Suchergebnisse

This article examines the politics that emerge from three different conceptions of the "inter": exchange, interest and identity. It argues that the classical focus on "distributive justice" in political analysis is too narrow since it excludes important issues such as non-cognitive factors (loyalty) and inter-generational questions that are of particular importance to politics. It thus draws attention to the "particular" and (historically) contingent as defining characteristics of politics which have been marginalised by the contemporary emphasis on the "universal" in both epistemology and (analytical) ethics.

ABSTRACTThis article revisits some of the theoretical debates within the field of IR since Ashley and Cox challenged the mainstream. But in so doing it attempts also to show that the proposed alternatives have their own blind spots that are subjected in the second part to discursive criticism. Neither Ashley's celebration of the wisdom of old realists nor their 'silence' on economics, nor the notion of 'internationalisation of the state' and of the world order are adequate for understanding politics in the era of globalisation. Instead, a critical theory has to examine the political projects that were engendered by the Hobbesian conception of order and rationality. Highlighting the disconnect between our present political vocabularies and the actual political practices, I argue that a critical theory has not only to 'criticise' existing approaches but has to rethink and re-conceptualise praxis, which is ill served by the analytical tools which are imported to this field from 'theory'.

In responding to the critics of my Tartu lecture, I firstly examine a little further the community aspect of science as a practice, because I do not quite share Lebows's optimism that ethics applied to the scientific enterprise are powerful enough to prevent its derailments. Secondly, I admit that a lack of an explicit historical dimension in my lectures noticed by Suganami was dictated more by circumstances than by an oversight or a denial of its importance. While Suganami believes that a sense of history, as well as some criticism of both international relations (IR) and history on the meta level, are sufficient for a new and fruitful beginning of IR analysis, I'm emphasizing the contribution which ordinary language philosophy could make to a new type of social analysis and, in particular, the theory of speech acts and of institutions a la Searle. Thirdly, instead of putting up a straw man and knocking him down, as Wight has done in his misunderstanding of my position, I'm addressing the issue of scientific realism and its alleged predominance in the philosophy of science, the question of ontology and epistemology and, finally, the issue of whether the claims that nature directly speaks to us is of any help in explaining actions rather than events. Adapted from the source document.

This article revisits some of the theoretical debates within the field of IR since Ashley and Cox challenged the mainstream. But in so doing it attempts also to show that the proposed alternatives have their own blind spots that are subjected in the second part to discursive criticism. Neither Ashley's celebration of the wisdom of old realists nor their 'silence' on economics, nor the notion of 'internationalisation of the state' and of the world order are adequate for understanding politics in the era of globalisation. Instead, a critical theory has to examine the political projects that were engendered by the Hobbesian conception of order and rationality. Highlighting the disconnect between our present political vocabularies and the actual political practices, I argue that a critical theory has not only to 'criticise' existing approaches but has to rethink and re-conceptualise praxis, which is ill served by the analytical tools which are imported to this field from 'theory'. Adapted from the source document.

How can secular Western IR theory deal with religion? Bringing in the debates on religion in the public sphere, the paper's goal is to foster a deeper understanding of the nexus between religion and international relations. Religion in global politics challenges the notion of a secular world order based on contract and custom in a system of states, as they had developed since the Westphalian settlement. According to this foundational myth religion mattered only domestically, and there only within the 'private' realm. The forces of globalization inevitably transcend the traditional boundaries of the state and also the fundamental distinction between the public and the private. The ongoing IR debate based on terrorism, and asymmetric conflict is decidedly too narrow to understand this fundamental challenge. It is here that the discussion in political theory which focused on the changing configuration of the public sphere (public/private distinction) attains it importance for the IR debate about religion in a global perspective. It supplements the debate in international relations that addresses the re-drawing of boundaries that had traditionally marked the internal/ external (global) distinction, but offers more than Huntington or Norris and Inglehart. For both of them the decisive breaks in the tectonics of world politics are cultural fault-lines where a secular segment of the world population is facing a religious one. The problem with this kind of argument is that of a dangerous selffulfilling prophecy. Contrary to others who still hope to round up the wagons and fight back the passing raids of the challengers, Habermas has understood that it does not make much sense trying to push religion into the camp of fundamentalism. In our paper we use Habermas's notion of a post-secular society in a global perspective to understand the challenge of the Westphalian system without running into the trap of a clash of civilizations. To do so, we contrast Habermas's suggestion of a post-secular society with Berger's claim of the desecularization of the world and Connolly's deep pluralism and politics of becoming. Based on Chambers's interpretation of Habermas we offer a strong and a weak reading of the concept of a post-secular society and argue that only a strong reading can meet the needs of a global public sphere.