1 The Power of Soft Theory: Theorising the Context of Discovery in Historical International Relations Adam Humphreys, University of Reading
Draft paper prepared for EISA conference, Sicily, Sep 2015. Please do not cite without permission. Updated 18/09/15
In a recent critique of disciplinary divides in International Relations (IR), Lake (2011) distinguished strongly between theoretical and epistemological divisions. Whereas he offered clear prescriptions for overcoming what he regards as pathological competition among theoretical sects, he identified a
o e e du i g di ide et ee o ologi al a d a ati e fo s of e pla atio Lake : . This is a familiar refrain. While grand theoretical debates in IR are in retreat (see Sil & Katzenstein 2010; Dunne et al 2013), the idea of a categorical division between theory and history is notably recalcitrant.1 This idea is, however, problematic, for it leaves little space for inquiry which is both theoretical and historical: theoretical in the sense that it draws on well integrated sets of ideas that are not peculiar to individual empirical episodes, but also historical in the sense that it nonetheless respects evidence of the particularity of those episodes Given the methodological constraints which flow from our interest in s all u e s of i o pa a le complex e e ts Wohlfo th : 41), we urgently need to make sense of how theory can inform history without determining it.2
The principal reason that the idea of a categorical distinction between history and theory in IR is so e al it a t is the sa e easo that I‘ s pe e ial histo -theory debates have tended to devolve into mutual recrimination: theorists tend to view history through the lens of a strong conception of theory.3 If we conceive of theory as a deductively-linked system of propositions, geared to produce candidate causal generalizations (and predictions) which are capable of being tested, then it is hard
1Theo a d histo a e te s, ot Lake s. The disti tio et ee the is e al it a t ot just i the fa e
of a decline in grand theoretical debates but also in the face of attempts by historical sociologists to bridge (grand) theory and history and the recent move away from diplomatic and international history and towards a more global history. Notable exceptions include Suganami (2008) and Lawson (2012).
2I speak he e of histo as a ode of i ui , e plo ed i IR, not of Histo as a i stitutio alized dis ipli e
with its own journals, conferences, university departments, professional associations and the like.
3 Selected examples of I‘ s histo -theory debates from across the years include Knorr & Rosenau (1969); the
2 to see how it could contribute to historical inquiry.4 For rather than orienting the historian within the complexity and uncertainty of a process of inquiry, this kind of theory prescribes what the historian would have to find for the theory to be sound. E p essed i Kapla s terms (1964: 13): while this strong conception of theo a e ade uate to the o te t of justifi atio , it is ot ade uate to the o te t of dis o e . Whereas in the context of justification the aim is to stipulate the standards an explanation is required to meet, the context of discovery is where explanations are developed. In the context of justification, it is obvious how a strong theory could be tested against an independent historical record (if such a thing exists) and why such a goal might be desirable. But if we can predict what the evidence will show, then there is no need for a process of exploration, interpretation and narration.
A perennial complaint from international historians is that IR theo ists use histo to illust ate theo , athe tha de elopi g theo ies hi h a e used to deepe ou u de sta di g of histo (Ingram 1997: 62). One way in which theorists have ducked this challenge is to distinguish among the aims of theorists and historians while insisting that they employ the same kind of theory. For example, Levy (1997: 22) argues that [h]istorians describe, explain, and interpret individual events or a temporally bounded series of events, whereas political scientists generalize about the
relationships between variables , but that both tasks involve theory. It is then but a short step to the complaint that historians are not sufficiently explicit about the assumptions and causal laws which, theorists suppose, must drive their interpretations (Levy 1997: 31). What such arguments fail to consider is that when international historians discuss the role of theory in history they are, for the most part, discussing how theory contributes to the process of inquiry. Inevitably, therefore, they have in mind a rather softer conception of theory. My aim in this paper is to consider what kind of theory this might be and to examine the implications for our understanding of the relationship between history and theory in IR. In doing so, I draw principally on the work of historians. My aim is not to establish standards for historical explanation (see Mahoney, Kimball, and Koivu 2009), but rather to understand how such explanations may be constructed.5
There is good reason to think that some kind of theory must play a role in historical inquiry. It involves, among other things, discovering evidence, interpreting it, and arranging the results in a
4 This is, nonetheless, the conception of theory which predominates in IR s history-theory debates (see
Schroeder 1997: 66; Elman & Elman 2001b: 13-14). This is also the conception of theory which narrativist historians and philosophers of history reject (see Veyne 1984: 90; Mink 1987).
5 Mahoney, Kimball and Koivu s (2009) argument speaks to the context of justification, rather than the context
3 comprehensible narrative. This requires historians to decide which questions to ask, to focus on some possibilities rather than others, to employ a conceptual scheme, and to interpret evidence in light of certain understandings of how the world (usually) works. These activities are all theoretical at least in the sense that they draw on relatively well integrated sets of ideas that are not peculiar to individual historical episodes. Moreover, although this is rarely acknowledged in IR, the discipline of History is teeming with ideas about the nature of theory and the contribution it makes to historical inquiry.6 Moreover, there is a clearly discernible middle ground in which historians a ept that the
ediate past ealit th ough … sha ed atego ies of a al sis a d o eptualisatio ut strongly reject fitti g e e ts i to a p e o ei ed patte (Munslow 2006: 25). This middle ground is
particularly favoured by international historians, as e p essed, fo e a ple, i T a hte e g s : 30, 32) lai that the histo ia has to ake … [the fa ts] speak d a i g on a kind of theory but that this theo is ot a su stitute fo e pi i al a al sis. It is a engine of a al sis .
What is missing here is an account, in terms recognizable to social scientists, of precisely how this kind of soft theory functions as an engine of analysis. I propose that we can make sense of what these middle ground international historians say about how theory contributes to historical inquiry by construing theory as a form of conceptualization to which ideal-typical theoretical expectations are integrally linked. Soft theory provides a conceptual vocabulary which constructs evidence as being evidence of a certain kind of thing, while the associated expectations provide a picture of how thi gs t pi all ha g togethe ‘uggie : , a pi tu e that orients inquiry by highlighting particular features of empirical episodes as being more or less puzzling and hence more or less in need of explanation. However, there is no expectation that these expectations are borne out in practice: the theory orients inquiry without determining what it will find. Indeed, the process of historical explanation, viewed from this perspective, involves homing in on the conceptualization which best assimilates the evidence to our conventional understandings of how the world ordinarily works. Soft theory therefore provides the a necessary baseline from which historical inquiry can proceed, rather than being an alternative to historical inquiry.
I contend that this account of the nature of theory and how it contributes to historical inquiry makes better sense of what many international historians say or imply about the role of theory in history than is available when we approach the issues through the lens of strong theory. It also makes sense of the practice of many international historians and IR theorists who engage with history. Indeed, I
6 Following convention, I use History (capitalised) to refer to the institutionalised discipline and history to refer
4 show that a range of theorists and historians who have sought to explain the relative peacefulness of the nineteenth-century Concert system are all plausibly understood as drawing on soft theory in the manner I lay out.
However, my aim is not merely to articulate how theory can contribute to the process of discovery in history, but also to raise broader questions about the relationship between history and theory in IR. An important corollary of my argument is that the histories which international historians (and IR theorists) develop do not constitute an independent historical record against which strong theories might reliably be tested. This is what Smith (1999: 7) terms the historical problem in IR, viz. that
there are histories, not history . To point this out is not to advance an argument against the pursuit of strong theory in IR, but rather to clarify the contingent nature of any apparent consensus against which such a theory might be tested. My argument also carries implications for how we think about the relationship between both history and theory on the one hand and policy-making on the other. For if histories themselves are theoretically laden, if the theories historians employ in constructing their histories function in ideal-type fashion, and if the credibility of strong theories as a predictive tool rests on their having been tested against which histories which are themselves products of ideal-type theoretical expectations, then seeking to learn lessons from either history or theory really consists in transferring ideal-type theoretical expectations from one domain to another.
In developing this argument I proceed as follows. In the first section I make the case that although strong theory is inadequate to historical inquiry, history must, nonetheless, be theoretical, at least in a certain sense. In the second section I turn to the discipline of History, including the philosophy of history, to explore alternative ideas about how theory contributes to historical inquiry, identifying a middle ground position around which many international historians appear to cluster. In the third section I reconstruct the logic of this middle ground position in ideal-type terms. In the fourth section I make the case that both historians and theorists of the nineteenth-century Concert system are plausibly understood as drawing on this kind of theory. I then return, in the conclusion, to the implications for the relationship between theory, history, and policy-making.
Theory and the Possibility of Historical Inquiry
5 the selection of an object of inquiry and that this necessarily involves theory. As he put it: the shee i fi it of so ial life akes e hausti e des iptio of e e of the s allest aspe t of it i possible.
All cognitive knowledge of infinite reality ests upo the i pli it p esuppositio that at a o e ti e o l a fi ite pa t of this ealit … [is] " o th k o i g"'. Historical knowledge is hence by defi itio knowledge f o a spe ifi poi t of ie We e : , that is, a poi t of ie hi h identifies some (and only some) aspects of social life as worth knowing. The point is not just that historians interpret events, but that the spatial and temporal boundaries of events are just as much creations of the historian as they are natural phenomena (see Isacoff 2009: 72): whereas social life is continuous both spatially and temporally, history singles out particular elements, under particular descriptions, as deserving special attention.
To some, this may seem so obvious as to hardly require stating, but it opens the door to theory in significant ways.7 For as Carr (2001: 97) points out: o sa e histo ia p ete ds to do a thi g so fantastic as to e a e the hole of e pe ie e ; he a ot e a e o e tha a i ute f a tio of the fa ts e e of his hose se to o aspe t of histo . It follo s f o this that histo a ot consist in the o pilatio of a a i u u e of i efuta le a d o je ti e fa ts Ca : .
When we seek to know the facts, the questions which we ask, and therefore the answers which we o tai , a e p o pted ou s ste of alues Ca : .8 Carr (2001: 3) therefore rejected the e pi i ist , o o on-se se ie of histo as o sisti g of a o pus of as e tai ed fa ts … a aila le to the histo ia s i do u e ts … like fish o the fish o ge s sla .9 He argued (2001: 18) that the histo ia s fa ts
a e eall ot at all like fish o the fish o ge s sla . They are like fish swimming about in a vast and sometimes inaccessible ocean; and what the historian catches will depend, partly on chance, but mainly on what part of the ocean he chooses to fish in and what tackle he chooses to use – these two factors being, of course, determined by the kind of fish he wants to catch. By and large, the historian will get the kind of facts he wants. History means interpretation.
Weber (2004: 374) famously argued that the e is o o je ti e a al sis of so ial phe o e a independent of spe ial a d o e-sided pe spe ti es, o the asis of hi h su h phe o e a a e
7 Moreover, it is accepted even by traditional historians (see, for example, Hexter 1971: 37-8).
8 This led Carr to articulate a proto-theory of historical revisionism: that when, shaped by their own social and
histo i al o te ts, histo ia s alues ha ge, so do the uestio s the ask, e e a out the same historical episodes (Carr 2001: 118; see also Martin 1982).
9 The empiricist position he criticizes is sometimes characterized as realist or reconstructionist (see Munslow
6 … sele ted as a o je t of esea h, a al sed a d s ste ati all ep ese ted . In other words, the same perspective which is involved in the selection and demarcation of a historical episode as an object of inquiry also contributes to its conceptual representation. This thought is also taken up by Carr (2001: 5) in his famous insistence that a fact is like a sack –it o t sta d up till ou e put so ethi g i it. Historians have to actively decipher evidence (Carr 2001: 10), such that our picture of the facts is unavoidably oulded the atego ies th ough hi h e app oa h them and hence also our values Ca : . Carr therefore depicts the historian as playing an active role in the production of histories: he e take up a o k of histo , he a gued : - , ou fi st
o e should e ot ith the fa ts it o tai ed ut ith the histo ia ho ote it . Histo is ot an unmediated record of the past, but rather emerges out of a p o ess of i te a tio et ee the historian and his facts, an unending dialogue between the present a d the past Ca : .
Another way in which the historian plays an active role, according to Carr, is in arranging (already theoretically laden) evidence in a historical interpretation. Even his description of the traditional, empiricist approach to history gives a sense of this: Carr (2001: 3) describes empiricists as believing that the histo ia olle ts the fa ts the takes the home and cooks and serves them in whatever st le appeals to hi . Ca s o ie : is that [t]he fa ts speak o l he the histo ia
alls o the : the histo ia de ides to hi h fa ts to gi e the floo , a d i hat o de o o te t . Carr was, of course, unfamiliar with what was to become the narrative turn in History (see Munslow
, though his all fo the histo ia to e a i e hi self a d his o positio i histo Ca 2001: 134) is very much in line with the kind of reflexivity that is increasingly called for in History today, if little practised in international history (see Finney 2001).
7 as a othe Ca : . The histo ia has a dut to espe t his fa ts , i ludi g oth he ki g that they are accurate and bringing all knowable facts into the picture, but this does not eliminate interpretation, which is the life-blood of histo Ca : ; see also Ca : .
Ca s a gu e t as di e ted agai st a e pi i ist u de sta di g of history and in favour of the idea that theory must be theoretical. But his argument also implies that history cannot be theoretical in the strong sense invoked i I‘ s histo -theory debates.10 Levy (1997: 32) is right that the question of whether history involves theory is not at stake in these debates. Ingram (1997: 53, 55-6), Schroeder (1997: 66-7) and Gaddis (1997: 83) all accept that history involves theory. Schroeder (1997: 66) even states, strikingly, that ost a ati e histo ies, i ludi g ost o k i i te atio al history, are clearly nomothetic in the sense that they develop hypotheses, assign particular causes fo e e ts a d de elop e ts, a d esta lish ge e al patte s . However, Schroeder (1997: 65-6) also explicitly rejects Levy s (1997: 22) claim that historians and theorists differ only insofar as the former focus on the particular and the latter on the general (see also Ingram 1997: 53; Gaddis 1997: 83).11 Moreover, “ h oede s contention that history is nomothetic cannot be taken at face value given his rejection of theoretical approaches which seek to u o e la like, st u tu al o elatio s as ha i g o eal o e tio [to histo ] at all “ h oede : .12 What is at stake in these debates is not whether history involves theory, but how theory contributes (see Smith 1999: 24).
Ingram (1997: 53) observes that the historian standing in the past is content to look around him and is supposed not to know ahead of ti e hat a tu up e t . The aim of strong theory is precisely to relieve such uncertainty. Armed with a strong theory, the historian will know what must happen next if the theory is sound.13 In other words, the historian need not even consult the evidence except to check that her theory is indeed sound (see Smith 1999: 3). As Ingram (1997: 56) objects, this kind of theory functions as a alte ati e to the e ide e athe tha a a of aki g o e of it . He observes, moreover (Ingram 1997: 55, 53), that because theorists have already drawn the pattern of what the e pe t to fi d efo e the i ui egi s and then merely colour it in, they
10 This articulation of a middle ground position explains the strong reactions Carr received. As Evans (2001:
i otes, the depi tio of Ca so e de o st u tio ists as a u ege e ate e pi i ist is as disto ted as the depi tio of hi so e t aditio alists as a out-and-out elati ist .
11 They, like many historians, reject the idea that they only explain the particular. To the extent that any
histo ia s a ept this, Ve e s : ualifi atio is i po ta t: histo is i te ested i the spe ifi it of i di idual e e ts athe tha i thei si gula it .
12Trachtenberg (2006: 28) also appears to embrace strong theory before backtracking, arguing that 'historical
e pla atio … should to the e te t possi le ha e a ki d of dedu ti e st u tu e', ut the ualif i g this insisting that the historian 'has to take care not to push the effort too far'.
13 It is sound if its argument is valid (its conclusions are entailed by its assumptions) and its assumptions are
8 sometimes end up recounting visions of the past which are unrecognizable to historians (see also Osiander 2007). However, like other international historians, Ingram (1997: 55) explicitly recognizes that the histo ia s a igatio of the process of historical inquiry implies – and demands –a theo . What he denies is that theorizing first and then illustrating the theory (Ingram 1997: 58) is plausible as a model of historical inquiry. In order to understand in what sense historical inquiry is theoretical, we require a different conception of theory.
We might, of course, accept that strong theory can tell us little about the process of historical inquiry but insist that it provides an appropriate standard for historical explanation. That standard, which is widely accepted among IR theorists, is that an explanation must show that an outcome was to be expected in the circumstances and also indicate why it was to be expected.14 In other words, strong theorists might be understood as demanding that a sound historical explanation must be susceptible to reformulation as a set of causal generalizations linking conditions of a certain type to outcomes of a certain type, a set of causal generalizations which could, in principle, be tested in other historical scenarios.15 This would retain the connection that IR theorists such as Levy seek to draw between theoretical and historical explanations. But when we turn to the process of discovery we would still face the question of what kind of theory might actively contribute to historical inquiry.
Furthermore, even when understood as articulating a standard for historical explanation, there is a degree of misfit between strong theory and history. For advocates of this standard seem to want to have things both ways. They demand that historical explanations must be theoretical, in the sense that they must be susceptible to generalization as strong theories subject to systematic testing.16 Yet they also demand that history can be regarded as a bank of presumably theory-free data against which such (proto-)theories might be tested. These two demands are hard to reconcile with one another and are individually hard to reconcile with ost histo ia s understandings of history as a realm of interpretations, not data. For example, Schroeder (1997: 68-9) argues that what a historian does in the p o ess of histo i al i ui is to seek to de elop a e , ette s opti judge e t , that is, a oad i te p etatio of a [histo i al] development based on examining it from different angles to determine how it came to be, what it means, and what understanding of it best integrates the a aila le e ide e. He adds that although historical controversies may seem to involve disputes
14 Suganami (2008) rejects this understanding of explanation entirely.
15 This is precisely the demand which Mink (1987) rejects when he insists that historians conclusions are not
detachable, but integral.
16 As Suganami (2008: 331) points out, this has the odd implication that historical explanations which meet the
9 about the fa ts, the a e i fa t o fli ts et ee diffe i g s opti judge e ts (see also Mink 1987).
Schroeder (1997: 68-9) insists that these synoptic judgements can and should involve theory, but he is at pains to stress how different the process of historical inquiry is from the formulating and testing of hypotheses. The challenge this poses is that of understanding how the histories against which strong theories might be tested are formulated. To do this, we need to think differently about what kind of theory might contribute to historical inquiry and in what way. For this purpose, it is helpful to turn to the discipline of History. For despite the growth of critical theory in IR, there has been little interest in developing alternative accounts of how theory contributes to explanation.17 In History, by contrast, there is an extensive debate about the extent to which, and the way in which, historical inquiry is (or must be) informed by theory.
Conceptions of Theory in History
Carr is now a somewhat unfashionable figure in History: his sympathy for determinism in history and his establishment sensitivities, especially his focus on political elites, were out of kilter with the turn towards social and cultural history in the 1960s (Evans 2001: xxxvii).18 However, his contention that all histo ia s a ied so e ki d of pe so al o eptual, i telle tual a d politi al aggage ith the when they went into the archive, and his warning that the sources which they used had their own
iases too is, a o di g to E a s : ii , o ada s pa t of the asi o eptual e uip e t of the histo i al p ofessio . I deed, Mu slo : a gues that the t aditio al ie of histo as an empirical research method based upon the belief in some reasonably accurate correspondence
et ee the past … a d its a ati e ep ese tatio is o lo ge … te a le see also No i k . There is a far wider range of views in History today about the nature of theory and the role that it plays tha i Ca s ti e, but the debate is very much focused on the context of discovery.19 The question is to what extent historical inquiry, from the discovery and interpretation of evidence through to the plotting of narratives, is necessarily informed by theory and what implications that
17 Some theorists have, nonetheless, begun to point towards the need for such alternative accounts (see Sil &
Katzenstein 2010; Humphreys 2011). I understand critical theory to involve a rejection of explanation as a goal of theory.
18 However, this kind of disposition may have survived more among diplomatic historians than elsewhere in
History (see Haber, Kennedy & Krasner 1997: 38; Finney 2001).
19 The range of positions to be found in History may be surprising to those IR theorists used to thinking of
10 carries for History as a discipline. Much of this debate is relevant to our understanding of the
relationship between history and theory in IR.
There is no consensus in History on the nature of the contribution theory makes to historical inquiry. However, Munslow (2006) distinguishes three archetypal positions. Reconstructionism refers to the
o o se se e pi i ist t aditio , criticized by Carr, in which history is construed as a craft i ol i g o je ti e a d fo e si esea h i to the sou es , su h that the o e a efull e do it … the o e a u ate e a e o e, a d the lose e get to … k o i g histo as it a tuall
happe ed (Munslow 2006: 20, 22).20 Reconstructionists have no choice but to make the proto-theoretical moves described by Weber: selecting and demarcating events as objects of explanation and employing a conceptual vocabulary. They also recognize that historians, fo e a ple, fo ulate rough h potheses a d ake judge ents about what histo i al te po a ati es should employ (Hexter 1971: 24, 37-8), but they do not regard this as theory. Constructionists explicitly reject an empiricist picture of history and both read and cite social theory. This is especially common among social and cultural historians who are committed to telling the stories of marginalised groups (see Munslow 2006: 20, 26). Indeed, Sewell (2005: 3) observes that such figures as Clifford Geertz, Antonio Gramsci, Michel Foucault, and Pierre Bourdieu – not to mention Karl Marx, Max Weber, and Emile Durkheim – have become something like household names in contemporary historical
dis ou se . Deconstructionists share the constructionist rejection of empiricism but place less e phasis o e pli it social scientific theorising a d o e o literary theory. The tend to view history and the past as a complex series of literary products that derive their chains of meaning(s) or signification from the nature of narrative structure … as much as from other culturally provided ideologi al fa to s Munslow 2006: 21). Indeed, Munslow (2006: 27) argues that the linguistic turn has aused all histo ia s to thi k self-consciously about how we use language – to be particularly aware of the figurative character of our own nar ati e as the ediu hi h e elate the past .
The extent to which all these positions involve theory may be somewhat obscured by the terms of debate in History. First, many historians conceive of History, compared to the social sciences, as being distinctively non-theoretical even though in practice they draw on theoretical ideas (Jordanova 2006: 62). Sewell (2005: 11) observes that many historians do not recognize their understanding of, fo e a ple, te po alit as ei g a atte of theo at all, but simply as how the world works, as the e e fa tualit of thi gs . What i I‘ ould e ega ded as theo is ega ded i Histo as a ki d of p ofessio al o o se se . Consequently, histo ia s do t o t i ute to theo eti al
11 debates even when their ideas about matters such as temporality are more sophisticated than those of social scientists (Sewell 2005: 5-6). Second, many reconstructionist historians reject the idea that history is theoretical because they have in mind a strong conception of theory. For example, Ma i k : des i es hi self as doi g pu el e pi i al histo as disti t f o spe ulati e philosoph of histo see also A de le , hile a histo ia s lai to e just doi g histo as distinct from applying explicit theo ies su h as Marxism, structuralism, discourse theory, or fe i is Ful ook : . Third, the sense in which deconstructionist history is theoretical may be obscured by the fact that it involves a focus on the distinctive qualities of narratives (see Mink 1987; White 1987), which had previously been used to differentiate history from the social sciences (see Gallie 1963; Dray 1971).
These divergent perspectives on the role of theory in historical inquiry highlight the importance of “ ith s o se atio : that 'diffe e t ki ds of histo ia s tu to theo fo diffe e t easo s, just as different theorists use history for a variety of ends'. However, Munslow (2006: 24) observes that most historians range themselves around the methodological point at which constructionism
a hes f o e o st u tio is . These historians are dubious about strong forms of
constructionism: they ask how histo a approximate what actually happened in the past when, in effect, all it does is generate explanations grounded in contemporary cultural practices, and hence is ideologi all tai ted (Munslow 2006: 21). But for those who combine a form of constructionism
ith a ati e e pi i is , o st u tio ist model-making is not taken necessarily to involve fitting events into a preconceived pattern (Munslow 2006: 25): explanatory frameworks are used to enrich our understanding of human agency, not to deny it. Relatedly, Munslow (2006: 10) notes that the most recent develop e t ithi de o st u tio is has ee the e e ge e of a e e pi i is that has a k o ledged the post ode iti ue, espe iall of histo s dis u si e o st u tio , but
hi h has o etheless sought to etai e pi i is , though … i so e ki d of odified form, as the ed o k of histo . In other words, there is a popular middle ground among these positions which accepts that historians rely on explanatory frameworks, and which accepts that any representation of the past is linguistically mediated, but which also recognizes that the histo ia s i te p etatio is sharply constrained by the evidence.21
21This is, of ou se, oughl Ca s positio , ut ith t o ualifi atio s: fi st, he was concerned with the
12 Pe haps the lea est a ti ulatio of this iddle g ou d positio i Histo toda is Ful ook s
defence of historical theory against both reconstructionism and deconstructionism.22 The feature of her work which locates her at the intersection of reconstructionism and constructionism is her soft characterisation of what historical theory involves. She insists that e e histo ia s ho … lai to
e si pl doi g histo … a e o ki g ithi odies of assu ptio s of hi h the a e o e o less a a e (Fulbrook 2002: 4).23 Yet these are not substantive social theoretic assumptions of the kind associated with constructionism, but softer kinds of assumptions about, for example, what is al ead o o k o ledge … hat to look fo a d he e to look fo it … [and] how to define who are the key historical actors Ful ook : ). According to Fulbrook (2002: 10), othe esse tiall theo eti al p o le s i lude f a i g uestio s, de isi g app op iate o eptual f a e o ks, [a d] assessi g hat is al a s theo eti all etted e ide e (see also Jordanova 2002: 62). In other words, this kind of soft theory contributes to the context of discovery by marking out objects of inquiry, providing a conceptual vocabulary, and indicating priorities for investigation. Fulbrook (2002: 10) also observe that the o epts a d ethodologi al tools hi h histo ia s use a e ope to a e d e t a d de elop e t i the p o ess of i ui . Soft theory is therefore a tool that is flexible enough to contribute to historical inquiry without determining it, but also robust enough that the histories it helps generate must be recognized as interpretations, not data.
I o te d that ost i te atio al histo ia s e pli it a gu e ts a out the ole of theo i histo occupy this middle ground. While international historians have, for a long time, criticized purely narrative conceptions of history (see Thorne 1983), some have now begun to embrace theory more explicitly, none more so than Trachtenberg (2006: vii), ho a gues that good histo i al o k has to ha e a st o g o eptual o e : in order to ake se se of the e ide e, the histo ia e ui es a
e tai se se fo ho thi gs o k . T a hte e g the efo e e a es the idea that histo i al i ui is theoretically informed, but also qualifies this, insisti g that theo does ot p o ide a ead -made answers. Instead, it serves to generate a series of specific questions you can only answer by doi g e pi i al esea h . I othe o ds, theo is ot a su stitute fo e pi i al a al sis. It is a engine of a al sis. It helps ou see hi h spe ifi uestio s to fo us o T a hte e g : . A similar pattern emerges among other international historians. For example, Ingram (1997: 56) accepts that a historical narrative i plies a theo a d t ies to ad a e its de elop e t , ut also insists that a theoretically-i fo ed a ati e continues a discussion instead of claiming to be a proof'.
22He te s a e e pi i is a d post ode is Ful ook : .
23 She therefore makes common cause with constructionists against reconstructionists (see, for example,
13 This soft conception of theory also underpins what international historians say about historical facts and the role of generalization in historical inquiry. Trachtenberg (2006: 30) follows Carr in arguing that [t]he fa ts e e eall just speak fo the sel es . The histo ia … has to ake the speak
d a i g o a ki d of theo . This is idel a epted oth i te atio al histo ians and IR theorists (see Elman & Elman 2001: 3), but it is important to recognize the soft conception of theory
hi h T a hte e g is a gui g ust i fo histo ia s i te p etatio of the fa ts o , o e p ope l , the evidence).24 Gaddis (2002: 62) argues that it is uite o g to claim that historians reject the use of theory, for theory is ultimately generalization, and without generalization historians would have nothing whatsoever to say. The very words we use generalize complex realities. Ho e e , we must, once again, bear in mind his understanding of the nature of theory: he explicitly qualifies this statement about the role of generalization in historical inquiry by noting that whereas for social scientists the aim is to confirm a hypothesis, histo ia s normally embed our generalizations within our narratives … We ge e alize fo pa ti ula pu poses Gaddis 2002: 62-3).
Thus whe eas the issue i I‘ s histo -theory debates is whether history is theoretical and, if it is, whether international historians are sufficiently explicit about it, the debate within History is subtly different. Here, the issue is not whether history is theoretical but what role theory plays. The position in question is a middle ground between a last-ditch defence of the idea that history is an empirical discipline and a full-scale adoption of social theory as the motor of historical inquiry. International historians reject both of these possibilities, while also implicitly repudiating
deconstructionism (see Finney 2001). They accept that history must embrace theory, but reject the strong conception of theory which IR theorists suppose must underpin their explanations.
International historians are therefore not quite the traditionalists implied in the image of diplomatic historians as refugees from a discipline overtaken by social history (see Elman & Elman 1997: 6, 16; Haber, Kennedy & Krasner 1997). It is important to recognize this, for if we view international historians as traditional empiricist historians, it is only a small step from here to the view that the histories they produce may be employed as data against which strong theories may be tested. By contrast, the conception of theory employed in the middle ground, while softer than that employed by either constructionist historians or IR theorists, is too strong for the histories it helps to generate to be regarded as data. Indeed, it is a key contention of the middle ground that histories are necessarily incomplete representations of the past (Gaddis 2002: 26). As Gaddis (2001: 308) puts it,
14 a histo is a d a atizatio : a ep ese tatio of ealit , ot ealit itself. This is why understanding the sense in which theory contributes to historical inquiry is important for IR: because it impacts on the ways in which histories may be used in IR.
That said, international historians do not spell out the form taken by their soft conception of theory or how precisely it shapes the process of historical inquiry. How can theory be an engine of analysis without providing ready-made answers? What does it mean to say that generalizations are
embedded within narratives? Ho a theo e a guide fo f a i g uestio s , ut also a te plate fo a s e i g the “ ith : , all ithout o st ai i g the a ilit of the histo ia to follow where the evidence leads? In the next section I go further than international historians have in spelling out how soft theory can contribute to historical inquiry without determining what the historian must find.
Making Sense of the Middle Ground: Theory as an Ideal-Type Resource
One popular alternative to strong theory is the Bourdieusian conception of theo as a set of thi ki g tools Ja kso : . This conception of theory is criticised by defenders of strong theory on the grounds that using different combinations of tools in each case hampers cross-case generalization (see Kiser 1996: 258; Levy 1997: 31-2). I agree that it is less than fully satisfactory, though for a different reason, viz. it fails to specify what form theories take and what functions they serve when drawn upon. I contend that a more helpful idea, found explicitly or implicitly in the work of many historians and philosophers of history, is that theories are generalized pictures of how the world works which are not claimed to be descriptively accurate but rather function as ideal-types.25 As Weber (2004: 387) explains, a ideal t pe is ot a representation of the real, but seeks to provide
ep ese tatio ith u a iguous ea s of e p essio . Ideal-types prescribe a way of marking out events, provide a conceptual vocabulary for doing so, and indicate what we would expect to happen under idealized conditions. They thereby direct inquiry by prompting the historian to ask to what extent what happened matched these idealized expectations and to focus on explaining what is highlighted, from this perspective, as the particularity of the case under investigation.26 As Weber
25 I claim that they function as ideal-types, not that they are explicitly developed as ideal-types. For a
discussion of how an ideal-type suitable for use in historical inquiry may be developed, see Humphreys (forthcoming B).
26 Of course, investigating what appears, from the perspective of one ideal-type as a particularity, may require
15 : puts it: Historical research has the task of determining in each individual case how close to, o fa f o , ealit su h a ideal t pe is . Thus in contrast to strong theory, there is no suggestion that when reality (as it usually will) deviates from the ideal-type this constitutes a failing.
The power of an ideal-type conception of theory for making sense of how historical inquiry can be theoretical is twofold. First, it links concepts to a more substantive set of theoretical expectations. This e eals h soft theo is dese i g of the la el theo . If soft theo e el o sisted in the fact that the historian inevitably has to make choices about what to study, what scope parameters (temporal, geographical, social, etc.) to impose, what to focus on, and what descriptive terminology to employ, then we might ackno ledge that su h hoi es a e likel to efle t the histo ia s o values, but insist that having made such choices the historian can proceed in essentially empirical fashion to explore what happened and why. This is the stance adopted by reconstructionists: they acknowledge the need to make choices which structure inquiry but do not regard this as severely u de i i g Histo s status as a e pi i al dis ipli e. And this suggests, in turn, that history might constitute an uncontroversial domain of data against which strong theories might be tested.
Ideal-type concepts are not merely labels, but also express idealized expectations about our object of inquiry. Thus, for example, describing an action as being of a particular kind is conceptually linked to expectations about the conditions under which such actions are performed and about their likely consequences. T a hte e g : a gues that a histo i al i te p etatio is ot pie ed
together from observed phenomena; it is rather what makes it possible to observe phenomena as ei g of a e tai so t, a d as elated to othe phe o e a .27 It is the same with an ideal-type. We do not assemble historical data and then choose appropriate labels, but rather construct the data by describing (the evidence of) what happened by means of a conceptual scheme which not only labels particular phenomena but also thereby positions them in relation to other kinds of phenomena.
If this is beginning to sound like a constructionist imposition of a theoretical framework which dictates to the historian what she must find, then this is where the second aspect of an ideal-type conception of theory comes in. Because we do not expect to find ideal-types precisely reproduced in reality, the associated expectations serve as a baseline for analysis, rather than a prescription. By articulating a set of idealized expectations about what will happen and why, a well-theorized ideal-type provides a way of explaining actions and outcomes that do align with those expectations. It
27 He is citing Hanson, one of the few philosophers of science in the post-war era to devote significant
16 also prompts the historian to focus on the points where the individual case diverges from those expectations, thereby orienting the inquiry in a particular direction. Finally, it invites comparisons with other phenomena conceptualized in the same way, even though they may differ in detail. In other words, the generalizations on which historians draw retain an element of fluidity: historians do not typically claim that human action is a realm of empirical regularities, but rather that explaining human actions draws on generalizations about human propensities, while remaining open to the play of the particular.
It is important to recognize, moreover, that historians never address a tabula rasa: their data is already theoretically-laden. Evidence from the past is itself theoretically-laden in the sense that it utilises the conceptual vocabulary and associated expectations of past actors. As Osiander (2007) points out, this requires the historian to judge whether it is reasonable to conceptualize historical phenomena in terms that are familiar in the present but would not have been familiar to the actors themselves.28 In addition, historians often respond to earlier histories which have proved incapable of satisfactorily synthesizing a particular conceptualization of the evidence with our best theories about how the world (ordinarily) works. Historians will reconceptualize elements of such histories in order to, as Schroeder (1997: 68- puts it, ea h a e , ette s opti judge e t that i teg ates
the e ide e i a ette , o e o p ehe si e a d p ofou d a . This reconceptualization will involve a new theoretical baselines which will highlight different aspects of the object of inquiry as deviating from our idealized expectations. Thus when an ideal-type theory is employed, it does not so much impose a framework which prescribes how the evidence is to be interpreted as to bring a different perspective to the inquiry.
To see briefly how concepts can be integrally connected to idealized theoretical expectations which se e to o ie t i ui , o side Ki to s a gu e t that the g o i g political influence of the G7 in the late 1980s and early 1990s is explained by its concert-like features. In conceptualizing the G7 as a concert, Kirton was clearly doing more than labelling features of the G7 identified through a purely empirical inspection. First, he was seeking to overturn a previous way of thinking which had treated the G7 like any other post-1945 international institution and supposed that its limited bureaucratic capacity would constrain its effe ti e ess. “e o d, Ki to a gued that the G s o e t -like features became more pronounced over time, notably as the end of the Cold War furthered the effective concentration of global power within the G7. This suggests that the concert idea functions as a theoretical baseline which the reality approaches to different degrees at different times. Third,
17 Kirton used his conceptualization of the G7 as a concert to orient inquiry towards a crucial tension this highlighted: between, on the one hand, the need to minimize bureaucratic machinery in order to retain the flexibility and low transaction costs that make the concert model attractive to great powers and, on the other hand, the need for the G7 to develop institutional machinery in order to implement its agreements. Whether or not we accept it, it should be clear that his conceptualization is associated with a theoretical baseline which orients inquiry towards some questions rather than others and invites a comparison between the actual case and the expectations associated with that baseline.29
This ideal-type construal of how soft theory can contribute to the process of historical inquiry is not explicitly endorsed by many historians. It does, however, make sense of a range of common claims made by historians about the nature of historical inquiry. For example, Ringer (1989: 156-7) argues that historians use generalizations, but that they are imperfect, ha a te isti all a d fo the ost pa t ge e alizatio s hi h a e su je t to odifi atio i the ou se of histo i al e pla atio as it e o es lea that othe p o esses o o ditio s di e ted hat e e h potheti all posited as the o di a ou se of e e ts. More broadly, this conception of theory offers a plausible construal of
hat histo ia s ea he the talk of o ki g theo ies see “e ell : 6) which guide inquiry but in a manner that allows pursuit of the evidence wherever it leads.30 Similarly, it makes sense of how historians cope with ausal hete oge eit (Sewell 2005: 10): they draw on generalized models but expect particular cases to deviate from those models to some extent. Finally, it can account for
h , i Mi k s 7: fa ous fo ulatio , histo ia s o lusio s a e e e deta ha le ut a e athe i g edie t i the a gu e t itself : histo ia s o lusio s a e ot detachable because the generalizations they employ do not subsume their cases, but rather provide a baseline for describing both the generality and the particularity of their cases.
Co st ui g the histo ia s soft theo as a ideal-type resource also helps to make sense of how historians can draw on strong theories in a way that still allows a meaningful process of historical inquiry to take place. “e ell : otes that histo ia s ofte use so ial theo to o ie t thei thinking, or borrow its vocabulary in their interrogation of historical sources or in formulating their a gu e ts ut fi d that the o epts do t uite fit, that the eed to e adjusted, ua ed, o combined with concepts from other, apparently incompatible, theoretical discourses in order to be useful (see also Jordanova 2006: 67). One way of understanding this is that historians treat what
29 For a more detailed discussion of the characteristics of a concert ideal-type see Humphreys (forthcoming B). 30 It also offers a suggestive way of thinking about what Bates et al (1998: 12) might mean when they describe
18 are intended as testable generalizations as idealized sets of expectations from which explanations are permitted to depart as required by the specifics of the case. In other words, they employ such theories as heuristic resources (Humphreys 2011). This is suggested by Ve e s : , des iptio of a theo as the summary of a prefabricated plot' which is utilized as a heu istic de i e a d Mi k s : suggestio that historians regard generalized hypotheses not as potential laws but as guides hose se i es the e plo … the histo ia see s to use h potheses as suggestively rather than deductively fe tile.31 Historians treat hypotheses as relating to how things might normally be expected to work out, not as claims about what must have happened in any particular case.
This conception of soft theory can also make sense of what international historians mean by some of their more cryptic remarks about how theory contributes to the process of historical inquiry. For example, an ideal type might be understood as an engine of analysis or template which does not itself provide ready-made answers in the sense that it provides an idealized picture which orients the inquiry but from which deviation is required in the construction of any particular explanation. We might also construe the thought experiments which Gaddis (1997: 76) identifies as being central to the process of historical inquiry in ideal-typical terms, while generalizations might be regarded as embedded in narratives in the sense that idealized sets of expectations are always adjusted to the particularity of the case. Finally, construing theory in ideal-type terms might help make sense of the gap between synoptic judgements and inferences from deductive frameworks: historical inquiry requires judgement in the sense that there is no algorithm telling the historian how to bridge the gap between an idealized set of expectations and the particularity of the case. Consequently, there can also be no algorithm for evaluating a historical explanation: we can ask to what extent an explanation makes sense of the available evidence and fits with what our best theories tell us about how the world (usually) works, but whether an individual explanation fits well enough with evidence and theory for us to accept it must involve a degree of judgement.
Theory and History in (the) Concert
I contend that this ideal type interpretation of how soft theory can contribute to the process of historical inquiry not only makes se se of a i te atio al histo ia s othe ise so e hat pti pronouncements on the role of theory in history, but also captures how at least some international
31Pu hala : a gues that I‘ theo fails dedu ti el ut e e theless offe s a i h a d e iti g a a of
19 historians and IR theorists actually operate when engaging with historical international relations. To illustrate this, I briefly review how two theorists (Jervis and Mitzen) and two historians (Schroeder and Schulz) set about explaining the relative peacefulness of the 19th-century Concert system. These authors are chosen because they each illustrate my thesis, though in subtly different ways, even though they represent a range of views on how the relative peacefulness of the Concert system is best explained. While I do not evaluate their competing positions, I do aim to demonstrate the plausibility of an ideal type model of how soft theory contributes to the context of discovery in historical international relations, whether undertaken by IR theorists or international historians.32
Jervis (1985) provides a rationalist explanation for the relative peacefulness of the Concert system. He argues (1985: 59) that under balance of power politics states a e est ai ed o l e te ally, by what others are doing, or by the anticipation of what others will do : the order which emerges is a product of the clash of competing self-interests. By contrast, concerts arise after major wars which alte the pe ei ed pa offs ge e ati g u usually close bonds among the states of the counter-hege o i oalitio , i ludi g a olle ti e i te est i est ai i g the defeated hegemon, and by u de i i g the pe eptio that a is a legiti ate i st u e t of state aft Je is : . However, as e o ies of the a fade , so the o ds a o g the i to s a d pe eptio s of the costs of war erode, undermining concert-like cooperation (Jervis 1985: 61-2).
This might be construed as a straightforward example of how strong theory can be used to develop a historical explanation: Jervis employs abstract reasoning to derive theoretical expectations then shows how they were borne out in practice (see, for example, Jervis 1985: 63). However, much of Je is s p a ti e is ette aptu ed by an ideal-type model of how theory contributes to historical explanation. First, although Jervis focuses on the Concert of Europe, he also identifies nascent concerts as having arisen in 1919-20 and 1945-46, and while he argues that the same theoretical
aseli e a e applied, he also a k o ledges that [d]iffe e t fa to s e e at o k i ea h of the th ee pe iods (Jervis 1985: 58). Indeed, he notes that the different outcomes in the three cases is partly explained by the different perceptions of the actors as to the causes of the preceding hegemonic war and the different measures taken to reduce the threat from the former hegemon (Jervis 1985: 65, 67-8). Second, when he turns to a more detailed analysis of the 19th-century concert, he complicates his theoretical baseline by introducing new factors such as the perceptions by the French people of the legitimacy of their new regime, the emergence of altruistic motives and
32 For an exploration of the kinds of considerations that would have to come into play if we were to seek to
20 ties among the great powers, and the procedural norms of the Concert, including the o al alue they acquired (Jervis 1985: 67, 71). As he acknowledges (Jervis 1985: 68), such factors have no place in the structural logic of a purely rationalist analysis. In other words, when he turns to a more historical mode of inquiry, he treats his theory as a baseline set of idealized expectations which structure his inquiry by highlighting the particularities of his case which stand in need of explanation.
The sense in which Mitzen (2013) can be understood as deploying theory in an ideal-type fashion emerges through an understanding of her overall project. Her principal concern is not to explain the relative peacefulness of the Concert system, but rather to develop a theory of how global
governance is possible through collective intentions and collective agency, especially in the absence of a hegemon (Mitzen 2013: 1, 17). “he the efo e de elops a theo of i te atio al pu li po e (Mitzen 2013: 5) which explains how institutionalized international forums can support the
emergence of joint commitments. Her discussion of the Concert of Europe is intended to illust ate the theo eti al f a e o k : she p o ides a st lized a ou t athe tha a full histo Mitze : 18, 66). However, she also seeks to p o ide histo i al evidence of the rise of particular conditions a o g Eu opea states that ade it possi le fo i te state o it e ts a d fo u s to p odu e international public power for the first time (Mitzen 2013: 65). This is where the ideal-type nature of her approach emerges.
Mitzen (2013: 63-4) does not seek to show that her theory of international public power is sufficient to explain the (relatively) peaceful governance of the European system after 1815. Rather, she seeks to show that the Vienna Settlement made i te atio al pu li po e possi le a d that the g eat po e s joi tl , i te tio all p odu ed the lo g pea e that follo ed . I othe o ds, the e e ge e of international public power is a necessary part of the story, but only a part. Thus, for example, she does not deny that balance of power politics operated during the Concert period, but rather denies that a balance of power approach captures everything important (Mitzen 2013: 22).33 Her theory therefore does not offer a set of testable predictions about the conditions under which public power will emerge (see Mitzen 2013: 51). It does, though, provide a conceptual prism through which concert institutions are to be viewed, and that in turn is connected to a set of idealized theoretical expectations about the potential of these new fora to produce international public power. But these expectations are not determinate: the implicit claim is that we have to examine, in any particular episode of concert diplomacy, the extent to which the outcome is explicable in terms of the
33 She advances similar arguments against arguments from British hegemony, cultural commonality and
21 operation of international public power, recognizing that aspects of balance of power politics, hegemonic leadership, cultural commonality, and systemic-but-not-collective thinking are also in play. Indeed, this is precisely what is at stake in her recent exchange with Rendall (see Goddard et al 2015): if we view her theory as a strong theory, proposing a determinate and testable explanation of concert diplomacy, then it fails, whereas if we view it as a theoretical baseline from which deviation is only to be expected in particular instances, then it is rather illuminating.
Although he does not articulate a theory as such, Schroeder is critical of histories which focus on explaining motives and decisions. He argues (1972: xiv, xvi) that the reasons actors give are often really justifications of actions which are principally shaped by the systemic context. He is therefore committed to de elopi g a s ste i app oa h to i te atio al histo , a d o e i hi h olle ti e mentalities and assu ptio s a e gi e just as u h p o i e e as st u tu es a d fo es of
ha ge “ h oede : . However, this commitment does not determine what he will find. He a gues that et ee a d the e as a fu da e tal t a sfo atio i the governing
ules, o s, a d p a ti es of i te atio al politi s “ h oede : . But the easo he ide tifies such a transformation is not that his theoretical commitments dictate this (after all, mentalities and assumptions can remain constant, as well as change) but rather that he finds a conceptualization of international politics in terms of the balance-of-power adequate for the 18th-century but not for the 19th-century. He argues that such a conceptualization can make sense of neither the distribution of power in the 19th-century (Schroeder 1992) nor of its language and norms (Schroeder 1989). He therefore argues that a transformation takes place at two levels. The fundamental change is in the development of systemic thinking: the great powers begin to consider the equilibrium of the European order as a whole (Schroeder 1989: 141-2).34 They are able to achieve such an equilibrium because of hegemonic imbalances at both a systemic and local level (Schroeder 1992: 692-3).
The ideal-type fashion in which Schroeder draws on his theoretical commitments therefore emerges at various levels of the analysis.35 First, he works with some quite general assumptions about the nature of social order, but these are orienting assumptions, not testable generalizations. Second, he tries out different conceptualizations of the 19th-century international system (in terms of balance-of-power politics or in terms of political equilibrium within a hegemonic distribution of power), treating these not just as conceptual labels but as interpretive frameworks that come along with
34 Although Schroeder emphasizes systemic thinking, this need not imply collective intentionality of the kind
emphasized by Mitzen.
35 Levy (1994) is o e o e ed a out the eso a es et ee “ h oede s a gu e t a d diffe e t
22 their own attendant set of expectations about how international politics will typically operate. Third, while theory clearly orients his inquiry, the specifics of his explanations are very much driven by the particularity of the historical case. He works with an overall vision of the problem of systemic order, but recognizes that this is worked out in different ways in different systems (see Schroeder 1986: 26; 1993: 128).
Whereas Schroeder (1994: v) begins his narrative by stressing the centrality of rules, norms, and practices, in practice he often focuses more centrally on the hegemonic distribution of power within the Concert system (see Schroeder 1986, 1992). And whereas for Schroeder (1986: 12) the rules and norms associated with the Concert are just part of what produced a relatively peaceful system, Schulz (forthcoming) adopts a more explicitly constructivist approach, focusing on how new norms arose out of the procedures of concert diplomacy, notably the frequent ambassador conferences. Schulz (2007: 45) therefore conceptualizes the o e t as a institution hi h as e a led to pla a
egulati e fu tio pa tl e ause its ultu al patte s e e idel i te alized . Ho e e , he e og izes that the ha a te a d pe eptio of the o e t e ol ed ith ti e a d also that the egulatio of state eha iou th ough i stitutio uildi g i the i te atio al a e a is a o -linear, u stead , a d e e si le p o ess . As ith “ h oede s app oa h, the efo e, “ hulz s is shaped ideas about the nature of social order and how it changes, but these ideas do not prescribe what he finds in particular episodes. Schulz interprets the Concert as a more substantive institution, wielding greater legal and normative authority, than did earlier historians. But this interpretation is driven by the finding that the ambassador conferences were much more prevalent than had previously been recognized and a consequent dissatisfaction with previous conceptualizations of the concert which, he judges, cannot accommodate this adequately.
23 explicit in developing abstract models, but they explicitly approach their research with certain ideas in mind about the nature of social order and how it changes. As with the theorists, these ideas guide the inquiry, in virtue of the conceptual language employed, the expectations accompanying any conceptualization, and the distinctive orientation this gives to our sense of what is puzzling and what stands in need of explanation, but without determining what is found.
Moreover, the theories that these scholars employ are not ideologies, held prior to engagement with historical evidence, but rather reflect their attempt to make sense of their dissatisfaction with previous conceptualizations. Thus Jervis was seeking to make sense of a greater degree of
cooperation than was expected within existing conceptualizations of balance-of-power politics. Schroeder believed that even reading the evidence through the lens of a balance-of-power conceptualization of international politics generated too much cognitive dissonance for that
conceptualization to be accepted. Mitzen and Schulz both, in different ways, respond to Schroeder, accepting elements of his approach but adding in elements of reconceptualization to make better sense of particular aspects of the 19th-century international system. In this sense, the various theoretical ideas in play are not imposed on or evaluated on independent evidence, but are deeply implicated in the construction of the evidence as being evidence of one thing rather than another.
Conclusion
Whereas IR theorists have often tended to approach the relationship between history and theory in IR through the lens of a strong conception of theory, this is inadequate to the context of discovery. In order to understand how theory contributes to historical inquiry, we require a softer conception of theory. I have argued that an ideal type conception of theory is adequate to the possibility of meaningful historical inquiry, while also making sense of (i) what many historians, including many international historians, say about the role of theory in history, and (ii) the practice of at least some international historians and also IR theorists who engage with history in IR. This argument is not an argument against strong theory, the potential merits of which are obvious. However, it is an argument in favour of pluralism about what counts as theory in IR. It is also an argument in favour of engaging more centrally with the context of discovery and in favour of recognizing that theory can enrich as well as simplify. As Hofstadter (2009: 234) put it, when the historian draws on theory, his
24 My contention that the context of discovery in historical international relations is likely to be shaped by ideal type theory also carries strong implications for how IR theorists use history. If historians produce theoretically-laden histories, rather than generating an independent historical record, then theories of the kind prized in IR cannot straightforwardly be tested against history. This raises difficult questions about the degree of confidence we can have in a theory that appears to be borne out in relation to a particular historical period, even if there appears to be a historical consensus. Given the difficulties associated with hard theory testing, IR theorists might consider shifting from pursuit of candidate causal laws to pursuit of what Scriven (1959: 464) termed normic statements , that is, dispositional claims which are not definitionally true, and in relation to which we do not deny the possibility of counter-examples, but the reasoning for which is intuitive and the claims of which are widely borne out in practice. Because these are guarded generalizations (Scriven 1959: 465) rather than strictly universal claims, it is less problematic to regard them as supported by widely accepted histories than it is with strictly universal claims. Moreover, this would admit of a much greater degree of affinity between the contexts of discovery and justification, for in many cases the idealized expectations associated with soft theory consist in precisely this kind of normic statement.
25 Bibliography
A de le, Oth a F. A Plea fo Theo eti al Histo , History and Theory 4(1): 27-56.
Bates, Robert H. et al (1998) Analytic Narratives, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Bueno De Mesquita, Bruce (1996) 'The Benefits of a Social-Scientific Approach to Studying
International Affairs', in Ngaire Woods, ed., Explaining International Relations Since 1945, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 49-76.
Callinicos, Alex (1995) Theories and Narratives: Reflections on the Philosophy of History, Cambridge: Polity Press.
Carr, E. H. (2001 [1961]) What is History? With a New Introduction by Richard J. Evans, Basingstoke: Palgrave.
Clark, Ian (2002) 'International Relations: Divided by a Common Language?' Government and Opposition 37(2): 271-9.
D a , W. H. O the Natu e a d ‘ole of Na ati e i Histo iog aph , History and Theory 10(2): 153-71.
Du e, Ti , Le e Ha se & Coli Wight The E d of I te atio al ‘elatio s Theo ? European Journal of International Relations 19(3): 405-25.
Elman, Colin & Miriam Fendius Elman (1997) 'Diplomatic History And International Relations Theory: Respecting Differences And Crossing Boundaries', International Security 22(1): 5-21.
Elman, Colin & Miriam Fendius Elman, eds. (2001a) Bridges and Boundaries: Historians, Political Scientists, and the Study of International Relations, Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. Elman, Colin & Miriam Fendius Elman (2001b) 'Negotiating International History And Politics', in
Colin Elman & Miriam Fendius Elman, eds., Bridges and Boundaries: Historians, Political Scientists, and the Study of International Relations, Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 1-36.
E a s, ‘i ha d J. I t odu tio , i E. H. Ca , What is History? With a New Introduction by Richard J. Evans, Basingstoke: Palgrave, ix-xlvi.
Fi e , Pat i k “till Ma ki g Ti e ? Te t, Dis ou se a d T uth i I te atio al Histo , Review of International Studies 27(3): 291-308.
Fulbrook, Mary (2002) Historical Theory, London: Routledge.
Gaddis, John Lewis (1997) 'History, Theory, and Common Ground', International Security 22(1): 75-85.
26 Bridges and Boundaries: Historians, Political Scientists, and the Study of International
Relations, Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 301-26.
Gaddis, John Lewis (2002) The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Gallie, W. B. The Histo i al U de sta di g , History and Theory 3(2): 149-202.
Goddard, Stacie E. et al ‘ou dta le -11 on the Congress of Vienna and Dialogue between IR “ hola s a d Histo ia s , International Security Studies Forum,
http://issforum.org/roundtables/7-11-congress-of-vienna (accessed 17 Sep 2015). Goldthorpe, John H. (1991) 'The Uses of History in Sociology: Reflections on some Recent
Tendencies', British Journal Of Sociology 42(2): 211-30.
Haber, Stephen H., David M. Kennedy & Stephen D. Krasner (1997) 'Brothers Under the Skin: Diplomatic History and International Relations', International Security 22(1): 34-43.
Hempel, Ca l G. The Fu tio of Ge e al La s i Histo , The Journal of Philosophy 39(2): 35-48.
Hexter, J. H. (1971) Doing History, London: George Allen & Unwin.
Hofstadte , ‘i ha d E t a t f o Histo a d the “o ial “ ie es , i Joh Tosh, ed., Historians on History, 2nd ed., Hounslow: Pearson, 230-7.
Hu ph e s, Ada ‘. C. The Heu isti Appli atio of Explanatory Theories in International ‘elatio s , European Journal of International Relations 17(2): 257-77.
Humphreys, Adam R. C. (forthcoming A Causatio , Co ple it a d the Co e t: The P ag ati s of Causal E pla atio i I te atio al ‘elatio s , Journal of International Relations and Development.
Hu ph e s, Ada ‘. C. fo th o i g B Concerts as a Mode of Ordering in World Politics: An Ideal-T pe App oa h , i Ha ald Mülle & Ca ste ‘au h, eds., Title TBC.
I g a , Ed a d The Wo de la d of the Politi al “ ie tist , International Security 22(1): 53-63.
Isa off, Jo atha B. P ag atis , Histo a d I te atio al ‘elatio s , i Ha Baue & Elisabetta Brighi, eds., Pragmatism in International Relations, London: Routledge, 65-81. Jackson, Peter (2008) 'Pierre Bourdieu, the "Cultural Turn" and the Practice of International History',
Review of International Studies 34(1): 155-81.
Je is, ‘o e t F o Bala e to Co e t: A “tud of I te atio al “e u it Coope atio , World Politics 38(1): 58-79.
