Is There a Philosophy of Statesmanship?

This essay assumes that readers will be familiar with Wight’s analysis distinguishing three traditions of thinking about international politics and will therefore recognize ‘three types’. The ‘three groups’, Wight observes, consist of (1) ‘idealists’ and ‘revolutionaries’ and ‘Utopians’ committed to serving the ‘general will’ and ‘the cause’; (2) ‘moralists’ and ‘Grotians’ dedicated to upholding treaties and the rule of law; and (3) ‘realists’ and ‘Machiavellians’ concerned with calculating how to defend and advance ‘the national interest’. With regard to survival imperatives, however, Wight holds that ‘all statesmen are realists’. He also qualifies this exposition of three traditions of thinking about international relations by pointing out that some Grotians and moralists have championed ‘a different Utopia’, an ideal distinct from the revolutionary uniformity sought by certain religions and ideologies. This different Utopia was the League of Nations, an institution designed to bring about a peaceful universal legal order. The League’s advocates expected a majority of nations, backed by world public opinion, to maintain peace and order through rational appeals and, if necessary, economic sanctions, with war as a final recourse to restore international amity.