Studying practitioners’ practices

Abstract

Practice theory is a diverse and constantly evolving body of ideas regarding the nature of social action, transcending a variety of disciplines in the social sciences. This chapter traces the evolution of the practice turn, from the seminal work in The Practice Turn in Contemporary Theory (Schatzki et al, 2001) to a more recent application in the field of International Relations (Pouliot, 2010; Adler and Pouliot 2011) and EU studies (Adler-Niessen, 2016). This chapter illustrates the different debates and discussions that have guided the path of practice theory towards an application within IR and EU scholarship. It particularly emphasises the importance of Raymond D. Duvall and Arjun Chowdhury’s contribution to the field, which highlights the emergence of two distinct approaches that the practice turn facilitates, namely the focus on behaviour/conduct on one hand and the discursive/linguistic on the other. While the former seems to have found greater support in the discipline of IR, this chapter argues that the ontological foundations upon which the practice turn rests allude to the utility and even necessity for a discursive practice approach. The book serves as a contribution to the linguistic approaches within the practice turn.