The concept of practice in the English School

Abstract

The English School concept of practice is what Stephen Turner in The Social Theory of Practices calls a ‘telic’ notion. A telic practice is an activity seeking a goal ‘which is conceived as a result of following certain general principles of procedure’. Examples of telic practices are playing a game of chess, holding a seminar, baptizing a baby or going fly-fishing. Such practices are carried out according to standards of excellence set forth in some tradition of interpretation. Maurice Keens-Soper has placed de Caillèires’ De la maniere de negocier avec les souverains in a tradition of interpretation applied to diplomacy, and one that set standards. A practice in the English School sense is not a private idea: a commitment to communal standards is required if one is to talk meaningfully of a practice. A telic notion of practice may be contrasted with a causal notion. In the causal notion, a practice is a form of mentalist ‘object’ which impinges on behaviour. Pierre Bourdieu (1977), for example, is interested in practices as hidden convictions or habits shared by a group; his ‘habitus’ informs social action. Either as a kind of presupposition, or as a kind of mental trace, a practice in the causal sense disposes thought or action in a certain way. In this form, practices are not directly accessible, their existence must be inferred, and the means of accessing them are fraught with difficulties. A person engaging in a telic practice is guided by its standards rather than being caused to perform, and telic practices are directly accessible to empirical investigation.

Scope, mechanism, and outcome: arguing soft power in the context of public diplomacy

“…So, how might practices like public diplomacy reveal characteristics of the field? This form of insight is well-established in international studies scholarship, but has yet to be applied to the notion of soft power and public diplomacy (Neumann 2002;Adler-Nissen 2009;Adler and Pouliot 2011;Navari 2011). The methodological position that follows requires attention to strategic and public argumentation about public diplomacy from policymakers and public figures as well as the programmes derived from such discourse.…”

“…Finally, outcomes reveal how public diplomacy is justified and articulated as contributing to feasible strategic objectives. The article builds on the work of practice-oriented scholarship in IR and diplomatic studies, to propose a methodological framework based on attention to registers of public argument indicative of institutional comprehension of soft power as a field of practice (Navari 2011;Sending et al 2011;Brown 2012;Adler-Nissen 2013).…”

Southeast Asia and the English School of International Relations

“…The ES's interpretative strengths, correspondingly, lie in its awareness of history (Linklater & Suganami, 2006, 84-97); its elaboration of a three-stranded dynamic as a framework of thought for interstate politics (Bellamy, 2005a, 294;Suganami, 2005, 41-2); its focus on agency (Dunne, 1998, 120;Keens-Soper, 1978, 40;Suganami, 2005, 33) and social practice (Navari, 2010); and its modest pointer to the possibility of building 'a "theory" -in the sense of an "interpretation" -of world history which embodies a cautious and mild form of progressivism' (Suganami, 2005, 42). These are the theoretical strengths that this book will seek to harness.…”

The Implications and Imperfections of Practice

“…Vincent Pouliot and Emmanuel Adler's forthcoming edited collection on International Practices (Cambridge, 2011) promises to showcase the state of the art in the practice turn. 2 Cornelia Navari's recent work sorts through these influences and considers their implications(Navari 2010a;2010b). The Introduction to Vincent Pouliot and Emmanuel Adler's edited collection on 'International Practices'(Cambridge, 2011) acknowledges that there is no single theory of practice, but rather a variety of theories which focus on practice.…”