1 Theorising Agency in International Relations In Hobbes's Wake ...

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What did carry over from Hobbes , moreover, is once again the analogous juxtaposition of the individual and the state that centrally underpins Alexander Wendt’s (1999, 215-245) elaboration of the notion that the state has a ‘Self’ that constitutes both the seat of a core, fixed identity and the place from which it enters into interactions with an ‘Other’. After all states, for Wendt (1999, 215, 221), are people too; this ‘anthropomorphizing’ of the state is rooted in the Hobbesian state of nature. Although Wendt (215-221) extensively elaborates this concept of personhood as a corporate or collective rather than an individual form of agency, this is also the point in Wendt’s social theory where the individual is split in two, between the actor and the self. On the one hand this elaboration serves to stake out actorhood as the terrain upon which to deploy the constitutive logic that characterises enquiries into processes of social construction. On other hand, by the same token, it serves to hold off the self from such enquiries. For Wendt, as an actor of international politics the state may be socially constructed, but its’ self is not. In IR at large, the legacy of Hobbes’s Leviathan has largely revolved around the state of nature. The Leviathan points to a blind spot on the horizon of IR theory, both within the so-called Hobbesian traditions and those critical of it. Yet the ‘serious engagement with his thought rather than a cursory dismissal’ to which Michael William’s (1996, 233) enjoins ‘those critical of positivist-inspired theories international relation’ requires, I argue, bringing back the other pole of the narrative. Looking for the Leviathan: The Misadventures of Carl Schmitt Bringing the figure of the Leviathan back in requires stepping out of IR and into political theory. To this effect, the figure of Carl Schmitt provides a useful bridge; first, because Schmitt’s own thought increasingly straddled the two disciplines (see also Schwab 2008); second, in view of his recognised lineage within classical realism, as per Morgenthau’s ‘hidden dialogue’ with him (Scheuerman 1999, 62). I focus specifically on his The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes. Meaning and Failure of a 16
Symbol. Schmitt’s perspective is useful for casting the focus upon the Leviathan as a symbol, that is, as a linguistic trope, and for operating the shift from considering the Leviathan as the symbol of a particular political order bound up with sovereignty to the symbol of order, at the national and international levels. Schmitt’s concern, as per his subtitle, is with understanding the true meaning of this ‘strongest and most powerful image’ in the ‘long history of political theories’; one, moreover, that, however ‘rich in colorful images and symbols, icons and idols, paradigms and phantasms, emblems and allegories’ has left many a political theorists pondering over this particular one (see also Brown 1980, Ball 1985, Stillman 1995, Springborg 1996). Carl Schmitt alone however, to my knowledge, dedicates an entire book to appraising it as a symbol, albeit without actually developing the concept. Schmitt (2008, 19) sets out to record all the meanings of this ‘mythical totality’ by gleaning references to it, first in the text itself, then in the broader historical context of the treatise’s writing. He finds only three mentions in the text itself. He does not hide his disappointment: ‘the explanation is very brief and does not correspond to the great expectation that a mythical blending of god and animal, animal and man, man and machine evokes’ (Schmitt 2008, 20). Once he has exhausted all possible sources of meaning within and beyond the text Schmitt concludes to the symbol’s failure; an astounding conclusion, given its deep resonance in the history of political thought, Schmitt’s own motivations in trying to appraise its power. Schmitt’s somewhat deflated conclusion appears, rather, to express his own unease in the face of profound ambiguity in the ‘old myth’ that ultimately eludes his best efforts to pin down all its meanings. The ambiguity and polysemy at work in this symbol, Schmitt senses, is intended by Hobbes; uncertain though he remains as to how to tackle it. Schmitt’s approach, I suggest, actually leads him astray from being able to grasp the function of the Leviathan in Hobbes’s political thought. I propose a different way of appraising this mythical totality. Rather than wring the symbol for all its meanings, 17
Page 2 and 3: 2001). As the seat of human agency,
Page 4 and 5: foundation for elaborating a type o
Page 6 and 7: ones; to the extent that it is dire
Page 8 and 9: away from the ‘Hobbesian traditio
Page 10 and 11: Classical realism thus cast its len
Page 12 and 13: Gauthier is right to find in Hobbes
Page 14 and 15: he mobilises Searle’s distinction
Page 18 and 19: within and beyond the text, it is i
Page 20 and 21: This explains, second, the diachron
Page 22 and 23: The imaginary is also the site wher
Page 24 and 25: or signification. 17 The word does
Page 26 and 27: Part III: The Leviathan as the sign
Page 28 and 29: subject that function as anchoring
Page 30 and 31: in terms of what the Leviathan achi
Page 32 and 33: The symbolic, as we have seen, is t
Page 34 and 35: experience and unimpeded desires. H
Page 36 and 37: Reading Hobbes through Lacan shines
Page 38 and 39: imagination of the discipline’s f
Page 40 and 41: Citations Aron, Raymond (1966 [1962
Page 42 and 43: Hansen, L.(2006), Security As Pract
Page 44 and 45: Morgenthau, Hans J. (1960), Politic
Page 46: Wolfers, Arnold (1962), Discord and

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