ABSTRACT
This study claims that the evolution of realist thought in International Relations can be fruitfully understood as the attempt, repeated and repeatedly failed, to translate the maxims of nineteenth century's European diplomatic practice into more general laws of an American social science. Therefore, two accounts are needed for understanding the evolution of realism. First, there is an internal story of the debates around central realist concepts and assumptions. Realist theoreticians were influenced by previous research and theories. But they continued to revise them when they found conceptual and logical flaws, and when underlying assumptions and deduced explanations did not fit the empirical evidence. Second, this internal debate took place in a particular political and academic environment. Realist theorizing shaped, and in turn was shaped by, US international policy concerns and the scholarly criteria typical for academic communities in US social sciences.
