Science, Narratives and International Relations

Abstract

The aim of this panel is to explore the philosophical and political questions that narrative explanation raises for the academic study of politics and international relations. Specifically, this panel investigates the relationship between the idea of ‘science’ and ‘narratives’. Often narrative explanation has been conceived to challenge the ‘scientific’ image of the study of politics/IR. Yet, there is nothing necessarily incompatible about narrative forms of engagement and the scientific study of politics and international relations, certainly if alternative non-positivist philosophies of science (such as pragmatism or scientific realism) are explored, nor necessarily even within positivist frameworks of thought (as ‘analytical narratives’ method has demonstrated). In this panel, not only are we directed to revisit the meaning of science and its inter-relationship with narrative forms of engagement, but also this panel directs contributors to explore the normative consequences or the ‘politics’ of how we narrate our disciplines as well as world political events, that is, to explore the stakes involved in narrating disciplines as well as truth claims in particular ways. Indeed, important normative, explanatory and political questions as to the relationship of academic narratives (scientific or otherwise) and real world political realities are brought into focus through the investigation of the relationship between science and narratives. This panel invites contributors to explore two broad sets of questions arising from the intersection of narrative explanation and the question of science. 1) What is the relationship between narrative explanation and ‘scientific’ study of politics/IR? Does narrative explanation challenge or complement classical understandings of what social science research should entail? What are the philosophy of science consequences of taking narratives seriously? 2) What is at stake in narrating disciplines or knowledge claims as either scientific or non-scientific? What kind of a ‘discipline’ is politics/IR and (how) does it matter? What are the consequences of our understandings of the discipline and the type of knowledge it produces for our engagements with world political events and explanations? What are the consequences of our engagement with narratives for our understanding of the relationship between academic study and world political realities, if any?

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