P O L I T I C A L S T U D I E S : 2 0 0 9 VO L 5 7 , 8 9 2 8 9 8

doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9248.2009.00819.x

Your Ontology, My Ontic Speculations ... On

the Importance of Showing Ones
(Ontological) Working
post_819

892..898

Colin Hay
University of Sheffield

In a discipline such as ours, in which all contributions are necessarily preliminary

and should perhaps best be seen as openings to potential conversations rather
than definitive statements in their own right it is always pleasing to have ones
work engaged with explicitly and directly. Yet the satisfaction that comes with a
new opportunity for a fresh conversation about ontology in political analysis is
tempered on this occasion by the length of the charge sheet in front of me. In the
space of approximately 3,400 words, Nigel Pleasants accuses me of many things.
My article on King Canute and the Problem of Structure and Agency (Hay,
2009), he suggests, is part of a broader crusade, of which I am a chief protagonist
(Pleasants, 2009, p. 885), to convert political analysts to the value of arrant, arid
and ultimately unhelpful ontological reflection, foisting this on unwitting and
unwilling students of political science to boot. Even taken on its own terms, my
contribution is flawed in almost all significant respects. It rests, it seems, on the
false premise that ontological reflection is an aid to a reflective political analysis,
it fails to differentiate between genuine ontologies (deserving of their designation
as ologies) and mere ontic speculations, superstitions and hunches, it achieves no
fresh analytical purchase on the story of King Canute and the waves and it adds
next to nothing to our understanding of the structureagency relationship. In
fact, were we to bracket out the (numerous) references to structure, agency and
ontology that litter the text, we would find that nothing of significance is ... lost
to the historical and political analysis of the story of King Canute (p. 891).
Indeed, neither Canute himself, nor the current-day reader ... need know
anything about theories of structure and agency or ontological reflection in
order to conceive or understand those events (p. 891).
This is quite a list of accusations. In the brief response the editors have graciously
allowed me, I challenge all but one of these contentions, while seeking to explain
why it is that Pleasants final charge that the analysis could readily be recast
without explicit reference to the categories and concepts on which it lavishes so
much attention is one to which I happily plead my guilt. That he sees this as
a failing of the piece is, I suggest, indicative of a broader misunderstanding on his
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part both of the nature of the analysis I engage in and of the broader value of
ontological reflection of this kind. In the process I argue once more for the merits
of ontological reflection not as a substitute for political analysis but as a way of
achieving a degree of reflexivity about the categories we deploy as analysts and
for the value of showing ones ontological working.
I begin, however, with an altogether more serious and significant set of issues.
Indeed, enthusiastic though I am to defend my arguments about ontology,
structure and agency and even King Canute against what I see as the distortion
and misunderstanding to which Pleasants subjects them, such matters are of
nothing in comparison to the issues raised by the subtext and general tenor of
Pleasants remarks. For I detect in his response to my article an alarming, even
somewhat sinister, disciplinary insularity. There are two elements to this the
former rather less significant (and to my mind, sinister) than the latter. Political
analysts, he seems to suggest, should venture extremely cautiously, if at all, on to
the terrain of cognate disciplines such as history. Although I find this a rather
depressing and parochial view, and one that can surely only be based on a
somewhat artificial delimiting of the realm of the political, I am content to
comfort myself with the thought that it is likely to be seen as such by a growing
proportion of political analysts and to pass on.
What troubles me very much more are the implications of what he has to say
about the venturing of political analysts on to the terrain of philosophy. I must
confess to being quite shocked by these passages in his response and I have read
and reread them extremely carefully. I would like to think that I have misread
them, but I fear that I have not. First, Pleasants a philosopher himself it should
be noted clearly sees issues of ontology in general, and structure and agency in
particular, as belonging to philosophy. They are part of the natural and seemingly
jealously guarded terrain of the discipline on to which political analysts encroach
if, as and when they choose to venture an opinion on such matters. This, I think,
is troubling in itself. For as I and others have sought to argue for some time, the
nature and status of the categories we deploy and the relationship between those
categories and the realities they seek to capture, reflect or model are issues of
fundamental importance, regardless of the specific empirical realm of our inquiries. They have massive implications for the claims we might legitimately make as
analysts of empirical phenomena and should rightly be seen as pan-disciplinary in
character; they are not the exclusive preserve of philosophy. For an analyst of the
political (however one might delimit that realm) to have opinions on such matters
is, in and of itself, to engage in political analysis.Whether or not it takes us into
issues also debated and discussed by philosophers and whether or not such
reflections have practical implications for the conduct of substantive political
research is not the point though it is difficult to see how a sustained reflection
on the status of the categories that we deploy in the analysis of an empirical realm
can fail to have implications for the kind of analysis we engage in. If the
implication of this is that we must all be or become amateur philosophers then
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so be it; if that is the price for reflecting systematically on the status of the
concepts we deploy then it is surely a price worth paying, however much it might
irritate those with greater metaphysical and ontological capital.
But this is by no means all that Pleasants has to say on the subject. From my
perspective, worse is to follow. In a passage that worries me more each time I read
it, Pleasants effectively entreats us to abandon (presumably, all) ontological reflection in political analysis on the grounds that it is simply too abstract for many
to grasp and unappealing to the theoretically less inclined (p. 891). There are two
obvious problems with this. First, it seems to me at least to rest on a false premise.
It is inevitably true that some students of politics struggle sometimes with some
of the issues with which we present them. But in my experience, and initially
counter-intuitive though it may well seem, issues of ontology in general and
structure and agency in particular are not prevalent among them. Indeed, if
anything the converse is the case with students often finding that debates on
structure and agency have both an intuitive character and an appealing accessibility. Although the evidence could, of course, be interpreted differently, my own
experience would lead me to suggest that students of politics well versed in issues
of political ontology emerge not only unscathed from the experience, but more
confident, more consistent and with more of an independent voice than they
previously possessed.
Second, Pleasants depiction of the poor, philosophically illiterate and theoretically averse student of politics is deeply condescending. More substantively, its
implication is to condemn both students and practitioners of political analysis to
silence on the status and nature of the categories, constructs, models and concepts
they must (presumably) continue to deploy. That, I think, we have to resist.We do
not need, and cannot afford, to subcontract matters of political ontology to
philosophers and/or philosophy these are issues we must grapple with ourselves, however much we might usefully draw insight from philosophers in the
process of so doing.
If this is the rather disturbing undercurrent to Pleasants analysis, then the rest of
it is far more explicitly stated and targeted. It takes the form of the lengthy charge
sheet summarised above. In the little space that remains I take each of the claims
that together comprise it in turn.
The first of these relates to the seeming abandon with which I throw around the
term ontology. Reassuringly, he informs me, if previous usage is anything to go by,
I do at least understand the term though I would have been well advised to
remind myself of the definition before embarking on the analysis of Canute. For
I fail to differentiate between genuine ontologies and mere ontic speculations,
susperstitions and hunches magical beliefs and the things anthropologists
study (sic), for instance. This is undoubtedly an interesting point, but it is not
terribly consistent with Pleasants own remarks. For in explaining to me how I
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might better have introduced the concept, he states: ontology ... is used to refer
to the fundamental mode of existence of things, which is beyond the possibility of
empirical observation or inquiry (p. 886, emphasis added). I have no particular
problem with this passage. Indeed, it would seem quite consistent with my own
usage of the term ontology in this and previous work. But it immediately raises
the paradoxical character of an ont-ology, literally, a science of being (see also Hay,
2002, p. 61). For how do we know what exists, such that we might speak of having
developed a science of being especially if, as Pleasants here concedes, adjudicating such claims is beyond the possibility of empirical observation or inquiry?
More to the point, on the basis of what non-arbitrary criteria are we to downgrade those potential ontologies we do not find convincing magical beliefs, for
instance to the status of mere ontic speculation? In the absence of an answer to
such troubling questions an answer Pleasants does not provide and an answer I
do not think exists I prefer not to engage in what otherwise would seem to be
the arbitrary differentiation between genuine ontologies and mere ontic superstitions. Rather I label all ordered sets of ontic claim ontologies if there is good
reason to think that they are genuinely held.
Yet reading Pleasants critique this might sound strange for am I not happy to
condemn the ontological simplicity of rational choice theory as impoverished?
And am I not, in the process, violating my own self-imposed mantra not to
engage in ontological proselytising? This would certainly seem consistent with
Pleasants reading of my argument. But it is based on a fairly profound misreading
of what I actually say on rational choice theory (here, and indeed, elsewhere). My
basic point is in fact very simple and it is an argument that I certainly sought
to spell out as clearly as I could in the text. But let me try to clarify my position
further. Yes, I do see problems with the use to which the rationalist ontology
which posits that all behaviour is self-interested is put in much contemporary
political analysis. But, note, the problem is not with the ontology per se but with
the use to which it is put. However narrow and unappealing I may find it, the
ontology itself is not wrong and that is not my claim. My problem, in so far as
I have a problem with it, is that, as a set of ontological claims, it is not genuinely
held by the political analysts who deploy it. Put simply, I know of no political
analyst who genuinely believes that all human behaviour is narrowly selfinterested (Milton Friedman makes a very similar point about economists); but I
know of plenty of political analysts who model political behaviour on the basis of
such an assumption. For them the assumption is a simplifying convenience. If any
ontology is to be downgraded to the status of a collection of merely ontic
statements and assumptions, it is surely this.
The remaining points can perhaps be dealt with more rapidly though each
deserves more sustained discussion. Next on the charge sheet is the claim that my
analysis offers no fresh perspective on the familiar story of Canute and the waves.
To be fair, neither of us, I think, is particularly well placed to assess this claim. But
a couple of points might nonetheless be made here. First, Pleasants does seem
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prepared to concede that I have indeed consulted the principal authoritative

sources on the subject (pp. 886 and 891). But he simply cannot have read them.
For had he done so, he would see that not only do their perspectives on the story
of Canute and the waves vary massively, but they are also significantly at odds with
my own. Indeed, if Pleasants is right in thinking that I have indeed succeeded in
consulting the principal authorities on the subject, then it is difficult to see how
he could sustain the claim that my analysis of Canute offers no fresh perspective
for it differs in so many significant respects from the existing historical literature.
My account may well be wrong (though that, for once, is not his charge), but it
is difficult not to see it as distinctive. As such, it would surely take an argument
to the effect that it is flawed for it not to be seen as a potential contribution to
the (albeit limited) existing literature on the subject.
That, however, is not the key point. Although I certainly hope to have added
something to the historical (and political) debate on the story of King Canute and
the waves and although the argument certainly brings together the available
evidence in a manner distinctive in the context of that literature, it would, I think,
be somewhat perverse to judge the contribution of the piece solely or even
principally in such terms. King Canute, as I think even Pleasants would concede,
is a foil for a more general discussion of the problem of structure and agency. This
makes it particularly odd that, while condemning the piece for failing to say much
if anything that is genuinely novel or insightful on these broader themes, Pleasants
systematically fails himself to engage with the six core claims on structure and
agency that I set out in the abstract and defend in the article itself. In the absence
of such a discussion, it is difficult to respond to a critique which, in effect, I would
have to anticipate. The few passing comments that he does make on the relationship between the ontological and the empirical, however, suggest to me some
considerable confusion. For on the one hand, Pleasants would seem to accept
significant elements of the argument that I make notably, that the empirical facts
of the matter, as it were, cannot be used to adjudicate ontological claims
(p. 887). Yet he then goes on to suggest that whether Canute was a savvy, reflexive,
strategic social actor, or a deluded fool, is a matter of fact and its interpretation, not
of ontology (p. 888). This strikes me as profoundly muddled. For as I sought to
explain in the piece itself (though the claim is hardly a novel one), any interpretation of the facts entails committing oneself, whether one likes it or not, to
ontological/ontic assumptions. The category (and certainly the status) of the
deluded fool itself is an ontological one, as is the differentiation between, and
juxtaposition of, the deluded fool, on the one hand, with the savvy, reflexive,
strategic actor on the other. The idea, then, that one can adjudicate between
contending claims about Canute in an ontologically agnostic and innocent way is
itself mistaken as well as contradicting Pleasants starting premise.
Yet that, in itself, is insufficient to demonstrate the value to political analysts of the
kind of ontological reflection I here seek to defend. In the end the proof of this
particular pudding is in the eating and it is for others to judge whether or not
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for them reflecting on the nature and status of the categories they deploy sharpens
their analytical focus and points to new potential avenues to be explored or is an
unnecessary and unproductive indulgence which merely puts off the analysis of
real-world phenomena. For me, as in the discussion of King Canute, it is the
former. And this brings me to Pleasants final charge that were we to bracket out
the references to structure,agency and ontology in the text,nothing of significance
for the substantive analysis of King Canute would be lost. Perverse though it might
at first seem, I happily concede the point indeed, for me this is no kind of
concession at all. Let me explain. The point is a very simple one. Ontological
reflection is an aid to political analysis, not a substitute for it. The analytical
purchase (if any) that I achieve on King Canute and the waves is generated
principally (if not perhaps exclusively) by recasting the story of King Canute in
ontological terms. As such, though the analysis can retrospectively be stripped
of its references to structure,agency and the language of ontology,it could not have
been written without them. Whether analyses informed in this way should
ultimately be stripped of the language of ontology before they are made public is
an interesting question. For me there is a considerable value in showing ones
theoretical working and in this case that means showing ones ontological working.
For, if Pleasants is indeed right and I get the relationship between structure and
agency wrong in ways that might have a direct bearing on my treatment of King
Canute, then it is important that we are able to unpack this to isolate the
problematic propositions and to explore their implications for the analysis I offer.
Indeed, I take it that this is precisely what Pleasants is seeking to do.
But there is perhaps a more general point here, and it is with this that I conclude.
Invariably, I would contend, theoretically informed accounts can be stripped, after
the fact, of their explicitly theoretical content and restated in lay terms without
loss to the analytical purchase they offer. But that they can be recast in this way is
hardly in itself an argument for so doing, nor more significantly is it an argument
for disavowing the theory responsible for the analytical purchase in the first place.
Yet that would seem to be what Pleasants is arguing for. Showing ones working
may well, as in the present exchange, get one into deep ontological waters, but it
is surely preferable to foreclosing all theoretical and conceptual debate by burying
the theoretical inspiration for the analytical insights ones work presents. On this
point, at least, I hope we can agree.
(Accepted: 4 November 2008)
About the Author
Colin Hay, Department of Politics, Elmfield, Northumberland Road, Sheffield S10 2TN; email:
c.hay@sheffield.ac.uk

References
Hay, C. (2002) Political Analysis. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
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Hay, C. (2009) King Canute and the Problem of Structure and Agency: On Times,Tides and Heresthetics,
Political Studies, 57 (2), 26079.
Pleasants, N. (2009) Structure,Agency and Ontological Confusion:A Response to Hay, Political Studies, 57 (4),
88591.

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