What Are We Debating? IR Theory between Empire and the ‘Responsible’ Hegemon

Abstract

This article examines the conceptual and ethical outlook of contemporary debates concerning US foreign policy, organized thematically around the ‘American empire’ and the nature of its global hegemony. I argue that at the heart of ‘what we are debating’ lie two key themes, normative and epistemological. Normatively, we are witnessing a vigorous debate concerning the nature and possibility of ‘exceptional’, ‘responsible’ or ‘good’ states. As policy analysis and policy making engage each other more often and publicly than ever, epistemologically we can see an on-screen confirmation of the constitutive relationship between the theory and practice of international politics. Incontrovertibly ethical, reflections on the ‘American empire’ invite a reconsideration of the significance of the realist paradigm and call renewed attention to the normative and ideological foundations of international politics. They refocus IR's attention on the confluence of domestic and international politics that produces the empire or the responsible hegemon, always through an intense contestation of their identity, practices, interests and normative trajectory.