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International relations theory is witnessing a veritable explosion of works within the areas of modernism and postmodernism, yet there has been no attempt to compare these theories and their sources according to a common criterion or logical form. This author argues that while these pioneering, imaginative and exciting theoretical works are disparate, they also share a common thread that seeks to express emancipatory goals for international relations. This book provides an in-depth critical study of this genre of theorizing that he names 'Emancipatory International Relations'. Spegele.

Although international relations theory is witnessing a veritable explosion of theoretical works in the general area of what I call, for reasons that will become clearer below, emancipatory international relations (EIR), a full-length critical study of this genre of theorizing has not yet been written, so far as I am aware. My project is to fill the lacuna. This will involve describing, analysing and criticizing a group of theories whose central assumptions and presuppositions have been shaped by continental philosophy, especially those derived from the work of Kant, Marx and Nietzsche. In my study I will examine certain common features of theories or discourses loosely divided into four groups: Kantian cosmopolitan; international critical theory; poststructuralist and postmodernist theories; and feminist international relations theories. My goal in this article is to describe these forms of emancipatory international relations and to examine why they count as emancipatory and how they differ from other kinds of theory. `I see no reason why we should not be business like about the nebulous.' - Anonymous.

'International Relations and the Limits of Political Theory' by Howard Williams is reviewed.

With the precipitate and well-deserved demise of positivism as the only theory of knowledge backstopping international relations, a large number of ethical issues, emasculated by positivism's non-cognitivist views of morality, are emerging for philosophical reflection and analysis. One of the most important of these is relativism. Despite its obvious (and increasing) significance, however, few international theorists have specifically addressed the issues it raises. One of the main reasons for this neglect, this article argues, lies in the conspicuous failure on the part of the newer normative approaches to international relations even to acknowledge that a relativist interpretation is a plausible construal of their position. In the next section, three examples of such failure will be described. It is no accident that these examples derive from anti-realist positions. A perspicuous feature of anti-realism has been its evident incapacity to give sufficient weight to the fact that the world is divided into antagonistic groups which have serious, perhaps even irreconcilable, moral and political conflicts with one another. But whatever may be the case for anti-realists, revisionary political realism is in no position to obscure its relation to relativism. The possibility of relativism, for the revisionary political realist, arises from simple reflection on the realist tradition.

THE WORK OF RICHARD ASHLEY, ONE OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL POST-STRUCTURALIST THINKERS IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, IS FLAWED IN SEVERAL WAYS. ASHLEY RELIES ON EXCESSIVE RHETORIC, AND HIS UNDERSTANDING OF DERRIDA AND FOUCAULT IS INACCURATE. FURTHERMORE, HIS ARGUMENTS SUFFER FROM UTOPIANISM, RELATIVISM, AND IRRATIONALISM. IRONICALLY, HE IS UNABLE TO ESCAPE THE STRAITJACKET OF ENLIGHTENMENT THINKING HE SO STRONGLY CONDEMNS.

In the recent study of international relations, political realism has, apparently, had as many supporters as detractors. Nonetheless, there seems to be a growing tendency to treat the categories of political realism as if they were passing the way of all flesh, destined to be replaced by system theory, transnationalism, Marxist structuralism, critical theory or whatever. One difficulty with this judgement is that political realism is not a single theoretical entity which can be refuted by single disconfirming instances. Nor is it an understanding of the subject rooted in the views of such well-known exponents of this school as Hans Morgenthau, Kenneth Thompson, Martin Wight, Sir Herbert Butterfield, E. H. Carr or Raymond Aron. On the contrary, political realism is a conception of politics which stretches back to the great Indian thinker Kautilya and in fact constitutes a many-mansioned tradition of thought about international relations. Three aspects of that tradition are examined in this essay: Common-sense Realism, Concessional Realism and neo-Aristotelian Realism. These reflections are only very tangentially related to the debates in the 1950s and 1960s concerning realism. This essay focuses, rather, on certain neglected features of contrasting philosophies of science. The article concludes, somewhat tentatively, that neo-Aristotelian Realism is coherent and cogent and superior in important respects to what scientific empiricism has to offer.