Description
This paper argues for a re-examination of international society as a conceptual tool to examine international order. It does so to reflect on the role of progress for international order. Based on empirical data on humanitarian intervention between 1815 and 2015, the paper rejects the grand narrative of a progressing international order. Instead, it reveals the circular reasoning of basing the benchmark for progress of international order on its own values. I propose a two-dimensional conception of international society to capture the idea of progress of international order. Humanitarian emergencies provides the strongest indicator for the apparent tension between the pluralist and solidarist conceptions of international society. This tension between cosmopolitan and communitarian values does not confine international society to either a pluralist or a solidarist form. Instead, I argue for both solidarism and pluralism as orthogonal dimensions of international society and not as mutually exclusive or opposite ends of a spectrum. This approach allows for distinguishing between different types of international society shaping international order. The benefit consists in simultaneously accounting for the inherent morality of both solidarism and pluralism, for their combined role in determining the type international society, and for evaluating progress of international order against a framework independent from the current international order.
