Barry Buzan's essay provides a welcome forum for discussion about the virtues andfuture direction of the English School as a resource for IR research. Like many American With apologies to my Canadian colleagues, I use the term American to meanUS. I am uncomfortable ascribing the concerns outlined here to scholars in Canada who haveintellectual traditions of their own and may well have a different perspective on thesematters. constructivists, I am an admirer of English School scholarship and have foundit extremely helpful in my own work. I am less optimistic than Buzan, however, about the prospectsthat the English School will become either a grand theory or the focus of new trans-Atlantic IRdebates. It is not clear to me that grand theory status is necessary for the English School; it maynot even be particularly desirable. Buzan does not define what he means by a grand theory, but, fromthe context of his remarks and the Wallerstein example, it would seem that grand theory requires adegree of cohesion and discipline that is antithetical to the methodological pluralism which hascharacterized English School work and which Buzan views as one of its strongest virtues. Giving theEnglish School more salience in American IR debates, by contrast, would be a real improvement. Even ifit does not become the focus of debate, American scholarship would be enriched by incorporation of thehistorical and normative orientations the English School brings. As the growing strength ofconstructivist scholarship in the US indicates, there is an eager audience for theoretical frameworksthat provide traction on such issues. In what follows I sketch some reasons why the English School hashad only limited impact on US scholarship. Specifically, I will argue that the School's lack ofclarity about both method and theoretical claims has made it difficult for American scholars toincorporate it into their research. Addressing these issues might make the English School more usefulto more US researchers. It might also have the converse effect of sharpening work within the Schooland assisting its advocates in constructing the research focus Buzanseeks.