Identity, Interest and Action

a cultural explanation of Sweden's intervention in the Thirty Years War

In 1630 a Swedish army under the command of king Gustav II Adolf crossed the Baltic Sea and landed in Germany. Sweden, at the time, was one of the poorest and most peripheral countries in Europe. They were going to war against the Habsburg Emperor in Vienna, the most powerful man on the Continent. The question is why. Why did Sweden go to war in 1630. This book tells the story.

"Erik Ringmar has grasped a fundamental point that generations of historical analysts have usually missed: when state leaders intervene aggressively in world affairs, whatever material interests they might be advancing or defending they are always asserting claims to be consequential international actors. In the case of Sweden and the Thirty Years War, Ringmar presents that view convincingly and engagingly."

"Ringmar's book is an outstanding illustration of a very imaginative historical analysis of the emergence of a modern state -- Sweden. The analysis combines the evaluation of ideological and cultural factors together with power ones, especially in relation to the new international political and ideological system which emerged after the Reformation. I see it as a very important contribution."

"Ringmar has written a book of history which is also path-breaking in historiographical methods and in social theory. ...The alternation of narrative and clear theoretical reasoning makes for a passionate reading."

"Erik Ringmar has done a neat job of comparing rational-choice models of decision making with cultural ones in Identity, Interest and Action....this is a powerful little study, smoothly written and tightly argued that sheds light on many different areas of sociology."

But there is a theoretical argument here as well. The decision to intervene into the German war was taken since the Swedish king wanted recognition for himself and for his country, and he wanted recognition from the leading rulers of the day – the Habsburg Emperor, and the kings of France and Germany. We need recognition in order to establish an identity for ourselves, and the actions we undertake to that end are not concerned with matter of utility. It is only once we are someone – once we have a recognized identity – that we can act in our interests.

"Why are there wars? Why have human beings in practically all times and places seen it fit to kill each other, not just on an individual and one-on-one basis, but as a matter of official policy, backed up by the full resources of a community, a city or a state?"

"The fact that wars appear as irrational may in fact tell us very little about the stupidity or unreasonableness of human beings and very much about the limits of our contemporary explanatory accounts. The deficiency may rest not with the soldiers or with those who order them into battle, but rather with the scholars who attempt to explain these actions."

"Yet there is another possibility. The fact that wars appear as irrational may in fact tell us very little about the stupidity or unreasonableness of human beings and very much about the limits of our contemporary explanatory accounts. The deficiency may rest not with the soldiers or with those who order them into battle, but rather with the scholars who attempt to explain these actions."

"Actors exist in stories and nowhere else, and stories are governed by narratological, not ontological, requirements. There is consequently no reason why collective entities of various kinds could not be admitted to this status, and there is furthermore no reason why collective entities could not be conceived of as having both intentions and interests. Also states can be intentional, interest-driven, actors, we may conclude, provided that we tell stories which identify them as such."

"At the core of this alternative theory stands the suggestion that people act not only in order to win things, but also in order to defend a certain conception of who they are. We act not only because there are things we want to have, but also because there are persons we want to be."

"Neither the temporal nor the spatial present is a natural, hospitable, location which simply is 'there' for us to inhabit. What we must do is instead to create a present for ourselves; we must make room for our selves in time and in space. This is the task which a constitutive story fulfills by extending our being in space and in time. It is with the construction of a constitutive story that our selves come to exist, and it is with the destruction of a constitutive story that our selves disappear."

Book blog

Universities that use the book

It is pretty remarkable how the book has been picked up by teachers around the world, and used in their courses. I never expected this kind of a response. Courses that have had the book on the reading list include …

February 20, 2018 No Comments

Preface to the paperback edition

Writing the preface to a new edition of a book that first appeared twelve years ago is like trying to introduce a very good, but long-lost, friend. You know the person really well but you are at the same time not quite sure what he or she has been up to lately. …

October 8, 2009 No Comments

Out in paperback

Cambridge University Press just confirmed that Identity, Interest & Action, long available only in hard-back and ridiculously priced at some $130 US, now is out in paperback. It took 12 long years! …

May 27, 2008 No Comments

The struggle for recognition

This is a new project I’m working on together with a friend, Thomas Lindemann in Bourdeaux. It’s on “the struggle for recognition in international relations.” It’s going to be an edited volume with us two as editors. …

February 24, 2008 No Comments

Your PhD

The meeting went fine; your dissertation got two “very goods” and one “distinction” (Scott). I gave it very good, but that’s no criticism; it’s still one revision away from a distinction. …

April 2, 1993 No Comments