ABSTRACT

What is at stake in a name? Plenty, apparently. Benjamin Cohen’s (2008) depiction of the differences between what he calls the ‘American’ and ‘British’ schools of international political economy (IPE) seems to have provoked a mini bout of introspection over the disciplinary organization of IPE. This can only be helpful, if for no other reason than to make those who consider themselves to be IPE scholars more self-conscious about what it is they do and how they are organized to do it. The real value-added aspect of Cohen’s work – in contrast to some recent attempts to chart the state of the discipline but which really are advancing a particular conception of IPE (Lake, 2006; see also Lake’s contribution to this special issue) – is that he at least attempts to bring together research agendas that do not always speak to each other as clearly as they might. If this debate makes more of us aware of the richness and variety of IPE on offer, it will be a win-win debate for the field as a whole. Many of the features of ‘American’ IPE described by Dan Maliniak and Michael Tierney in this volume clearly resonate with those of us who practice IPE outside of America. In this short contribution I focus on three aspects of this debate that strike me as particularly interesting. First, and most importantly, I do not think it is ‘American’ IPE that Maliniak and Tierney (and Cohen) describe; it is a truncated and rather introverted slice of IPE in the American academy that they mistakenly equate with ‘American’ IPE. Unpacking this mistake demonstrates the great care we need to take when manufacturing data, whether about the real world or the academy. Second, what I believe Maliniak and Tierney do reveal is the astonishing concentration of disciplinary power within an important segment of IPE in America. This concentration – where power and authority truly meet – is also part of the story that Cohen tells, although he seems peculiarly shy about commenting on its implications. I am not so shy. And finally, I

argue that those of us who ply our trade outside of America need to engage more fulsomely with ‘American’ IPE, although we may take or leave (following our personal preferences) the version Maliniak and Tierney outline. The issues and problems that have generated an interest in IPE are serious affairs, and future generations would rightly chastise us were we to abandon this field of study to what I will call, following an earlier critique motivated by different concerns, the ‘Harvard’ school of IPE (Long, 1995).