The materials of practice: Nuclear warheads,rhetorical commonplaces and committee meetings in Russian–Atlantic relations

Abstract

In this article I argue that the Cartesian dualism informing dominant theories of International Relations (IR) has limited analytical purchase at the level of practice. The materials that enable and constrain contemporary diplomatic practices between NATO and Russia seamlessly combine natural, cultural and organizational artefacts: nuclear warheads take on a symbolic life of their own; linguistic formulations transform into ‘things’; and committee meetings inscribe intersubjective dynamics with a new materiality. To materialist theories à la neo-realism, practice theory shows that material objects matter not because they have an immanent meaning, but rather because, in becoming part of social relations, they acquire a form of agency of their own, making people do things they would not have done otherwise. To IR constructivism, this article demonstrates that it is not only people who attach meanings to things; things also attach meanings to people. Enmeshed in social relations, material objects often acquire an epistemic life of their own that may affect, in turn, the very people who constructed them.