Must International Studies Be a Science?

Abstract

Must international studies be a science? No. By which I mean: the investigation of the cross-boundary-encounter aspect(s) of things need not be organised so as to categorically privilege epistemic ways of knowing (even though there is a multiplicity of such ways, merely epistemic diversity is insufficient). Other flavours of knowing are equally valuable, and should be celebrated in their distinctness, rather than being forcibly assimilated to impersonal, factual knowing-that. That previous paragraph will likely make little sense without some unpacking and some elaboration. International Studies Grammatically speaking,2 it is not possible to answer the question: ‘Must international studies be a science?’ without some notion of what we mean by ‘international studies’. This is a treacherous domain, since there are multiple incompatible understandings of the field/discipline floating around, even using different names for the endeavour. Depending on which authority one consults, ‘we’ are a group of scholars held together by our ‘great debates’,3 by our concern with the implications of inter-state anarchy,4 by our implication in a (neo)colonial project of establishing European hegemony,5 by a set of so-called ‘paradigms’ which almost no one claims to adhere to any longer6 even though we keep organising our introductory textbooks and courses according to them,7 etc. There is no consensus on whether ‘international political economy’ is part of some larger whole or an autonomous domain,8 on whether the discipline/field even exists outside of ‘the West’,9 or whether the whole project, whatever ‘it’ is, has any life left in it.10 I do not propose to resolve this controversy here. Instead, I will circumvent it by simply elucidating what I mean by ‘international studies’ so that my answer to my initial question becomes clearer. I am using a deliberately broad term both because it is no part of my …