Seán Molloy
@SeanMolloyIR
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Leverhulme Major Research Fellow. Reader in International Relations Theory, Kent. Current research interests: Hegel. Realist Ethics. Kant.
United Kingdom
Joined February 2017
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Pinned Tweet
Kant's International Relations: The Political Theology of Perpetual Peace
#kant
#internationalrelations
#politicaltheology
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“Stupid International Relations”: a nicely provocative intervention into the state of the discipline debate in IR by Lucas Van Milders.
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I was in "poorer" parts of Poland 12 years ago, there was already better infrastructure than in most parts of Northern England. It was also clearly _improving_ due to investment. I think that's what really rankles in deprived areas of England: a sense of stagnation/regression.
And parts of Poland are *already* richer than parts of Britain
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My latest article on E.H. Carr, Max Horkheimer and the theorisation of liberal orders in crisis in the 1930s and 2020s is now available on the advance articles section of International Studies Quarterly.
#Carr
#Horkheimer
#internationalrelations
#IRtheory
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No, Realism did not emerge as a “science” - the early Realists (Carr, Morgenthau) thought this was the worst possible way of thinking that could be applied to how states operate. Carr and Morgenthau - especially Carr - were vehemently anti-Darwinist.
Realism emerged as a „science“, looking for timeless knowledge about how states operate. Realists like Kissinger thought that the world out there is Darwinist: states fight states for survival in a never-ending power struggle, with only temporary balances of power.
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I am pleased to announce that I have been awarded a Major Research Fellowship by the Leverhulme Trust for my project ‘The Attenuation of Law and Persistence of War.’ The fellowship takes effect from September 2021.
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International Relations?
Political theology?
Eschatology?
Theodicy?
Radical evil?
I Kant believe they forgot about Immanuel …
Why is there pain, suffering, and war in the world?
That is what International Relations theory sought to explain.
[THREAD]
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E.H. Carr knew six languages. Morgenthau at least four.
Why are these two emphases - math over on one side, realism on the other - so powerful and destructive? They are seductive because they relieve scholars of knowing anything about the areas they're talking about. No need to learn languages or master cultural knowledge. /5
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I was delighted to receive this notification last week from
@RoyalHistSoc
informing me that I have been elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Many thanks to the Society for this very welcome recognition of the historical element of my work.
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@ColinMenzies7
@daraobriain
@PronouncedAlva
Dara is obviously pronounced Trevor with an epithenic stress on third schwa with Venus in the ascendant. What do they be teaching ye I these Irish schools at all? 🙄
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A key difference between Morgenthau and Kissinger is that HJM realised the world could not be restored after the French Revolution. He looked back admiringly to the age of aristocratic diplomacy but knew it was over, eclipsed by political, moral & technological revolutions.
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@ColinMenzies7
@daraobriain
@PronouncedAlva
You’re welcome, “Colin” or should I say - correctly - Jürgen.
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This article is now available in all its bibliographical glory! It’s got page numbers and everything!
Seán Molloy, ‘Theorizing Liberal Orders in Crisis Then and Now: Returning to Carr and Horkheimer,’ International Studies Quarterly, Volume 65, Issue 2, June 2021, pp. 320–330.
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There’s probably a connection b/w Mearsheimer & Mahan (I imagine he studied Mahan as a strategist when in military). But Mahan and geopolitics of negligible importance in Carr and Morgenthau. Morgenthau was an opponent of Schmitt.
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I see IR Twitter has evolved from mistakenly conflating Realism with Waltz to mistakenly conflating Realism with Mearsheimer. Very good! Carry on!
It’s not like Morgenthau wrote a PhD on international law or Carr a diplomat with 20 years’ experience of … international law.
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Hi All, I’m stepping away from social media. I enjoy Twitter banter but I just don’t have the energy at the moment. It’s not that Twitter is wildly taxing, but I’m running on the fumes of fumes. When I return to health, I’ll be back for loads more on Realism, Hegel, Kant, etc.
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Delighted and very honored to announce that I have been awarded a 12 month British Academy Mid-Career Fellowship. The project, entitled E.H. Carr Between Hegel and Marx takes effect in December 2019. The award will enable me to finish the first of two books on Realist ethics.
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This little piece is starting to find its place in the world after being resolutely ignored by all and sundry for years. The rhizome progresses slowly but inexorably …
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What did IR theorists debate before the “Great Debates” (which may or may not have happened, or took place in ways very different to those in which we think). In this new article I examine the last great debate _before_ IR between Norman Angell and Alfred Thayer Mahan.
New online first article available
#OpenAccess
:
"Angell versus Mahan: revisiting International Relations on the eve of World War I"
Authored by Seán Molloy (
@SeanMolloyIR
)
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“Candidates should engage in research from an empirical perspective with quantitative or mixed methods.”
Can you imagine the _uproar_ if this read “Candidates should engage in research from a normative perspective with critical or historical methods.”
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This will go down as the weirdest ISA of all time. We’re in a hotel that is measured by acres: a unit of measurement used for farms. It has its own goddamn waterfall. It’s _miles_ from Nashville and it costs a kidney to get there. We are thrown on our own resources here guys …
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This is the abstract of my forthcoming article on
#Realism
,
#Reflexivity
#academicfreedom
and
#Morgenthau
in EJIR.
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I’ll just leave this here …
I'm sure Patrick will do a good job. However, let's help him out with the scope conditions by identifying some things realism doesn't expain. I'll start: the rise of human rights, the existence of the ICC and the rise of war crimes prosecutions, the EU, the big influence of 1/2
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The Twenty Years’ Crisis has three chapters engaging directly with international law. Morgenthau was a lawyer and much of Politics Among Nations addresses international law.
@ChasCarmen
has just written a PhD on Realism, international relations and international law.
Why IR theorists rarely engage with international law theorists? Vice Versa. Why does theorizing international order often happen in separation from theorizing international legal order?
#IRtheory
#Jurisprudence
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A brilliant, must read article on Liberal International Order and the concept of crisis by Columba Peoples.
The Liberal International Ordering of crisis - Columba Peoples, 2022
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There are going to be a lot of kids called Paul Atreides in the next few years who will ultimately only be able to relate to the slightly older kids called Daenerys or Khaleesi …
DUNE 2 made me a believer —
In the prophecy.
In Paul Atreides.
In the power cinema.
I will go to Holy War for this movie.
It’ll worm its way into your heart.
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Ah, this is now in the news! I’m pleased to announce that I was recently given the University of Kent’s Graduate and Researcher College Researcher Degree Supervisor award. It’s very pleasing to receive recognition of any kind, but this is particularly welcome!
Feelgood Friday!
We congratulate school prize winners
@SeanMolloyIR
@IrinaPyotrova
and Marwa Wasfy!
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Just stumbled across this fabulous project: CHOIR, dedicated to the conceptual history of International Relations.
Bravo to
@HalvardLeira
and the team!
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Saving for later. And when I say later, I mean about a week from now …
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They certainly don’t teach this in IR 101 and Morgenthau’s work is often taught as the precise opposite of what he wrote.
I am concerned that partisanship in IR will blind us to the benefits of rediscovering what has been forgotten or obscured in texts like this.
They don't teach you this in IR 101.
Hans Morgenthau: Thought and Action in Politics (1971)
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I’ve been tapping the sign for 20 years - to little or no avail. IR went down the wrong rabbit hole … and I’m not sure it can ever find its way back.
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The only way to make sure students will _not_ read John Mearsheimer is to make his work required reading on the course syllabus.
IR people are seriously removing Mearsheimer from their syllabuses?
Don't lose perspective. I don't think John is pro-China or pro-Russia.
John's work is also great to teach to. It shows the limits of offensive realism & how it has little predictive value in the real world.
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Realist constructivism really should have taken off in IR. I suspect it didn’t because it emerged at a time when Realism was synonymous with Neorealism and therefore people couldn’t get their heads around it. An approach to IR that just came too soon.
Re-reading a lot of what's out there on realist constructivism. Barkin 2003, the Forum 2004, the 2020 edited volume...it's fascinating that this has never really kicked off in the same way that neoclassical realism has. IR theory nerds - any guesses as to why?
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Also ignores that Morgenthau - the doyen of 20th century Realism - considered the balance of power an anachronism that had been superseded. Ideology - especially nationalism - had long eclipsed the balance of power as far as he was concerned.
The ‘realist’ idea that we are back to post-ideological ‘balance of power conflict’ ignores entirely the point that Russia, China, Islam and much of BRICs have explicitly ideological and anti-western agendas.
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The odd thing is that it _still_ surprises many IR academics that Morgenthau insisted on ethics being an important element of the study of IR.
Is there a role for ethics and norms in international politics? Hans Morgenthau acknowledged that they try to send a message. But is that message heard?
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Mearsheimer is a puzzling figure. Although he is a Realist of sorts, he’s not a Realist _theorist_. He operates with a series of intuitions and assumptions about the world. Sometimes these align with international politics and sometimes they do not.
John Mearsheimer was not wrong about the end of the Cold War. But he wasn't all the way right either.
Time to keep
#KeepRealismReal
.
[THREAD]
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Every Isaiah Berlin review of E.H. Carr:
“This is the best book written on this subject in many years. Mr. Carr is a brilliant scholar and superb writer. Mr. Carr is the single greatest threat to civilisation and will surely destroy every vestige of truth and morality.”
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An excellent appointment by the EUI and it is encouraging to see an IR theorist be appointed to this prestigious Chair in Political & Social Theory.
Welcome to Prof. Stefano Guzzini, who joined
@eui_sps
as Chair in Political & Social Theory & as Swiss Co-chair in Federalism, Democracy & International Governance 👏
🗣️ In an interview, he describes his background, scholarship to date & work-in-progress:
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Well, this is going on a PowerPoint slide when I return to teaching. Might just leave it up there for the entire duration of the class. Nope, the term.
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The whole point of
#Realism
is not “to leave morality entirely out.” Chapter 9 of Carr’s The Twenty Years Crisis would be a good place to start. He also wrote (a hard to find, admittedly) chapter called “The Moral Foundations of World Order.”
@RealCynicalFox
Going back to Walt's original post, since when did realists talk about the "moral calculus"? The whole point of realism is that it is supposed to leave morality entirely out of it. And no, the conflict isn't "morally murky", it's one of the most morally clear conflicts since WW2.
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@ClarkeMicah
@PopovaProf
The whole point of Thucydides’s book is that it is _precisely_ this attitude which leads to the Athenian defeat in the Peloponnesian War. So Thucydides’s First Law of International Relations (if he had one), would be “Don’t do this!”
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International Relations has splintered and fractured in interesting ways to the extent that it might not even exist as an academic discipline anymore - but it hasn’t left Realism vs Liberalism behind. And its inheritors would more than likely just re-invent them if it did.
That’s not how International Relations works, Jack. Kidding aside, IR as an academic discipline has moved on from the somewhat tedious realism vs. liberalism debate, and over the last 30 years with the constructivist turn has become more multi-dimensional and interdisciplinary.
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#academicfreedom
#reflexivity
#dissent
#realism
#ethicsofscholarship
This article has ‘em all!
The article now has a volume and issue number.
EJIR, 26(2), 2020, pp. 321-343.
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I’d use this but my students wouldn’t recognise the substitution of one figure from the distant historical past with another.
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That’s it, he’s got to go now.
BREAKING: President Joe Biden mixes up "realism" with "neorealism" in his final IR theory essay.
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For the love of god can we rid ourselves of the idea that realists claim that only states matter in IR?
One last time: You cannot be a realist, claim that only *states* matter in international relations, and subsequently blame NATO for the Russian war against Ukraine. That's intellectually inconsistent and dishonest
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Walt's attempt to make an ethical case for limiting support and thereby bring pressure to bear on the Ukraine government to reach a peace deal is interesting but seriously flawed.
It's easy to understand why many people sympathize with Ukraine and want to support it against Russia. But the correct moral calculus on this issue is harder to discern, even for those on Kyiv's side. Latest FP column here:
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Wight was the first IR theorist to really interest me. A genuinely fascinating thinker to whom the English School would be well advised to return.
Wight, not the historian of ideas, but on History and IR (with an interesting, yet broad, unpublished essay making the case for 'the classical approach')
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Nobody should be using Neorealism (at least Waltz’s variant) to explain _events_ - complex or otherwise - in the first place. God bless him, his effect on IR was disastrous, but Waltz was very clear on this point ... Neorealism is _not_ Foreign Policy Analysis.
Trying to explain complex events using theories like ~Neorealism~ is a lazy cop-out to avoid real analysis.
This is a hill I will die on.
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The original error was replacing Morgenthau and Carr with Waltz. Mearsheimer merely compounds the error.
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Just once it might be nice to have a BISA keynote along the lines of “IR: Not So Bad, In Fact Sometimes Quite Useful.”
At this stage, this would be the genuinely critical position …
Be sure not to miss the keynote by Prof Tarak Barkawi at
#BISA2024
📚
"War and World Politics: or why I stopped doing IR" - sponsored by TWQ (
@thirdworldq
)
#InternationalRelations
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It’s been a mad week in which I’ve had most of my gallbladder removed, spent a while on a ventilator, and currently resemble a Borg drone, but there’s a very nice sunset here in Margate. Shame I had to miss
@EISA
though …
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My recent-ish essay on Progressive Realism and UK Foreign policy has been cited in today’s Guardian.
The essay in question is available here:
#Realism
#Lammy
#ProgressiveRealism
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Why do so few IR scholars/political scientists have biographies written about them compared to basically any other social science discipline? Even the English School doesn't go beyond the odd extended obituary.
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I told colleagues in Edinburgh years ago that
@RobbieShilliam
was the future (or at least _a_ future) of IR. Some were dubious to say the least and I caught some flak for inviting him and Rob Deuchars to give a talk. Poetic justice has been served in Auld Reekie!
Has
@RobbieShilliam
’s Stein Rokkan Lecture at
#ecprjs22
got you thinking about the role of
#IR
?
The editorial team at
@EuroJournIR
have got you covered with a free, curated collection themed around problematising the discipline. 📚
🔗Read now |
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Delighted to announce that Kant’s International Relations: The Political Theology of Perpetual Peace has been jointly awarded the Susan Strange Book Prize for the best book published in any field of International Studies!
#Kant
#internationalrelations
#politicaltheology
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Keohane & Nye …
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Europe: a bit fighty.
Every recored battle in history --also why the EU was such a a good idea
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I had the privilege of attending the graduation of not one but two of my (now former!) PhD students last Friday. Congratulations and well done to
@ChasCarmen
and
@DrDunleavyDan
!
Onwards and upwards!
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I’ve been mulling over a “Lost Classics of IR Theory” podcast in which I would discuss with others (authors, when willing) books that should have been hugely influential on IR … but weren’t. Too busy though. So, not happening.
I am thrilled *Neglected Classics of Philosophy: volume 2* (
@OUPPhilosophy
, 2022) has appeared now. As you can see from the table of contents, it has a stellar line up by folk who gave me terrific papers. I have tagged some of the contributors; feel free to add more if you can.
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Ho Boy. Quite the two minutes of commentary here. I particularly liked the reference to the innate irrationality of the Irish.
The year is 2022… and a BBC presenter and someone from the British Army are explaining why “micks” actually isn’t an offensive term for Irish people… 🙄🤦♂️
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Another Hidden History emerges to shake the complacent assumptions of IR’s sleepy discipline!
Special thanks go to
@lucian_ashworth
, Brian Schmidt,
@soverylong
,
@CianODriscoll79
, and
@ty_solomon1
.
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Something we need to do a lot more of in IR: actually examine what people wrote as opposed to recycling textbook misrepresentations.
From the new issue: Context, reception, and the study of great thinkers in international relations - Claire Vergerio -
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This is a major problem for some theories, particularly the “scientific” varieties, but not all IR theories. The English School, particularly Martin Wight, incorporates the mediaeval period into its account of the emergence of international society.
A major problem for IR theory is that feudalism is stateless, and covered more of history than the current state system that IR theory exclusively focuses on.
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Yes, yes, yes Cambridge. You’re very pretty in a sun dappled, obvious kind of way.
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@colmocinneide
Ditto here. I would have thought the fact that I’m working in a UK university would provide sufficient evidence of my eligibility to work in a UK university, but ... no. That would be _pure_ mad.
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A very good appointment and a powerful signal to the discipline of IR that serious theory and ethics remain central concerns.
📢 We are thrilled to announce that Neta Crawford has been appointed the next
@UniofOxford
Montague Burton Professor of
#InternationalRelations
.
She will join
@Politics_Oxford
&
@BalliolOxford
next year, bringing a wealth of expertise on war & ethics.
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I think the best line here is “also attacked fish and chips” to underline that this is the absolute ultimate in food questioning perfidy.
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Retweeting in the faint hope that Carr might be recognised for what he wrote (which was occasionally quite problematic!) not what IR has convinced itself he wrote in order to preserve its 'disciplinary' identity.
E. H. Carr on the "science of international relations"
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Has anyone found a breakfast place at
#ISA
that isn’t going to force me to decide which of the kids we can afford to send to college?
Is there anywhere at all reasonable in or in close proximity to the Gaylord?
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Once again pondering the inanity of hassling academics who work in a UK university to prove that they are eligible to work in a UK university when they already work in a UK university, which should be sufficient proof in itself that they are eligible to work in a UK university.
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A couple of places are available on a workshop about my next book, “Fatal Dualism: Realist Ethics After E.H. Carr.” The workshop will be held in London on 9/9/2022. Places are open to PhD students & academics of all stages with relevant backgrounds, e.g., IR Theory, IPT, Ethics.
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The absence of the extraordinary amount of inherited wealth necessary for a deposit to buy even the most modest dwelling for a family of five in London.
What exactly is preventing you from moving to London?
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@PatrickHolden1
@colmocinneide
Clearly the price of academic integrity is eternal and stringent vigilance. The academic wings of ISIS, al-Qa’ida and the Mafia are no doubt shaking their fists in impotent fury at the resoluteness of UK academic administration to frustrate their plans.
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My excellent PhD student,
@ChasCarmen
’s doctoral journey came to a successful end today with a masterful viva in which she demonstrated both her command of IR theory and the international law of arms control and disarmament. Well done, Dr. Chas and all the best for the future!
Delighted to have passed my PhD Viva with minor corrections! Thank you to
@SeanMolloyIR
and
@RubeBiegon
for all their support and to my examiners
@ProfTonyLang
and
@timaistrope
for engaging so deeply with my thesis! Hard to believe my journey at
@UniKentPolitics
is at an end
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Errrrr, blood is Ireland’s top export???
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It was a pleasure to discuss my project on
#Realist
#ethics
with
@kieranjomeara
. The main part of our conversation covers the role of
#ethics
in
#Realism
(esp. E.H. Carr). We also discuss hermeneutics as a way to deal with the tradition of ethical thought of which Carr is part.
This week on the Thinking Global Podcast, Dr. Seán Molloy (University of Kent -
@SeanMolloyIR
@UniKentPolitics
) chats to Kieran (
@kieranjomeara
) about Realist Ethics in the thought of E.H.Carr and other 'Realists'. Check it out NOW!
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“Is the disorder of our times unprecedented?”
I wouldn’t think so: “Order” - which is very much in the eye of the beholder - is the exception rather than the rule.
Today’s disorder may be alarming but doesn’t compare to the scale of disorder between, for example, 1929-45.
Cambridge and nearby folks: we have a great public event coming up on September 23. Register here (It's free):
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Blade Runner, UK style.
“I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... Chip shops on fire near Leeds ... I watched C-Beebies in the dark in a Cambridge Travel Lodge. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain... Time to die.”
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What _IS_ IR Theory? We finally figure it out at 10:30 this morning in Nashville.
#ISA2022
Join me,
@elifkalay
,
@UTTerryChapman
,
@M_Jurkovich
, Daniel Levine,
@SeanMolloyIR
, and (maybe on Zoom)
@anjalikdayal
at 10:30 as we ask what we include and exclude when we talk "IR Theory" and whether it's a useful category around which to organize disciplinary practices.
#ISA2022
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It’s Spinoza’s birthday, so to celebrate here is my article on how he relates to E.H. Carr and the The Twenty Years’ Crisis and the development of Realist ethics in IR.
Also, a chapter in my next book!
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An absolutely stellar article that was crucial to the rehabilitation of
#Hegel
in IR.
RIS is celebrating its 50th volume in 2024. How do our articles reflect important epochs in IR? Here is the most cited article from 1983: “The Hegelian state and International polities” by Andrew Vincent.
📄 👉
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Embarrassingly, I’ve been calling it the Frankfurt School for years.
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It’s a cliché but there really is nothing like submitting an article for discovering previously undetectable typos.
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Looks like my Angell-Mahan article is doing reasonably well over
@IntRelationsJ
.
You can check it out here:
3 most recently published articles trending on
@IntRelationsJ
: Revisiting a 1912 debate about
#war
and
#IR
by
@SeanMolloyIR
; Saudi war in
#Yemen
by
@thomasjuneau
;
#WHO
response to
#COVID
-19 by
@ProfSaraEDavies
&
@DrSophieHarman
.
All available
#OpenAccess
⬇️
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Although it marked an advance of sorts at the time in that there was at least _some_ depth of engagement with the relevant texts, this book that has had altogether too much influence on thinking about Realism in general and E.H. Carr in particular.
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Zuckerberg here demonstrating why the study of history is essential: if anywhere is getting nuked to bejesus, it’s the location of the headquarters of the United States Pacific Command.
I can only imagine the Hawaii bunker is a decoy and he’s building the real bunker elsewhere.
Mark Zuckerberg is reportedly building a massive $100 million compound in Hawaii with an underground bunker, escape hatch, and a “blast-resistant door.”
The 5,000-square-foot underground bunker will be self-sufficient with its own energy, food, and water supply,
@WIRED
reports.
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This is a marvellous article by my former colleague
@TrineFlockhart
. Deftly weaving ontological security theory with some penetrating insights into the current crisis of liberal international order.
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The primary reason people “hate” Realism is because commentators with platforms insist on conflating it with variants of Neorealism.
One of our most insightful scholars,
@stephenWalt
, asks why people hate realism. His question points to a critical distinction: Between a simple appreciation for power in world politics and social science theories known as “realism." Long🧵
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Realism was only ever a paradigm in the minds of people who wanted to convince themselves they were doing “science.” They then retrofitted this fetish on to “classical” realism.
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@PatrickHolden1
@BrigidLaffan
I like the servicing submarines myth myself. Sure Ireland was only _heaving_ with submarine maintenance experts back in the 40s. Many a time I tripped over casually discarded WW2 submarine parts on the way to school.
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It’s almost like Realism isn’t this tidy paradigm where an identical selection of cookie cutters say the exact same thing. Wild!
Lots of self-proclaimed "realists" are arguing these days that appeasing Putin by giving him Donbas will end his invasion. But it should be noted that scholars from the realist tradition have also argued the exact opposite. 1/ THREAD.
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I can only hope that this book begins “Please allow me to introduce myself, I am a man of wealth and taste.”
Opps - *falls into an infernal abyss & starts to screed & soliloquy* "Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven"
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So, I finally got around to reading “The Case for Progressive Realism.” David Lammy has made a splash with this mission statement about Labour’s envisaged UK foreign policy but what is the relationship between it and Realism? My thoughts below.
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