New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Searle, J.R. (1995), The Construction of Social Reality, New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Sewell, W.H. (1992), ‘A theory of structure: duality, agency, and transformation’, American Journal of Sociology 98(1): 1–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Snidal, D. (1985), ‘The game theory of international politics’, World Politics 38(1): 25–57.Google Scholar
Snyder, G.H.Diesing, P. (1977), Conflict among Nations: Bargaining, Decision Making, and System Structure in International Crises, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Swidler, A. (1986), ‘Culture in action: symbols and strategies’, American Sociological Review 51(2): 273–286.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Swidler, A. (2001), ‘What anchors cultural practices’, in T.R. Schatzki, K. Knorr Cetina and E. von Savigny (eds), The Practice Turn in Contemporary Theory, New York: Routledge, pp. 74–92.Google Scholar
Taylor, C. (1985), Human Agency and Language: Philosophical Papers 1, New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tilly, C. (2006), Why? What Happens When People Give Reasons… and Why, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Turner, S. (1994), The Social Theory of Practices: Tradition, Tacit Knowledge, and Presuppositions, Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Villumsen, T. (forthcoming), The International Political Sociology of Security: Rethinking Theory and Practice, New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Walker, R.B.J. (1993), Inside/Outside: International Relations as Political Theory, New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wendt, A. (1999), Social Theory of International Politics, New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wenger, E. (1998), Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning and Identity, New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wenger, E., McDermott, R.Snyder, W.M. (2002), A Guide to Making Knowledge: Cultivating Communities of Practice, Boston: Harvard Business School Press.Google Scholar
Wiener, A. (2008), The Invisible Constitution of Politics: Contested Norms and International Encounters, New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Williams, M.C. (1991), ‘The future of strategy’, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CISS) Working Paper No. 3, York University.Google Scholar
Williams, M.C. (2007), Culture and Security: Symbolic Power and the Politics of International Security, New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Wittgenstein, L. (1958), Philosophical Investigations, Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Zürn, M.Checkel, J.T. (2005), ‘Getting socialized to build bridges: constructivism and rationalism, Europe and the Nation-State’, International Organization 59(4): 1045–1079.Google Scholar