Argument and Change in World Politics

Abstract

Arguments have consequences in world politics that are as real as the military forces of states or the balance of power among them. Neta Crawford proposes a theory of argument in world politics which focuses on the role of ethical arguments in fostering changes in long-standing practices. She examines five hundred years of history, analyzing the role of ethical arguments in colonialism, the abolition of slavery and forced labour, and decolonization. Pointing out that decolonization is the biggest change in world politics in the last five hundred years, the author examines ethical arguments from the sixteenth century justifying Spanish conquest of the Americas, and from the twentieth century over the fate of Southern Africa. The book also offers a prescriptive analysis of how ethical arguments could be deployed to deal with the problem of humanitarian intervention. Co-winner of the APSA Jervis-Schroeder Prize for the best book on international history and politics.

Strange Bedfellows: Australia, Iran and the Dilemma of Torture‐Tainted Information Sharing

“…60 Such an approach is drawn towards a base-line assessment to determine whether an intelligence agreement should be established with a foreign country if there is a risk of torture, the likelihood of whether the information received would be torturetainted, and whether the information received would be reliable, timely and accurate. 62 At the same time, institutionalisation can make the norm more resilient by embedding it into, in this instance, existing antitorture treaties, protocols and frameworks. Institutionalisation involves transforming the norm into clear-cut organisational rules and regulations to provide guidance for states and help identify compliant and non-compliant actors.…”

Lacunae in the Study of Culture in International Security

“…38 Crawford traces the way moral debates shaped many national views about the merits of colonialism. 39 Other scholars also examine the role of international social norms on shaping the practices of international affairs regarded as commonplace throughout the international system (indeed, that constitute the system). 40 Thus, the literatures on culture in security studies are wide-ranging.…”

Independence Day as a Cosmopolitan Moment: Teaching International Relations

“…Certainly one can ignore non‐state actors, select a particularly pleasurable version of history and proceed to teach IR as if it were so rational and simple, but they would be ignoring a large part of the story. History and U.S. foreign policy are normative and emotive, especially when unresolved social contradictions are featured, such as the peculiar example of the end of international slave trade that the field of IR had difficulty explaining using its own languages until recently (Crawford, 2002). I argue that contemporary IR desperately needs a multi‐layered approach, not just to teaching, but also to researching and speaking of it.…”