Abstract
For most men of affairs the term ‘theory’ has pejorative overtones — hence the commonly voiced criticism that although some projected policy may be alright in theory, in practice it leaves a great deal to be desired. Theory is believed to obscure rather than illuminate reality by getting between the observer and the raw data of facts and experience. To the extent that he is influenced by it, the practitioner is unlikely either to make an accurate diagnosis of the problem which confronts him or to devise appropriate prescriptions for its solution. The uselessness of theory in the field of international politics has been commented on many times. Roger Hilsman quotes one secretary of state as referring to the attics of foundations being stuffed with junk.1 And Z. Brzezinski is reported as saying that roughly 90 per cent of the research done in universities is useless and irrelevant to policy-makers.2
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Notes and References
R. Hilsman, ‘Research, Policy, and the Political Process’ in N. D. Palmer (ed.), A Design for International Relations Research Scope, Theory, Methods, and Relevance (Philadelphia: American Academy of Political and Social Science, Monograph no. 10, 1970) p. 248.
Ibid., loc. cit.
The phrase is borrowed from W. T. R. Fox. See his book The American Study of International Relations (Columbia: Institute of International Studies, University of South Carolina, 1968) p. 81.
W. T. R. Fox, ‘The Uses of International Relations Theory’ in W. T. R. Fox (ed.), Theoretical Aspects of International Relations (Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1959) p. 35.
O. R. Young, ‘The Perils of Odysseus’ in R. Tanter and R. H. Ullman (eds), Theory and Policy in International Relations (Princeton University Press, 1972) p. 180.
R. J. Lieber, Theory and World Politics (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1973) p. 8.
W. T. R. Fox (ed.), op. cit., p. 34.
D. Easton, The Political System (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1953) p. 53.
Quoted in A. A. Said (ed.), Theory of International Relations: The Crisis of Relevance (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1968) p. 1.
W. T. R. Fox (ed.), op. cit., p. 34.
A. Rapoport, ‘Various Meanings of Theory’, American Political Science Review, vol. LII, no. 4 (December 1958) p. 980.
O. R. Young, op. cit., p. 180.
H. Bull, ‘International Theory; The Case for a Classical Approach’ in K. Knorr and J. N. Rosenau (eds), Contending Approaches to International Politics (Princeton University Press, 1969) p. 21.
See for example L. F. Richardson, The Statistics of Deadly Quarrels, ed. Q. Wright and C. C. Lienau (London: Stevens, 1960) and also his Arms and Insecurity, ed. N. Rashevsky and E. Trucco (London: Stevens, 1960).
See for example, A. Rapoport, Strategy and Conscience (New York and London: Harper & Row, 1964).
See for example, C. J. Hitch, Decision-Making for Defense (University of California Press, 1965).
H. Bull, op. cit., p. 29.
O. R. Young, op. cit., p. 179.
See S. Hoffmann, ‘The International System’, The New Republic, vol. 156, no. 9 (4 March 1967) p. 26.
O. R. Young, ‘Aron and the Whale’ in K. Knorr and J. N. Rosenau (eds), op. cit., p. 143.
E. J. Meehan, The Theory and Method of Political Analysis (Homewood, Illinois: The Dorsey Press, 1965) pp. 127–67.
H. Bull, ‘The Theory of International Politics’ in The Aberystwyth Papers (London: Oxford University Press, 1972) p. 30.
Ibid., footnote, p. 30.
H. J. Morgenthau, ‘Common Sense and Theories of International Relations’, Journal of International Affairs, vol. XXI, no. 1 (1967) p. 209.
See M. Wright, Systems of States, ed. H. Bull (Leicester University Press, 1977).
Ibid., pp. 9–10.
A. Rapoport, ‘Various Meanings of Theory’, pp. 979–82.
Ibid., p. 981 (author’s brackets and italics).
W. Weaver, ‘Scientific Investigation’, Science, vol. 143, no. 3612 (20 March 1964) p. 1297.
C. P. Snow, ‘The Two Cultures and The Scientific Revolution’ in C. P. Snow, Public Affairs (London: Macmillan, 1971) pp. 13–80.
H. Bull in Knorr and Rosenau (eds), op. cit.
J. D. Singer, ‘The Incompleat Theorist’ in ibid., pp. 85–6.
Susan D. Jones and J. D. Singer, Beyond Conjecture in International Politics (Itasca, Illinois: F. E. Peacock, 1972) p. 4.
Ibid., p. 3.
Ibid., loc. cit.
J. D. Singer (ed.), Quantitative International Politics: Insights and Evidence (New York: The Free Press, 1968) p. 2.
Ibid., loc. cit.
Ibid., p. 17.
S. D. Jones and J. D. Singer, passim.
See C. A. W. Manning, The Nature of International Society (London: G. Bell and Sons, 1962
M. A. Kaplan, System and Process in International Politics (New York: John Wiley, 1957).
C. K. Ogden and I. A. Richards, The Meaning of Meaning: A Study of the Influence of Language Upon Thought and of the Science of Symbolism, 8th edn (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner and Co., 1946) p. 149.
C. L. Stevenson, Ethics and Language (Yale University Press, 1944) p. 71 (author’s brackets).
R. Pettman, Human Behaviour and World Politics: A Transdisciplinary Introduction (London: Macmillan, 1975) p. 19.
R. Dahl, ‘The Behavioral Approach in Political Science: Epitaph for a Movement to a Successful Protest’, American Political Science Review, vol. LV, no. 4 (December 1961) p. 767.
M. J. Levy, Jr., ‘“Does It Matter if He’s Naked?” Bawled the Child’, in Knorr and Rosenau (eds), op. cit., p. 105.
G. A. Almond and S. J. Genco, ‘Clouds, Clocks and the Study of Politics’, World Politics, vol. XXIX, no. 4 (July 1977) p. 510.
H. Bull in Knorr and Rosenau (eds), op. cit., p. 26.
Quoted by C. Bay, ‘Politics and Pseudopolitics: A Critical Evaluation of some Behavioral Literature’, American Political Science Review, vol. LIX, no. 1 (March 1965) p. 39.
S. Andreski, Social Sciences as Sorcery (London: Andre Deutsch, 1972) p. 116.
R. Pettman, op. cit., p. 14.
M. Banks, ‘Two Meanings of Theory in the Study of International Relations’, Yearbook of World Affairs 1966 (London: Stevens and Sons, 1966) p. 231.
H. Bull in Knorr and Rosenau (eds), op. cit., p. 28.
R. G. Collingwood, The Idea of History (Oxford University Press, 1946) p. 214.
Ibid., p. 213.
Ibid., loc. cit.
Ibid., p. 214.
E. H. Carr, What Is History? (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1964).
See H. P. Rickman (ed.), W. Dilthey Selected Writings (Cambridge University Press, 1970) p. 15.
C. A. W. Manning, op. cit., p. 31.
Ibid., p. 32.
K. E. Boulding, The Image: Knowledge in Life and Society (University of Michigan, 1956). See in particular his Introduction, pp. 3–18.
Ibid., p. 6.
P. Winch, The Idea of a Social Science and Its Relation to Philosophy (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1958) pp. 40–66.
H. Bull, The Anarchical Society: A Study of Order in World Politics (London: Macmillan, 1977) pp. 16–19.
P. Winch, op. cit., p. 53.
K. E. Boulding, op. cit., p. 172.
J. N. Rosenau, The Scientific Study of Foreign Policy (New York: The Free Press, 1971) p. 19.
Ibid., p. 14.
R. D. McKinlay and R. Little, ‘The U.S. Aid Relationship: A Test of Recipient Need and the Donor Interest Models’, Political Studies, vol. XXVII, no. 2 (1979) pp. 236–50.
Ibid., p. 247.
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© 1984 John C. Garnett
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Garnett, J.C. (1984). ‘Classical’ and ‘Scientific’ Theory. In: Commonsense and the Theory of International Politics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-17504-8_1
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