It is almost always a joy to find an unfamiliar relative. It is even more enjoyable and comforting to find a family, a warm and intimate circle that shelters you from the stormy world outside, nourishes you, and helps you find meaning in your life and realize your potential. The discovery of third generation Constructivism was, for me, something like the enjoyable and comforting experience of finding one’s own unknown family. Even though Constructivism has enjoyed a relative flourishing in recent years (especially in Europe) its status in IR is still unsecured. Thus, to be a constructivist in the world of International Relations might be the experience of daunting loneliness. Hence my joy in finding this lost family should not come as a surprise. A Solitary Walker comes to rest at long last in the warmth of familial shelter.
But a second discovery immediately followed the first: my found/ed family is a very diverse one. Third generation constructivists are spread all over in terms of issues and even perspectives. While all are sociologically oriented, some are more related to political psychology, others to history, and yet others to political theory and/or critical theory. Some look for refuge in modernism, others found their destiny in poststructuralism while more are in the in-between gray area inspired by the likes of Niklas Luhmann and Pierre Bourdieu. Many study norms, some identities, but many more adopted newer perspectives such as fields, habits, practices, emotions, narratives and networks. They employ these perspectives to study many issues like security, immigration and power. Yet others prefer to remain in the meta-theoretical and epistemological levels arguing for self-reflexivity and responsibility, or debating causation and scientific realism. Nevertheless, there is a set of understandings and commitments that is shared among them all, enabling us to think of them as belonging to a group, a generation. As suggested by David McCourt and Brent Steele third generation constructivists (or post second generation, as they term it) are characterized by a return movement to first generation constructivists like Onuf and Kratochwil, whom second generation constructivists quite abandoned. Second generation constructivists tactically attempted to ground themselves in a methodology that could help their theories to be tested and falsified; to position themselves as equals in the same playing field with neorealism and neoliberalism (or rationalist perspectives) (see also Subotic, this volume). As such, though focusing on constructivist issues like norms and identities, second generation constructivists took a more positivist route. They almost ignored the multifaceted ways by which social reality and social knowledge are intertwined together to such an extent as to undermine neopositivist methodology, based as it is on the distinction between the researching mind and the researched reality. Third generation constructivists reacted against this move and returned to post-positivism all the way down (though many-faced post-positivism), affirming a commitment to the study of discourse and the importance of interpretation of meanings. It is this commitment, which is at once ontological, epistemological, methodological and ethical, which makes a group out of these diverse scholars and renders them, as third generation constructivists, particularly appropriate, even hospitable, to the kind of analysis and Buberian proposal promoted here. Martin’s Buber philosophy of dialogue can and should be a tactic to sustain third generation Constructivism, enabling them to maneuver within their group and outside it.
Embracing Buberian dialogue is a tactic for sustaining TGC as a family, and it also bears strategic implications in the form of normative engagements with social reality. My use of strategy and tactics steers a little from that of Steele and other contributors to this volume, but not too far. Amy Skonieczny summarizes succinctly the common conceptualizations in this volume: “tactics appear minimal and in the moment as opposed to more certain and planned out strategies.” Tactics, that is, are the means and methods of using one’s own resources to achieve immediate goals. Strategy, on the other hand, is the broader plans and approaches that connect together the means, resources and the immediate goals in the services of one’s own purposes and ends. In this volume we see the discussions of methods as tactics serving to position Constructivism and constructivists within (mostly American) academia (McCourt). Strategies are often seen as too ambitious and vulnerable to the contingencies of the world (Steele), so much so that those trying to employ strategies may end up being servants to forces more powerful than us. While this may be true and the world is fragmented and full of contingencies, I still see no point in having tactics if there is no strategy, no point in having goals that serve no visionary purpose and ends (however ironic and cautious one wishes to be about those purpose and ends). Accordingly, I will argue here for a Buberian dialogical philosophy. My take on the Buberian dialogical philosophy comprises two tactical measures and one strategic end. The two tactical measures are directed for the goal of positioning Constructivism within academia. The overall strategic end is realizing truth as a living entity constructed in an engaged and dynamic process involving the wider public.
The core theme of Buber’s philosophy is dialogue as that authentic human phenomenon that is a meeting between persons, fostered by the mutually and intentionally opening of hearts. Buber maintained that although living in social alienation man can heal society by entering into interpersonal dialogue that is conditioned on presence, true intention and mutual opening of hearts. Those three traits can lead to the genuine dialogue that constitutes relation of I-Thou as that relation of unmediated listening and unity of existence. Constituting I-Thou relation establishes the interpersonal sphere that Buber called the Between and it enables constructing a community as We, the same We I am looking for in third generation constructivists. Community is characterized by the quality of the I-Thou relation, and is gravitated by a common Center that functions as that which binds the several I’s into We, envisioned by Buber as the ethical human and social existence. The Center is the shared facet of human society that its existence enables overcoming alienation and entering into dialogue. The obverse kind of relation is the I-It which is based on instrumentalization of the members of society and on distancing each other. I-It maintains the alienated conditions of human society, preventing the constitution of the dialogical community as We. The quality of the I-Thou and I-It relations exists, according to Buber, not only between persons, but also between persons and nature, as well as with intellectual essences such as theory. As I will argue later, it is here, in the relation between persons and nature, or with theory, that Buber’s dialogical philosophy can turn from tactic to strategy, of making third generation constructivists active agents in the society beyond academia.
The chapter will be divided into three sections, the first two dealing with the tactical measures of self-reflexivity and community building, and the third turning our gaze to the strategic end of engaged academia, dialoguing with and for the wider society and truth.
A core constructivist contention is that social construction is entwined with social knowledge. To socially know is to be involved in social construction and to socially construct is to gain, develop and distribute social knowledge. Hence, and following Buber, the first tactical measure to gain a functioning community is self-reflexivity. Buber argued that there can be no true knowledge of the world and of human society and community, without self-knowledge, “philosophical knowledge of man is essentially man’s self-reflection, and man can reflect about himself only when the cognizing person, that is, the philosopher pursuing anthropology, first of all reflects about himself as a person” (Buber 1947, 154–5). To know reality one has to know one’s own assumptions that act as filters which distort a true encounter with reality. Buber conceived theoretical knowledge in a very similar way to feminist standpoint epistemology, the claim that all knowledge – theoretical knowledge included – is situated both socially and politically; all knowledge, that is, is determined by the position of the knower in the social hierarchy and his ensuing social and political commitments. As Lawrence Silberstein made clear, for Buber, “the sociologist lacks an Olympian perch from which to look down and see things independent of his or her own perspective” (Silberstein 1989, 170). The same understanding drives feminist epistemologists to call for self-reflexivity. One has to be critically aware of those idealist assumptions and social and cultural commitments that shape one’s research and theoretical framework. Being aware of them will allow, in phenomenological terminology,1 bracketing: putting on hold, in encountering social reality, theory and any other unintended biases and filters, so as to enable direct and unfiltered encounter with social reality. There can be no theory without those assumptions and commitments which “affect the process of determining which data are relevant, which are less so, and which have no relevance at all” (Ish-Shalom 2006b, 441). One has to identify those idealist assumptions and social and cultural commitments operating in his or her theory to be able to understand their functioning as filters and biases that distort a genuine encounter with reality.
It should be noted that Buber does not undermine the importance of science (including social science) and theory. He considers them as a crucial sphere of human activity. Science enables coping with the complexity of the world in which we live. As such it is essential for progress, especially when conceptualized materially (Silberstein 1989, 120). Science allows sorting out different phenomena, measuring, and comparing them, thus it allows humans to have a degree of control over their environment, such that they can produce the artifacts that enable material progress. Hence science is evaluated positively and Buber also holds in high esteem science’s output (ibid.). However, the essence of relations that are characterized by controlling nature and producing out of it those artifacts that are necessary for material progress is the essence of instrumentalization and alienation. As such the scientific approach creates detached I-It relations with reality and social reality. Accordingly, while holding science in high regard and certainly not rejecting its utility Buber wishes to allocate it its proper place. Science is crucial to material progress but this should not be mistaken with human progress, and we should not let the I-It scientific approach imperialize our relations with nature, reality, and social reality (Silberstein 1989, 174). Side by side with the I-It instrumentalized scientific approach we should cultivate also a direct relation with nature, reality and social reality; direct relations unhindered by theory and any other systematic assumptions with which we engage our surroundings. It is this phenomenological understanding that we gain once we engage in self-reflexivity.
Self-reflexivity allows a modest (even ironic) attitude toward one’s own theory. It reminds us that reality is complex and theory is but a heuristic and competent tool of organizing this complexity. Theory can help us in shaping plans and policies to navigate the complexity and produce what Buber calls material progress. But complexity is also richness, and richness is not something to cope with but something to enjoy. And to enjoy the richness of reality and social reality we should be willing to bracket theory that stands in the way to direct and phenomenological relation with reality and social reality. In Buber’s words, “each of us is encased in an armour whose task is to ward off signs” (Buber 1947, 27). Bracketing theory will enable cultivating human progress, which is progress not limited solely to the material. It is human progress comprising the ideal, intellectual and cultural aspects of our humanity; human progress which Buber encouraged us to seek out, and believed will help free modernity from alienation. Bracketing will also enable the theorist to identify and understand the weaknesses and limits of her/his theory, and consequently will permit community to devise better policies, and execute those policies flexibly and successfully.
This perspective assigns theory a very important, yet confined and constricted, social role. Drawing from Richard Rorty’s terminology of the ironic liberal (see also Steele 2010) we can characterize Buber as an ironic theorist. Rorty attempted to reconcile his relativist undercurrents with a political commitment to liberalism by a perspective he called ironic liberalism. Similarly, Buber attempted to reconcile his commitment to science with an equally forceful understanding of its narrowness; hence, ironic theorist. Joining Buber’s perspective I maintain that this should be the nature of our commitment to the role of theory and theorist alike.2 Heuristically speaking theory is indispensable in confronting reality’s complexity, yet this complexity is irreducible and so we should be aware that by heuristically theorizing complex reality we lose some of its richness. Additionally, by theorizing we reduce the complexity, hence we are engaged inescapably in distorting reality. Without self-reflexivity and being aware of the distortions, they might overcome our encounter with reality and impede policies derived from those theories. The awareness and ironic theorization must be complemented by a sense of pragmatism, modesty, and flexibility in constructing theory and executing its derived policies.
The attitude of ironic theorist does not exhaust itself with theory as a general category. It is not enough to be aware of the limits and weaknesses of theory in general, we should also be ironically committed to the specific theory we hold, e.g., realism, liberalism, Constructivism, third generation Constructivism, and what have you. It is here where self-reflexivity, conceptualized along Buberian lines, turns into a tactical measure. It is too common to find theorists who ignore the heuristic nature of theory and cling to it as a dogmatic creed. Too often theorists shut their ears to other theoretical frameworks. The theoretical debates turn, at times, into all-out inter-paradigmatic wars with gate keepers who do whatever is in their powers to prevent publications of theorists who do not adhere strictly enough to their own theoretical creeds.3 Some journals turn into theoretical bastions closed to other theoretical perspectives. In our theoretical world it is enough sometimes to call someone post-modernist or realist to shut our ears from what s/he has to say, and prevent us from the opportunity to benefit from his/her writings.
Labeling ourselves by theories turned into creeds is one of the obstacles to truthful academic dialogue; it transforms us from theorists committed to pluralism into ideologues; from seeking warmth in a community to not too splendid isolationists. Put differently, self-reflexivity is required because interpersonal dialogue is constructed around the axis of I-Thou. Neither I nor Thou can exist in complete autonomy, nor can they be fully comprehended independently. The I-Thou, as is its obverse kind of relation the I-It, are a united concept, called in the Buberian terminology: basic or primary word (Avnon 1998, 39). Neither word has full meaning outside of this relation (ibid.). Genuine dialogue of the I-Thou is preconditioned on the dictate of knowing thyself,4 of making the I present to oneself so the Thou can also become present. Only then can the I endow the Thou with meaning, the Thou can endow the I, and the two become dialogically united. Thus writes Buber, “on the height of personal existence one must be truly able to say I in order to know the mystery of the Thou in its whole truth” (Buber 1947, 212). Put differently, for the ethical obligation to dialogically construct the Between and to be united in the mutuality of the I-Thou relation, one has to be implicated in self-study and self-reflexivity.5 Self-reflexivity is required to set off and constitute the community of third generation Constructivism (and other scholarly communities) without falling victim to the plague of paradigmatic wars that haunts our discipline every now and then.
The second tactical measure for third generation constructivists is the interpersonal dialogue, that which is the core of Buber’s philosophy, especially his political and social philosophy. It is this interpersonal dialogue that for Buber is the key remedy for the modern alienated society, for turning it into community: a multiplied I-Thou turned We and organized around a common Center. The I-Thou turned We and the communal drive behind this Buberian move have a double edged advantage: third generation constructivists can go on maintaining and nourishing their sense of cooperative community, without falling thereby into a paradigmatic dogma that busies itself with warring other paradigmatic dogmas. In the right formulation the I-Thou turned We, that is, can help making academia a pluralist and diverse community of communities.
Alexander Kohanski described the essence of the Buberian dialogue when writing, “In the act of speaking I-Thou one must be willing to step into relation with the other without holding himself back, without putting the other in doubt, without reservation whatsoever. This is the true state of dialogue” (Kohanski 1982, 22). The I-It, which is the obverse kind of relation, the one in which there is no real dialogue, is depicted by Dan Avnon, “in an I-It attitude to being, the person tends to distance himself from the other, to create in the interpersonal a quality of relationship characterized by the person’s desire to distinguish him- or herself by accentuating differences, by emphasizing the uniqueness of ‘I’ in contrast to the other.” In those two quotations the essence of true dialogue is captured and clarified. When confronting each other, two humans can open their hearts in mutual and reciprocal ways, and create between them a genuine understanding and an unmediated relation. It should be emphasized that Buber does not intend a necessarily loving relation or consensual agreement. He stresses that true dialogue can occur between those who disagree with each other (Avnon 1998, 39). This point would become important later on. What is required for genuine dialogue to take place is a mutual intention to open hearts to each other, translatable into presence and unmediated relation, a true human community. And it is this community freed from alienation that will enable and even ensure ethical relations between all its members, and moreover also between members across communities.
Aside of the ethical justification of assigning the interpersonal dialogic imperative with scholars, there is also an epistemological reasoning. For Buber, truth is a joint endeavor. Gaining truth is done by a meeting in which a genuine dialogue takes place, “Men need, and it is granted to them, to confirm one another in their individual being by means of genuine meetings. But beyond this they need, and it is granted to them, to see the truth, which the soul gains by its struggle, light up to the others, the brothers, in a different way, and even so be confirmed” (Buber 1965, 69). In the words of Emanuel Levinas analyzing Buber, “Truth, therefore, is not grasped by a dispassionate subject who is a spectator of reality, but by a commitment in which the other remains in his otherness … Thus the problem of truth raised by the Parmenides is resolved in terms of a social or intersubjective relation.” It is truth beyond objectivity and subjectivity (Friedman 1976, 4), namely it is the product of the Between or in a more contemporary constructivist terminology, the intersubjective. And there is no better social locus for such an intersubjective endeavor than a community of scholars related to a Center defined by common values, which in academia is nothing else than truth-seeking.
However, an important note of clarification is necessary. Theorists comprise a community not in a sense of a homogenous group that shares a total belief system.6 Theorists do not share a totality of norms, values, assumptions and commitments. The community of scholars is a group of people with certain core beliefs which unite them, but which diverge on many other important beliefs. It is a plural community which is joined by certain norms, values and commitments, namely those of truth-seeking and doing it publicly, openly, and with a sense of healthy irony and skepticism. Those norms, values, and commitments are the Center in the Buberian terminology, and being jointly committed to this Center is a second feature that facilitates the organizing of scholars in a community of dialogue. Yet it is a community divided by numerous assumptions and commitments, such as how to reach truth, the content of that truth, and what to do with that truth once it is attained. It is, in other words, a community divided along the axes of disciplines and paradigms. And as we learn from standpoint theory issues of identity and life experiences, such as regions, expertise, genders and yes, even generations, are among the fundamental drivers in the divisions into the assumptions and commitments, namely into the paradigms. Thus the IR community (itself a community within the broader community of academia) is diversified into different and loosely distinct theoretical communities consisting of realism, liberalism, critical theory, feminism, Constructivism, post-structuralism, and many more. These are the basic paradigmatic building blocks of our discipline. But even to speak of the community as those who share a specific paradigm, such as the realist community, and liberal, Marxist, English school, is too constraining and misleading. These communities can all be further subdivided. Thus, realism can encompass the loose communities of classical realism, structural neorealism, neoclassical realism, and let us not forget offensive and defensive realisms, each communally organized around its whole and shared set of belief-systems. Constructivism can be divided into mainstream and critical Constructivism and into first, second, and third generations Constructivism. And the same internal subdivision can also be applied within liberal, Marxist, constructivist, English school, etc., communities, and the communities can be organized around subject matter or expertise rather than theoretical assumptions. It is sensible to talk about the communities of theoreticians who study and theorize international political economy, conflict resolution, human rights, transitions to peace, transitions to war, globalization, global justice, integration, identity formation, the effects of norms, civic-military relations, etc. And the same holds true for the criterion of methodology, say the communities of quantitative, qualitative and formal modelers, comparativists, historicists, discourse analyzers, and more. Each of these criteria is robust enough to legitimize a section in the International Studies Association, and indeed many do constitute such sections. Each can be seen as a community but note too that none can be totally delineated from the other communities. A community, say, structural neorealism, can be distinct from the community of neoliberal institutionalism, yet some of its members can for example be jointly united in the community of formal modeling. It may even be seen by critical outsiders as one community, the “neo-neo” community (Wæver 1996). The combination of agreement and disagreement is the internal pluralist composition of the community of IR theorists, or more accurately the community of communities. Moreover, the disagreements give reason for dialogue. There is no epistemological point in dialogue where consensus exists.
The Center is a gravitational axis around which disagreement can be discussed, at least if the intention to do so exists. It is a gravitational axis around which the scholars can gather and form a community of communities: a Between that facilitates and is facilitated by multiple I-Thou relations. It is a community devoted to truth-seeking, and also, in a constructivist orientation, for the construction of truth as the product of collective and pluralist endeavor; a truth, that is, which is beyond objectivity and subjectivity (Bernstein 1983);7 a truth which is a meeting point of different theories escaping the risk of becoming dogmatic ideologies. From this Buberian perspective disagreement is healthier than agreement resulting in a consensus that breeds monophonic and monolithic understanding of reality. Consensual agreement can turn out to be immune from questioning and critique, hence ossified into the arch-enemy of progress, namely a dogmatic ideology. On the other hand, if we understand our theories in the modest and flexible way proposed above, theories that are advocated by ironic theorists, disagreements can contribute to the clarification of the different perspectives, of the different perspectives’ heuristic merits as well as their weak points and lacunas. Thus, a continuous and dynamic dialogue will take place and truth will be alive and developing, rather than an ossified object. In other words, truth will stand as Thou genuinely related to the scholar as I and to the community of scholars as We. There is a sort of dialogue between the truth and seekers of truth, and as will be discussed shortly, this dialogue is based on mutuality and (unequal) reciprocity. It is a social science transfigured, and carried out by, among others, third generation constructivists, from the exclusive domain of the I-It to include also I-Thou (see also Friedman 1976, 172). And it is here where the tactical measures are revealed as serving a strategic end.
While the first two dialogical measures were tactical in essence, their goal being the internal composition and culture of academia, the third dialogical measure takes us to the level of strategy: seeking and attaining truth and doing something good, that is something true with truth, by engaging and dialoging with the wider society. It is a strategy that centers on the dialogue between the community of scholars and the public as well as with social reality and truth (Ish-Shalom 2008). The strategy arises from the notion of responsibility as a fundamental public duty. Again Buber’s language is instructive,
The straightforward argument for assigning responsibility with scholars to do something good with truth can go as follow, truth is a public good, and though it is achieved by scholars it is done so with the help of public resources. Hence it should be treated as a public good to be conveyed by responsible scholars to the public. Truth about reality, that is, is discovered by scholars and is a property to be owned by the public. Therefore, scholars are burdened with a responsibility to communicate all their discoveries to the public to be beneficially used by it. However, from Buberian and third generation Constructivism perspectives this argument is flawed for two main reasons. The first is its objectivist foundation and the second is its elitist undertones.
I will start with the first flaw, that of the objectivist objection to the straightforward argument. As was explored above, the relations between scholars and truth should be constituted on I-Thou relations,9 and I-Thou relations are founded on mutuality. It is no longer the detachedly collected data which produce objective truth that is being instrumentalized for the sake of humanity. No longer is there the positivist futile attempt by scholars to gain this detached view that will gain them access to the objective truth. Truth is a living entity constructed in an engaged and dynamic process and should be treated accordingly. As rightfully noted by Silberstein, “Buber envisioned a critical investigation of problems to which the sociologist is existentially committed. Concerned with far more than description, the sociologist’s responsibility is to enquire into the human meaning of social life in order to help shape that life” (Silberstein 1989, 170). The fact-value distinction cannot hold as the social scientist is committed existentially, that is morally. And furthermore, the facts that are enquired into and gained are social facts that encompass the meaning of human and social life, namely the values of those lives. Social research, according to Buber is (among other things) about values and is value-implicated, and henceforth the positivist distinction collapses along with its objectivist ideal.
The mutuality and (unequal) reciprocity that exist in such a dialogical relation means that truth also affects the community of scholars. There is, in the language of Hans-Georg Gadamer, a fusion of horizons (1989, 306) with which both the scholars and the reality they study affect and change each other (Ish-Shalom 2006a). Or in the language of Buber, truth about reality and the community of scholars enters into presence with each other, endowing each other with the relation of I-Thou. It is no longer reality as an instrumentalized It in the service of humanity as an alienated I. It is reality and truth as valued entities that enter into presence with the scholars and mutually constitute a moral Between in which an ethical, dialogic and communal We arises. It is a non-detached social inquiry that by constructing I-Thou relation with truth may be beneficial to the scholars and public as a whole.
The second flaw of the straightforward argument explaining and justifying the social responsibility of the scholars to the public is the sense of elitism it conveys. Allegedly, the scholars are those active transmitters who gain access to truth and in a benevolent act give it away to the public that is but a passive recipient. But this is not how we should understand Buber. Again we should understand dialogue as a relation founded on mutuality and reciprocity. As such, the public is far from being a passive and ignorant crowd. And the communication of knowledge is not a one way street. The dialogue takes the form of participatory and deliberative democracy, but one which is not limited to the political, which is the paradigm of the I-It relation (Buber 1957, 161–76). It is a deliberative and participatory democracy tuned to the social and forming I-Thou communal relation. There is a sincerity and mutuality in the Between that guards against instrumentalization and alienation. And it is the work, among other things, of the engaged scholars‘community of communities, spearheaded by third generation constructivists with their sensitivity to meanings and interpretivism, that is a key element in understanding their own relations with truth as constituted by the quality of I-Thou. And this quality of I-Thou also characterizes the relations between the scholars and the public. This quality constitutes the dialogue with the public as mutual and reciprocal that enriches the two sides of the relation, two sides each of which is I to the Thou and Thou to the I. Truth, that is, as a living entity constructed in an engaged and dynamic process jointly involving academia and the wider public. These are the reasoning and justifications for the strategy of Buberian dialogical philosophy that should inform the tactics and strategy of third generation constructivists.
Drawing from Buber and his dialogical philosophy I argued for two tactical measures centering on dialogue and community and one strategic end, all tailored around third generation constructivists’ sensitivities and appropriate to their epistemological, ontological and ethical commitments. On the tactical level I called for self-reflexivity and dialogue as constituting third generation Constructivism as a pluralist and ironic scholarly community, and academia as a whole as a community of communities devoid of dogmatism, alienation and war of paradigms, and committed to the pursuit of truth. On the strategic level, I advanced the end of engaged academia, spearheaded by third generation constructivists, who understand and realize truth to be a living entity constructed in an engaged, dialogic and dynamic process, involving the wider public. Thus, third generation constructivists will form a We, a community enjoying the Buberian quality of I-Thou relations. This same I-Thou quality will also characterize the relations of academia as a whole, establishing and constituting a community of communities, and academia relations with the wider public, mutually engaging each other in fruitful, participatory and deliberative relations. Tactics and strategy are inseparable, and third generation constructivists can and should embrace Buberian dialogical philosophy, to shape themselves and for themselves a place in academia and in the broader social reality. This is after all the truth of the matter.
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