Presented by Professor Ian Hurd, Northwestern University

It is common for scholars to describe IR as a field of study devoted to understanding how international order can be constructed in world politics. Order is presented as a kind of mechanical stability in world affairs which serves a universal good for all. Yet scholars can’t agree on what order is or how should be studied.

I look at three axes of disagreement: is international order an objective condition or an interpretive device; what is its opposite; and, is it inherently normatively good? Down each path is a different kind of thinking about world order, divided by ontology, epistemology, and conceptualisation.