The Globalization of International Society re-examines the development of today's society of sovereign states, drawing on a wealth of new scholarship to challenge the landmark account presented in Bull and Watson's classic work, The Expansion of International Society (OUP, 1984). For Bull and Watson, international society originated in Europe, and expanded as successive waves of new states were integrated into a rule-governed order. International society, on their view, was thus a European cultural artefact - a claim that is at odds with recent scholarship in history, politics, and related fields of research. Bringing together leading scholars from Asia, Australia, Europe, and the United States, this book provides an alternative account: it draws out the diversity of polities that existed at around c1500; it shows how interacting identities, political orders, and economic forces were intensifying within and across regions; it details the tangled dynamics that helped to globalize the European conception of a pluralist international society, through patterns of warfare and between East and West. The Globalization of International Society examines the institutional contours of contemporary international society, with its unique blend of universal sovereignty and global law, and its forms of hierarchy that coexist with commitments to international human rights. The book explores the multiple forms of contestation that challenge international society today: contests over the limits of sovereignty in relation to cosmopolitan conceptions of responsibility, disputes over global governance, concerns about persistent economic, racial, and gender-based patterns of disadvantage, and lastly the threat to the established order opened up by the disruptive power of digital communications.

Barry Buzan offers an extensive and long overdue critique and reappraisal of the English school approach to International Relations. Starting on the neglected concept of world society and bringing together the international society tradition and the Wendtian mode of constructivism, Buzan offers a new theoretical framework that can be used to address globalisation as a complex political interplay among state and non-state actors. This approach forces English school theory to confront neglected questions about both its basic concepts and assumptions, and about the constitution of society in terms of what values are shared, how and why they are shared, and by whom. Buzan highlights the idea of primary institutions as the central contribution of English school theory and shows how this both differentiates English school theory from realism and neoliberal institutionalism, and how it can be used to generate distinctive comparative and historical accounts of international society.

Since the 1970s, various sociological approaches have tried to understand and conceptualize "the global," yet few of them have systematically addressed the full spectrum of social relationships. Prominent exponents of the global approach - such as world systems analysis - instead have focused on particular domains such as politics or the economy. Under the label of "world society," however, some authors have suggested alternatives to the predominant equivocation of society and the nation-state. The contributions to this volume share that objective and take their point of departure from the two most ambitious projects of a theory of world society: world polity research and systems theory, mapping out the common ground and assessing their potential to inform empirical analyses of globalization.

In recent years, the English School or international society approach to International Relations has risen to prominence because its theories and concepts seem able to help us explain some of the most complex and seemingly paradoxical features of contemporary world politics. In doing so, the approach has attracted a variety of criticisms from both ends of the political spectrum. Some argue that the claim that states form an international society is premature in an era of terrorwhere power politics and the use of force have returned to the fore. Others insist that international society's state-centrism make it an inherently conservative approach unable to address many of the world's most pressing problems.International Society and its Critics provides the first in-depth study of the English School approach to International Relations from a variety of different theoretical and practical perspectives. Sixteen leading scholars from three continents critically evaluate the School's contribution to the study of international theory and history; consider its relationship with a variety of alternative perspectives including international political economy, feminism, environmentalism, andcritical security studies; and assess how the approach can help us to make sense of the big issues of the day such as terrorism, the management of cultural difference, global governance, the ethics of coercion, and the role of international law. They find that whilst the concept of international society helps toshed light on many of the important tensions in world politics, much work still needs to be done. In particular, the approach needs to broaden its empirical scope to incorporate more of the issues and actors that shape global politics; draw upon other theoretical traditions to improve its explanations of change in world politics; and recognize the complex and multi-layered nature of the contemporary world.

Working from a unique non-U.S. perspective, this market-leading text provides a coherent, accessible, and engaging introduction to the globalization of world politics. Now in its sixth edition, The Globalization of World Politics has been fully revised and updated in light of recent developments in world politics. FEATURES * Presents contributions from an impressive line-up of international experts, each of whom provides accessible but stimulating insights into history, theory, structures, processes, and other key issues in the field * Offers a visually appealing full-color interior * Provides a strong pedagogical program that includes numerous boxes, figures, tables, maps, questions, lively examples, and case studies

Now in its fifth edition, this title has been fully revised and updated in the light of recent developments in world politics, with new chapters on the changing nature of war, human security, and international ethics.

This book provides an introduction to, and analysis of, the English School’s views on International Relations as they developed from the somewhat vague state/society distinction to the present focus on foundation institutions, regional organisation and the globalization of international society. It focuses on key thinkers and texts and turning points and moves our understanding of the English School beyond the past work of the British Committee to the more recent work of Barry Buzan et. al. to offer a comprehensive overview and interrogation from the leading lights of this arm of International Relations thought. This volume is one of the cornerstones of the EISA sponsored Trends in European IR Theory series complementing the volumes on International Political Theory, Liberalism, Realism, International Political Economy, the post-positivist tradition, and Feminism published for the centenary of IR as a discipline.