The English School of International Relations (IR) is a distinctive approach to understanding global politics, emphasizing the interplay between international society, world society, and the international system. Rooted in the works of scholars such as Hedley Bull, Martin Wight, and Herbert Butterfield, the English School offers a historically-informed perspective on the norms, rules, and institutions that shape international relations.

This website is created and maintained by the English School Section of the International Studies Association (ISA), a global platform dedicated to advancing the study and practice of international relations. Here, you will find resources, research, and insights into the English School’s rich intellectual tradition and its relevance to contemporary global issues.

From ‘reconvention’ to today

This website is part of a process that came out of discussions amongst Barry Buzan, Richard Little and Ole Wæverstarting in the mid-1990s, about whether and how to reconvene the English School (ES) of International RelationsTheory. By 1998 these discussions had taken concrete form, culminating at the BISA Conference in 1999 where aset of panels on the ES made the re-launch idea public. One aim was both to strengthen ties within the existing EScommunity, and in doing so to build new ties to related areas of work in other disciplines and areas, particularlyWorld History, International Law, International Political Economy, European Union Studies and Historical Sociology.Another was to develop a set of ES research priorities and to create a clearer division of labour both within the EScommunity and between it and other research communities. The initial idea for implementing these aims was to‘reconvene’ in the sense of trying to establish a formal and funded structure of meetings along the lines of theoriginal British Committee from the late 1950s to the mid-1980s. This approach did not work out, not least becausethe Economic and Social Research Council rejected the proposal on the misguided grounds that it was ‘too English’.

As a consequence, the focus shifted towards having a more structured ES presence at IR Conferences, especiallyBISA, ISA, the Pan-European Conferences, and WISC. Alongside that, several working groups were set up, a blogattempted, and a website established on which conference and working group activity logs could be kept, andvarious documents and a bibliography made available. The blog found no takers, and died away. The workinggroups mostly did not become a major or sustained focus of activity. The bibliography, mostly done by Buzan onthe basis of his own research, but with increasing contributions from others, did become a widely used tool. Itoffered the ability to search the literature by keywords and authors, and has been updated annually. This work hasnow been taken over by the ES Section of ISA. Perhaps the biggest success, however, was the organization of amore structured ES presence at major IR Conferences.

This task was originally undertaken by Buzan, who put out calls for papers, panels and multi-panel sections, and organized ES bids for the various conferences. Over the years others joined in to help, and this activity became both more self-sustaining, and in some ways less necessary: once the pump had been primed it functioned more or less automatically. Creating a more systematic ES presence at IR conferences worked in three ways. It increased the sense of community amongst those working in the ES tradition. It raised the profile and standing of the ES (especially within the US) in the rest of IR. And it encouraged PhD students to ‘join’ the ES by orientating their own work towards it. The revival of the ES has both benefitted from, and contributed to, the ‘historical turn’ in IR.

It now seems to be generally recognized that from 2001 the ES experienced a revival in two senses. First, it enjoysa bigger constituency and therefore more intellectual energy than it did before. It has both a stronger sense of itselfand a more focused approach to its research agenda. Second, the ES is now broadly recognized and accepted as amainstream approach to IR. This is true not just in Europe and Australasia, where it always had standing, but alsoin the US, where the setting up of an ES Section of ISA was a key move, as well as in China and many othercountries. There is now a significant foreign language ES literature, especially in China, but also in Japan, Koreaand Italy. In China, the ES has provided some inspiration for those promoting a ‘Chinese School’, and similarthings have happened in several other countries where some IR scholars are looking to challenge the grip of USintellectual hegemony in their home IR markets. The ES is now larger, more international, and more diverse than atany time in the past. It continues to inspire new generations of scholars, as it always did, but now does so on aglobal scale, and across a wider historical and theoretical framing.