I appreciate Barry Buzan and George Lawson’s thoughtful and probing commentary. In responding, let me begin by reminding the reader of my book’s goal: to develop a theoretical framework for understanding contemporary global governance. My premise was that what distinguishes governing from mere cooperating is a form of purposiveness directed toward the public good. To develop that claim, I drew on the concept of collective intentionality, highlighting the role of joint commitments and publicity, and then used the Concert of Europe as an illustration.

Buzan and Lawson’s criticisms are historical and theoretical. On the historical points I largely agree. Continental revolutions exposed fissures that restricted the scope of great power concerting after 1830, and Britain also focused increasingly on its empire more than its continental partners. While one would seem to make European war more likely and the other might make it less so, Buzan and Lawson are correct to point out that a deeper consideration of British interests would have been productive, especially since I argue that states can sustain collective intentions across ideological divides. Nonetheless, when they suggest that my omission inhibits a “judicious assessment of the Concert,” I wonder whether they are asking me to write a different book. I certainly do not want to offer a nonjudicious reading, and as I indicate in my review of their book, it is difficult to know how best to marry historical sensitivity with generalizable claims. But my central empirical goal was not to break new ground on the Concert; it was to illustrate a general theoretical claim.

On the theoretical side, they find my book to be parochially U.S.-centric, claiming that I seem “unaware” of the close fit between it and the English School (ES) tradition. Yet in Chapter 1, where I introduce my two central concepts, collective intentionality and public power, the latter is defined explicitly by situating it relative to Hedley Bull’s notions of society and solidarity (pp. 7–11). In Chapter 3, I introduce my historical discussion (that draws on several ES authors) by noting that while, like Bull, I examine the institutions of international society, my focus is on the conditions of possibility for collective purposiveness, which he does not distinguish from normative structure. I agree with Buzan and Lawson that in Chapter 7 I ought to have returned to the ES. Still, it is unclear how a centrally located, substantive engagement with Bull’s ideas in the very frame of my argument suggests “unawareness” of the ES.

Additionally, given my focus on collective purposiveness, it would have been difficult to engage ES concepts more deeply in any case. In particular, Buzan and Lawson lament that I do not engage Adam Watson’s concept of raison de systeme, “the belief that it pays to make the system work.” Yes, there are affinities that, had I been aware of the concept, I might have pointed out. But examining references to it in Watson’s and Buzan’s own writings, its contours and causal powers remain unclear. Whose beliefs constitute the raison de systeme? Are they an aggregation, an emergent property, or something else? Do decision makers need to explicitly commit to the beliefs? Must those commitments be sincere? Most importantly given my theoretical goals, is raison de systeme purposive, and if so, how could it be, without a central actor? These are questions of social theory, and it is because I did not find them answered in any IR scholarship—including the ES—that I turned to the philosophical literature on collective intentionality. So whereas Buzan and Lawson chose to dwell on the glass half empty of insufficient engagement with the ES, in this case one could as easily see my argument in glass-half-full terms as an unpacking of an otherwise underdeveloped ES concept.

In closing, I want to return to the charge of parochialism, which suggests a willful disregard of views outside of one’s community. I think “situated” is more accurate. I was trained in the United States and cash my paychecks in Ohio. However, my central question was problem driven: How can we understand global governing, action for public purposes on a global scale, in the absence of a world government? This problem transcends U.S. international relations. True, I could have been explicit about how my Western gaze structured and limited my research. But Buzan and Lawson are no less situated than I. Both of our great-power-centric, English-language-sourced books are unmistakably products of the Global North. Moreover, their suggestions for how I might have globalized my narrative are to include European revolutions, British imperialism, and deeper engagement with ES authors. As such, I wonder how a scholar situated in the Global South might interpret our exchange—pots calling each other’s kettles black? Buzan and Lawson bring in empire and I try to reverse the gaze by viewing the Concert from the perspective of the Ottomans, but each of us is burdened by our time and place. There is no gaze from nowhere.