Normative theory and international relations: overcoming the posittvist bias

ABSTRACT

Few scholars in the discipline of international relations have devoted their energy to normative theory. One of the reasons why they have eschewed normative theory stems from an unexamined epistemological assumption which is held in common by most of the scholars in the field. According to this assumption only those theories which are in the last instance grounded in fact are capable of producing scientific knowledge properly so called. On this view facts are superior pieces of knowledge in that they mirror the world This article challenges this claim and concludes that factual assertions are validated in much thesame way as assertions in normative discourse are validated. It follows from this that normative discourse is not epistemologically suspect in the way it is often assumed to be.