1 Foucault, Michel, ‘Politics and Reason’, in Kritzman, Lawrence D., (ed.), Politics, Philosophy, Culture: Interviews and Other Writings, 1977–1984 (London: Routledge, 1990), p. 83Google Scholar .

2 Ashworth, Lucian M., ‘Did the Realist-Idealist Great Debate Really Happen? A Revisionist History of International Relations’, International Relations, 61 (2002), pp. 33–51CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Ashworth, Lucien, ‘Where Are the Idealists in Interwar International Relations?’, Review of International Studies, 32 (2006), pp. 291–308CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Bell, Duncan, ‘International Relations: The dawn of a historiographical turn?’, British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 3 (2001), pp. 115–126CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Bell, Duncan (ed.), Victorian Visions of Global Order: Empire and International Relations in Nineteenth-Century Political Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007)CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Long, David and Wilson, Peter, Thinkers of the Twenty Years' Crisis: Inter-War Idealism Reassessed (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995)Google Scholar ; Long, David and Schmidt, Brian C., Imperialism and Internationalism in the Discipline of International Relations (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2005)Google Scholar ; Schmidt, Brian C., The Political Discourse of Anarchy: A Disciplinary History of International Relations (New York: State University of New York Press, 1998)Google Scholar ; Wilson, Peter, ‘The Myth of the First Great Debate’, Review of International Studies, 24:5 (1998), pp. 1–16CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Schmidt, Brian C., ‘Anarchy, World Politics and the Birth of a Discipline: American International Relations, Pluralist Theory and the Myth of Interwar Idealism’, International Relations, 16 (2002), pp. 9–31CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

3 Osborn, R., ‘Noam Chomsky and the Realist Tradition’, Review of International Studies, 35 (2009), pp. 351–370CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Herring, E. and Robinson, P., ‘“Introduction” to Forum on Chomsky’, Review of International Studies, 29 (2003), pp. 551–552CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Falk, Richard, ‘Anarchism and World Order’, in Pennock, J. R. and Chapman, J. (eds), Nomos XIX: Anarchism (New York, New York University Press 1979), pp. 63–87Google Scholar ; Prichard, Alex, ‘Justice, Order and Anarchy: The International Political Theory of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (1809–1865)’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 35 (2007), pp. 623–645CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Prichard, Alex, ‘Deepening Anarchism: International Relations and the Anarchist Ideal’, Anarchist Studies, (forthcoming)Google Scholar ; Turner, Scott, ‘Global Civil Society, Anarchy and Governance: Assessing an Emerging Paradigm’, Journal of Peace Research, 35 (1998), pp. 25–42CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Weiss, Thomas, ‘The Tradition of Philosophical Anarchism and Future Directions in World Policy’, Journal of Peace Research, 12 (1975), pp. 1–17CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

4 I will be using the term pluralism exclusively as used by the predominantly English left-pluralists of the mid-to-late 20th century. See, for example, Barnard, F. M. and Vernon, R., ‘Pluralism, Participation, and Politics: Reflections on the Intermediate Group’, Political Theory, 3 (1975), pp. 180–197CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Hirst, Paul, From Statism to Pluralism: Democracy, Civil Society and Global Politics (London: UCL Press, 1997)Google Scholar ; Little, Richard, ‘The Growing Relevance of Pluralism?’, in Booth, Ken, Smith, Steve and Zalewski, Marysia (eds), International Theory: Positivism and Beyond (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 66–86CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Mouffe, C. (ed.), Dimensions of Radical Democracy: Pluralism, Citizenship, Community (London: Verso, 1992)Google Scholar ; Schmidt, The Political Discourse of Anarchy, chap. 5; Sylvest, Casper, ‘Beyond the State? Pluralism and Internationalism in Early Twentieth-Century Britain’, International Relations, 21 (2002), pp. 67–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

5 Laski, H., Foundations of Sovereignty and Other Essays (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1921)Google Scholar ; Laski, H., Communism (London: Butterworth, 1926)Google Scholar ; Laski, H., The State in Theory and Practice (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1935)Google Scholar ; Laski, H., Liberty in the Modern State (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1947)Google Scholar ; Laski, H. J., Studies in the problem of sovereignty (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1917)Google Scholar ; Laski, H. J., Authority in the Modern State (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1919)Google Scholar .

6 Cited in Scheuerman, William E., Carl Schmitt: The End of Law (Oxford: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999), p. 226Google Scholar .

7 Schmitt, Carl, The Concept of the Political (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007), pp. 41–45CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

8 Schmitt, Carl, ‘Ethic of State and Pluralistic State’, trans. Dyzenhaus, David, in Mouffe, C. (ed.), The Challenge of Carl Schmitt (London: Verso, 1999), pp. 195–208Google Scholar . First published in Positionen und Begriffe im Kampf mit Weimar-Genf-Versailles 1923–1939 (Positions and Concepts in the Fight against Weimar, Geneva, Versailles, 1923–1939) in 1940.

9 Morgenthau, Hans J., ‘The Corruption of Liberal Thought: Harold Laski’, in Morgenthau, H. J. (ed.), The Restoration of American Politics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962)Google Scholar ; Cf. Morgenthau, Hans. J., Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace (Brief, ed.) (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1993)Google Scholar . Another long-forgotten ‘debate’ (though, again, Carr had no interlocutors) is the one between Carr and the nineteenth century anarchists. See, Carr, E. H., Michael Bakunin (London: Macmillan, 1937)Google Scholar ; Carr, E. H., ‘Proudhon: The Robinson Crusoe of Socialism’, in Carr, E. H. (ed.), Studies in Revolution (London: Macmillan, 1950), pp. 38–55Google Scholar .

10 Smith, Steve, ‘The Self-Images of a Discipline: A Genealogy of International Relations’, in Smith, Steve and Booth, Ken (eds), International Relations Theory Today (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995), pp. 1–37Google Scholar .

11 See, for example, Ashley, R. K., ‘Untying the Sovereign State: A Double Reading of the Anarchy Problematique’, Millennium, 17 (1988), pp. 227–262CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Linklater, A., The Transformation of Political Community: Ethical foundations of a Post-Westphalian Era (Cambridge: Polity, 1998)Google Scholar .

12 See, for example, Behr, Harmut and Heath, Amelia, ‘Misreading in IR Theory and Ideology Critique: Morgenthau, Waltz and neo-realism’, Review of International Studies, 35 (2009), pp. 327–349CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

13 On ideology, see for example, Freeden, Michael, Ideologies and Political Theory: a conceptual approach (Oxford: Clarendon, 1996)Google Scholar .

14 Budd, A., The modern historiography reader: Western sources (London: Routledge, 2009)Google Scholar ; Lambert, Peter and Schofield, P. R. (eds), Making history: an introduction to the history and practices of a discipline (London: Routledge, 2004)Google Scholar ; Skinner, Quentin, Visions of Politics, Volume 1: Regarding Method (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002)Google Scholar .

15 The concerns of the state have been at the heart of the rise of modern history-writing. It was only with the rise of socialism in the nineteenth century that the people, as opposed to the army, ‘great men’ or governments, became a legitimate and explicit political subject for the discipline. For an introduction to these debates see for example, Lambert and Schofield (eds), Making History, part II.

16 Wight, Martin, ‘Why Is There No International Theory?’, in Butterfield, Herbert and Wight, Martin (eds), Diplomatic Investigations: Essays in the Theory of International Politics (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1966)Google Scholar .

17 For a summary of Proudhon's views on international politics see, for example, Prichard, ‘Justice Order and Anarchy’; Prichard, ‘Deepening Anarchism’; Cf. Pick, Daniel, War Machine: The Rationalisation of Slaughter in the Modern Age (New Haven/London: Yale University Press, 1993)Google Scholar , chap. 4.

18 Martin Wight, ‘Why is There No International Theory?’, p. 34.

19 Cited in Dunne, Timothy, Inventing International Society: A History of the English School (Houndmills: Macmillan, in association with St. Antony's College, Oxford, 1998), p. 53CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

20 Hoffmann, Stanley, ‘An American Social Science: International Relations’, [1977] in Linklater, Andrew (ed.), International Relations: Critical Concepts in Political Science (London: Routledge, 2000), pp. 77–98Google Scholar .

21 Hoffmann, ‘American Social Science’, p. 80.

22 Ibid., pp. 82, 84.

23 Hoffmann, Stanley, ‘The Areal Division of Powers in the Writings of French Political Thinkers’, in Maas, A. (ed.), Area and Power (Glencoe: University of Illinois Press, 1959)Google Scholar ; Ritter, Alan, The Political Thought of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969), p. vCrossRefGoogle Scholar .

24 Hoffmann, ‘An American Social Science’, p. 81.

25 Aron, Raymond, Peace and War: A Theory of International Relations, trans. Howard, Richard and Fox, Annette Baker (New York: Doubleday, 1966), pp. 600–610.Google Scholar

26 Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Du Principe Fédératif et de la Nécessité de Reconstituer le Parti de la Révolution (includes) Si les Traités de 1815 ont Cessé d'Exister. Oeuvres Complètes De P-J Proudhon, Vol. VIII (Paris: Ernest Flammarion, no date provided c. 1900)Google Scholar .

27 Hoffmann, ‘An American Social Science’, p. 87.

28 Smith, ‘The Self-Images of a Discipline’.

29 Wallace, W., ‘Truth and Power, Monks and Technocrats: Theory and Practice in International Relations’, Review of International Studies, 22 (1996), pp. 304, 310CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

30 Ibid., pp. 308, 309.

31 Smith, Steve, ‘Power and truth: a reply to William Wallace’, Review of International Studies, 23 (1997), pp. 507–516CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Booth, Ken, ‘Discussion: A Reply to Wallace’, Review of International Studies, 23 (1997), pp. 371–377CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Cf. Tilly, Charles, ‘War Making and State Making as Organised Crime’, in Evans, P. B., Rueschemeyer, D. and Skocpol, T. (eds), Bringing the State Back In (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp. 169–191CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

32 Falk, ‘Anarchism and World Order’.

33 Booth, Ken, Theory of World Security (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), p. 62, n. 93CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

34 Schmidt, The Political Discourse of Anarchy; Dunne, Inventing International Society. Considerations of space make it impossible to do justice to Dunne's work here. In his perceptive review Duncan Bell makes the comment that ‘[f]or a set of scholars usually regarded as amongst the most historically astute in the field of IR, the English School's sloppy attitude to the history of ideas is all the more intriguing’. Bell, ‘International Relations’, p. 123.

35 Schmidt, , The Political Discourse of Anarchy, p. 49Google Scholar ; Clinton, David W., Tocqueville, Lieber, and Bagehot: Liberalism Confronts the World (Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2003)CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

36 Ibid., p. 60.

37 Ibid., pp. 92–3, 127, 129, 130.

38 For an example of how feminism was asked to fit neatly into pre-existing research programmes see, Keohane, Robert, ‘International Relations Theory: Contributions of a Feminist Standpoint’, Millennium Journal of International Studies, 18 (1989), pp. 245–253CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Weber, Cynthia, ‘Good Girls, Little Girls and Bad Girls: Male Paranoia in Robert Keohane's Critique of Feminist International Relations’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 23 (1994), pp. 337–349CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

39 That contemporary theorists of new medievalism, from Hedley Bull to Andrew Linklater and others ignore this set of historical antecedents is typical of a broad rejection of inter-war thinkers in IR. For a good survey of contemporary thinking on new medievalism, see Friedrichs, Jörg, ‘The Meaning of New Medievalism’, European Journal of International Relations, 7 (2001), pp. 475–502CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

40 Lamb, Peter, ‘Harold Laski: Political Theorist of a World in Crisis’, Review of International Studies, 25 (1999), pp. 329–342CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Lamb, Peter, Harold Laski: Problems of Democracy, the Sovereign State, and International Society (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004)CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

41 Deane, Herbert A., The Political Ideas of Harold J. Laski (New York: Columbia University Press, 1955), p. 55Google Scholar .

42 Sylvest, ‘Beyond the State?’.

43 Laski, Harold, Communism (London: Butterworth, 1926)Google Scholar .

44 Kramnick, Isaak and Sheerman, Barry, Harold Laski: A Life on the Left (London, Hamilton 1993), p. 126Google Scholar .

45 Laski, Harold, ‘The Political Philosophy of Mr Justice Holmes’, Yale Law Journal, 40 (1931), pp. 689, 687CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

46 De Wolfe Howe, Mark (ed.), Holmes-Laski Letters: The Correspondence of Mr. Justice Holmes and Harold J. Laski. 1916–1935 (London: Oxford University Press, 1953), pp. 81–82CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

47 Ibid., p. 161.

48 Ibid., p. 375.

49 I have discussed Proudhon's international political theory in more detail elsewhere. See, for example, Prichard, ‘Justice, Order and Anarchy’; Prichard, ‘Deepening Anarchism’.

50 Proudhon, P.-J., The Principle of Federation and the Need to Reconstitute the Party of the Revolution, trans. and intro. Vernon, Richard (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1979), p. 12Google Scholar .

51 Much can be said about this, but space does not allow me to do so here.

52 Proudhon, , The Principle of Federation, p. 23Google Scholar .

53 Prichard, ‘Justice, Order and Anarchy’.

54 Proudhon, P.-J., La Guerre et la Paix, recherches sur la principe et la constitution du droit des gens (Paris: E. Dentu, 1861)Google Scholar ; Proudhon, P.-J., La Fédération et l'Unité en Italie (Paris: E. Dentu, 1862)Google Scholar ; Proudhon, P.-J., Nouvelles Observations sur l'Unité Italienne (Paris: E. Dentu, 1865)Google Scholar ; Proudhon, P.-J., France et Rhin (Paris: A. Lacroix, Verboeckhoven et Companie, 1868)Google Scholar ; Proudhon, Du Principe Fédératif.

55 Proudhon, , The Principle of Federation, p. 24Google Scholar .

56 Ibid., p. 24.

57 For a fuller discussion of this see Proudhon, ‘Si Les Traites de 1815 ont Cessé d'éxister’.

58 ‘[i]f ever there was a corner of the world in which it is possible to say […] that property is theft, it is in Poland.’ Proudhon, , Du Principe Fédératif, p. 302Google Scholar .

59 For more on this see, for example, Vincent, K. Steven, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and the Rise of French Republican Socialism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984)Google Scholar ; Prichard, ‘The Ethical Foundations of Proudhon's Republican Anarchism’.

60 Lamb, Harold Laski.

61 Laski, Harold, ‘The Pluralistic State’, The Philosophical Review, 28, (1919), p. 566CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

62 Ibid., p. 570.

63 Ibid., p. 569. This problematic use of sovereignty in this context was also typical of Proudhon's Principle of Federation.

64 Ibid., p. 571.

65 Ibid.

66 It is interesting that while Proudhon is often referenced by Laski, he refuses to classify anarchism in anything more than crudely syndicalist or anti-authoritarian terms. Laski's faith in the modern state meant he was not an anarchist in any truly meaningful sense of the word, despite being deeply indebted to Proudhonist ideas. See Laski, , Authority in the Modern State, pp. 88, 114Google Scholar .

67 Laski, ‘The Pluralist State’, p. 572.

68 Laski, , Authority in the Modern State, p. 30Google Scholar .

69 Ibid., p. 58.

70 Ibid., p. 74.

71 Lamb, , Harold Laski, p. 333Google Scholar .

72 Laski, , Authority in the Modern State, p. 89Google Scholar .

73 Vernon, Richard, ‘Introduction’, in Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, The Principle of Federation, p. xiiiGoogle Scholar .

74 Laski, , Authority in the Modern State, p. 89Google Scholar .

75 Ibid., p. 109.

76 Laski, , Liberty in the Modern State, p. 30Google Scholar .

77 Laski, , The State in Theory and Practice, p. 227Google Scholar .

78 Ibid., p. 224.

79 Laski, H. J., An Introduction to Politics, new edition prepared by Martin Wight (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1951), pp. 88–90Google Scholar .

80 Ibid., p. 91.

81 Ibid., p. 99.

82 Schmitt, ‘Ethic of State’, p. 198. The return to Schmitt by the left is lamentable.

83 For a similar critique of Laski, see Sylvest, ‘Beyond the State?’.

84 Schmitt, ‘Ethic of State’, pp. 200–1.

85 Ibid., p. 205. For another example of the muddle Schmitt's misleading use of Proudhon's critique of universalism has caused for IR theorists, see Devetak, Richard, ‘Between Kant and Pufendorf: Humanitarian Intervention, Statist Anti-Cosmopolitanism and Critical International Theory’, Review of International Studies, 33 (2007), p. 157CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Chandler, David, ‘The Revival of Carl Schmitt in International Relations: The Last Refuge of Critical Theorists?’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 37 (2008), p. 33CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

86 Schmitt, , Political Theology, pp. 56–57Google Scholar .

87 For more myth-busting, see, for example, Hartley, David, ‘Communitarian Anarchism and Human Nature’, Anarchist Studies, 3 (1995), pp. 145–164Google Scholar ; Morland, David, Demanding the Impossible? Human Nature and Politics in Nineteenth-Century Social Anarchism (London: Cassell, 1997)Google Scholar .

88 Ibid., p. 66.

89 Ibid., p. 60.

90 Future work relating human nature to world politics might consider Hauser's, MarcMoral Minds: How Nature Designed Our Universal Sense of Right and Wrong (New York: Ecco, 2006)Google Scholar .

91 Ibid., pp. 55–6.

92 Wolin, Richard, ‘Carl Schmitt, Political Existentialism and the Total State’, Theory and Society, 19 (1990), pp. 389–416CrossRefGoogle Scholar ; Wolin, Richard, ‘Carl Schmitt: The Conservative Revolutionary and the Aesthetics of Horror’, Political Theory, 20 (1992), pp. 424–447CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

93 Schmitt, ‘Ethic of State’, pp. 207–8.

94 See, Honig, Jan Willem, ‘Totalitarianism and Realism: Hans Morgenthau's German Years’, in Frankel, Benjamin (ed.), Roots of Realism (London: Frank Cass, 1996), pp. 283–313Google Scholar . First published in Security Studies, 5 (1995), pp. 283–313CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

95 William Scheuerman has shown that Schmitt took Morgenthau's main critique of The Concept of the Political and revised subsequent editions accordingly, without referencing the source of his revised ideas. This is a strange intellectual relationship indeed, and one that has been widely written on. See Scheuerman, Carl Schmitt, chap. 9. See also, Scheuerman, William E., ‘Carl Schmitt and Hans Morgenthau: Realism and Beyond’, in Williams, Michael C. (ed.), Realism Reconsidered: The Legacy of Hans Morgenthau in International Relations, (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2007), pp. 62–92Google Scholar .

96 Morgenthau, ‘The Corruption of Liberal Thought’, p. 29.

97 Ibid.

98 Morgenthau, , Politics Among Nations, p. 35Google Scholar .

99 Wolff, Robert Paul, In Defence of Anarchism (Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1998)Google Scholar .

100 Morgenthau, ‘The Corruption of Liberal Thought’, p. 31.

101 Ibid., p. 32.

102 Morgenthau, , Politics Among Nations, p. 42Google Scholar .

103 Morgenthau, ‘The Corruption of Liberal Thought’, p. 33.

104 Indeed, recent critical scholarship is taking up where Proudhon and Laski left off by showing what the centralisation of power has meant for the possibility of human freedom in the twentieth century. The central text in this regard is Linklater, The Transformation of Political Community.

105 Ibid., p. 32.

106 Ish-Shalom, Piki, ‘The Triptych of Realism, Elitism and Conservatism’, International Studies Review, 8 (2006), pp. 441–468CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

107 Morgenthau, , Politics Among Nations, p. 152Google Scholar .

108 Ibid., p. 154.

109 Schmidt, , The Political Discourse of Anarchy, pp. 51, 76Google Scholar .

110 Wight, Colin, Agents, Structures and International Relations: Politics as Ontology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006)CrossRefGoogle Scholar .

111 Scott, James C., Seeing Like a State: how certain schemes to improve the human condition have failed (New Haven, Conn.; Yale University Press, 1998)Google Scholar .