Theory / Ideology

There has been a growing disciplinary interest in ideology within IR in recent years. This is at least in part the result of changes in the real world of international politics, including the gradual emergence of a more diffuse and de-centred international order with correspondingly higher levels of ideological heterogeneity, and the increasing challenge to the liberal international order posed by politicisation and the rise of populism.

How to combine the insights of ideological analysis with IR is something that has been subject to much debate, both within and between mainstream and critical approaches. While mainstream perspectives have generally sought to use theory as a means of comprehending the influence ideologies – and related domestic political categories – have on foreign policy, more critical approaches have rather sought to uncover the ideological attributes of IR theories themselves.

The articles in this virtual Special Issue all contribute in their own way to thorny debates about the relationship between IR theories and political ideologies. In so doing, they raise important questions for the discipline concerning the objectivity of our existing theoretical tools, the separation of international from ‘domestic’ politics (and the power of this move), and the relevance of contemporary changes in international thought.

The works from the 1990s reflect the disciplinary preoccupations of the time. Howard’s article begins with the Cold War problematic of competing universalist ideologies, highlighting the mutual denial of pluralism and the difficulties of internationalism and reminding us that perspectives on the international cannot be separated from underlying political projects. Rosenberg’s critique of realism – “the conservative ideology of the exercise of state power” – and Jahn’s later depiction of the ‘state of nature’ as a ruling ideology, reflect – and actively problematise – the disciplinary dominance of realism. Behr and Heath, in their contribution, see realism as an ideology that is deeply rooted in the politics of the twentieth-century, showing how realist ideology manipulates political action through positing objective ‘realities’.

The more recent articles extend research on ideology in new directions. Holthaus and Steffek show how individual scholar-practitioners actively translated academic knowledge into praxis at key moments in the construction of the international order. De Orellana and Michelsen chart the internationalism of the New Right, helping in the process to problematise the view that nationalism and internationalism lie in opposition to one another. Abrahamsen looks at the diversity of international world-views in Pan-Africanism, helping correct for the Eurocentric focus in ideology studies, and showing how the recovery of marginalised worldviews challenges dominant narratives on the progressiveness of liberal order. And Schindler looks at how critical theory in IR can account for the relativisation of facts and defend itself against ideology critique.

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