Globalizing IR Theory: Critical Engagement

205 Pages·2020·1.497 MB·English

by  Yaqing Qin

Globalizing IR Theory
Despite attempts to redress the balance, international relations (IR) as a discipline
is still dominated by Western theories. The contributors in this book explore the
challenges of constructing an alternative, with a dialogue between global and
local approaches.
Drawing on scholars with backgrounds in the United States, Europe, Asia and
South America, this volume attempts to critically engage with and reflect upon
existing traditions of IR theory to produce a deeply pluralist approach. Traditions,
cultures, histories and practices from around the world influence their respective
theoretical understanding and in turn explain why the Western tradition of IR is
insufficient.
This book provides great insight for scholars of IR from around the world,
looking for more diversity in IR theory.
Yaqing Qin is Professor of International Studies at China Foreign Affairs
University. He is interested in IR theory, culture and social theory, and global
governance. He is Executive Vice President of the China National Association for
International Studies, Associate Member of the Royal Academy of Belgium and
Global Fellow at Oslo Peace Research Institute. His work has appeared in many
academic journals, including International Studies Review, The Chinese Journal
of International Politics and International Relations of the Asia-Pacific. His has
published over 100 journal articles and 40 books, including Global Governance:
Rebuilding of Order in a Multiplex World (2019), A Relational Theory of World
Politics (2018), Future in Retrospect: China’s Diplomatic History Revisited (2016)
and Power, Institutions, and Cultures (2005).
IR Theory and Practice in Asia
This series will publish philosophical, theoretical, methodological and empirical
work by prominent scholars, as well as that of emerging scholars, concerned with
IR theory and practice in the context of Asia. It will engage with a wide range
of issues and questions ranging from meta-theoretical underpinnings of existing
Western-oriented IR theories to ways of theorising Asian histories and cultures.
International Relations as a Discipline in Thailand
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Edited by Chanintira na Thalang, Soravis Jayanama and Jittipat Poonkham
Rethinking Middle Powers in the Asian Century
New Theories, New Cases
Edited by Tanguy Struye de Swielande, Dorothée Vandamme, David Walton and
Thomas Wilkins
Critical International Relations Theories in East Asia
Relationality, Subjectivity, and Pragmatism
Edited by Kosuke Shimizu
Ontological Security and Status-Seeking
Thailand’s Proactive Behaviours during the Second World War
Peera Charoenvattananukul
Going beyond Parochialism and Fragmentation in the Study of
International Relations
Edited by Yong-Soo Eun
Globalizing IR Theory
Critical Engagement
Edited by Yaqing Qin
For the full list of titles in this series, please visit www.routledge.com/IR-Theory-
and-Practice-in-Asia/book-series/IRTPA
Globalizing IR Theory
Critical Engagement
Edited by Yaqing Qin
First published 2020
by Routledge
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© 2020 selection and editorial matter, Yaqing Qin; individual
chapters, the contributors
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Qin, Yaqing, 1953– editor.
Title: Globalizing IR theory : critical engagement / edited by Yaqing
Qin.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2020. |
Series: IR theory and practice in Asia | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019051737 (print) | LCCN 2019051738 (ebook) |
ISBN 9780367404710 (hardback) | ISBN 9780429356292 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: International relations—Philosophy. | World politics—
21st century. | Globalization.
Classification: LCC JZ1305 .G574 2020 (print) | LCC JZ1305 (ebook) |
DDC 327.101—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019051737
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019051738
ISBN: 978-0-367-40471-0 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-429-35629-2 (ebk)
Typeset in Galliard
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Contents
List of contributors vii
Acknowledgments x
1 Introduction: the global turn in IR and non-Western IR theory 1
YAQING QIN
2 The second coming? Reflections on a global theory of
international relations 27
PETER J. KATZENSTEIN
3 How and how not to develop IR theory: lessons from core
and periphery 44
BARRY BUZAN
4 Toward a pluralist international relations theory:
a European Union perspective 67
MARIO TELÒ
5 Going beyond ‘the West/non-West divide’ in IR: how to
ensure dialogue as mutual learning 88
YONG-SOO EUN
6 Chinese values vs. liberalism: what ideology will shape the
international normative order? 102
XUETONG YAN
7 Toward a ‘global IR’? A view from Brazil 124
OLIVER STUENKEL
vi Contents
8 A multiverse of knowledge: cultures and IR theories 139
YAQING QIN
9 From heaven to Earth: ‘cultural idealism’ and ‘moral
realism’ as Chinese contributions to global international
relations 158
AMITAV ACHARYA
Index 186
Contributors
Amitav Acharya is Distinguished Professor, School of International Service,
American University, Washington, DC, USA, and Berggruen Institute Fellow
(2019–20). He also holds the UNESCO Chair in Transnational Challenges
and Governance (since 2011). He was elected President of the International
Studies Association for 2014–15. His areas of research and writing include
Southeast Asian affairs, IR theory and comparative regionalism. Professor
Acharya’s publications cover both academic and public affairs topics and
number over 25 books and 200 journal and magazine articles. His books
include The Making of Global International Relations: Origins and Evolu-
tion of IR at Its Centenary (with Barry Buzan, 2019); The End of American
World Order (2014); Rethinking Power, Institutions and Ideas in World Poli-
tics (2013); Non-Western International Relations Theory (coedited with Barry
Buzan, 2010); Whose Ideas Matter: Agency and Power in Asian Regional-
ism (2009); and Constructing a Security Community in Southeast Asia (2001).
His essays have been published in the world’s top academic and policy jour-
nals such as International Organization, International Security, International
Studies Quarterly, and World Politics, Foreign Affairs.
Barry Buzan is Professor Emeritus at the London School of Economics, Fellow
of the British Academy, Honorary Professor at Copenhagen and Jilin Univer-
sities, China Foreign Affairs University and the University of International
Relations (Beijing). His books include The Making of Global International
Relations: Origins and Evolution of IR at Its Centenary (with Amitav Acha-
rya, 2019); Global International Society: A New Framework for Analysis (with
Laust Schouenborg, 2018); The Global Transformation: History, Modernity
and the Making of International Relations (with George Lawson, 2015); Non-
Western International Relations Theory: Perspectives on and beyond Asia (with
Amitav Acharya, Routledge, 2010); From International to World Society? Eng-
lish School Theory and the Social Structure of Globalisation (2004); and Interna-
tional Systems in World History: Remaking the Study of International Relations
(with Richard Little, 2000).
Yong-Soo Eun, PhD, is Associate Professor of Political Science and Interna-
tional Studies at Hanyang University, South Korea, and Editor-in-Chief of the
viii Contributors
Routledge series IR Theory and Practice in Asia. Eun is broadly interested in
IR theory, pluralism in social and international studies, emotion studies and
the international politics of the Asia-Pacific region. He is the author of What
Is at Stake in Building ‘Non-Western’ IR Theory? (2018) and the coeditor of
Regionalizing Global Crises (2014). His work has also been published in Per-
spectives on Politics and Review of International Studies, among other venues.
Peter J. Katzenstein is the Walter S. Carpenter Jr. Professor of International
Studies at Cornell University, USA. His research and teaching lie at the
intersection of the fields of international relations and comparative politics.
Katzenstein’s work addresses issues of political economy, security and culture
in world politics. His current research interests focus on power, politics of civi-
lizations and regions in world politics, and European and German politics. His
recent books include Protean Power: Exploring the Uncertain and Unexpected
in World Politics (coedited with Lucia Seybert, 2018), Anglo-America and Its
Discontents: Civilizational Identities beyond West and East (2012), Sinicization
and the Rise of China: Civilizational Processes beyond East and West (2012)
and Civilizations in World Politics: Plural and Pluralist Perspectives (2010).
He is the author, coauthor, editor and coeditor of more than 40 books and
edited volumes or monographs and more than 100 articles or book chapters.
Katzenstein served as President of the American Political Science Association
(2008–9). He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Science in
1987, the American Philosophical Society in 2009 and the British Academy
in 2015.
Yaqing Qin is Professor of International Studies at China Foreign Affairs Uni-
versity. He teaches and does research on IR. He is interested in IR theory,
culture and social theory, and global governance. He is Executive Vice Presi-
dent of the China National Association for International Studies, Associate
Member of the Royal Academy of Belgium and Global Fellow at Oslo Peace
Research Institute. His work has appeared in many academic journals, includ-
ing International Studies Review, the Chinese Journal of International Politics
and International Relations of the Asia-Pacific. His has published more than
100 journal articles and 40 books, including Global Governance: Rebuilding
of Order in a Multiplex World (2019), A Relational Theory of World Politics
(2018), Future in Retrospect: China’s Diplomatic History Revisited (coeditor,
2016), China’s “New” Diplomacy (coeditor, 2008) and Power, Institutions,
and Cultures (2005).
Oliver Stuenkel is Associate Professor of IR at the Getúlio Vargas Foundation
in São Paulo, Brazil. He is also nonresident Fellow at the Global Public Policy
Institute in Berlin and a columnist for EL PAÍS and Americas Quarterly. His
research focuses on Brazilian foreign policy, Latin American politics, global
order and emerging powers. He is the author of the IBSA: The Rise of the
Global South? (2014), The BRICS and the Future of Global Order (2015) and
The Post-Western World: How Emerging Powers Are Remaking Global Order
Contributors ix
(2016). Aside from his academic research, he has written op-eds for news-
papers and magazines, including Foreign Affairs, New York Times, Financial
Times, Mail and Guardian, Die Zeit, Times of India, The Hindu, La Nación,
Folha de São Paulo, Valor Econômico, O Globo and Estado de São Paulo.
Mario Telò is Professor of IR and J. Monnet Chair, LUISS University, Italy, and
Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB). He is also Emeritus President of the
Institute for European Studies, ULB and member of the Royal Academy of
Sciences, Brussels. He served as consultant for the EU Commission, the Presi-
dency of the European Council and the European Parliament. He published
34 books and more than 100 articles in seven languages, including Deepen-
ing the EU-China Partnership (2018), Regionalism in Hard Times (2016),
Interregionalism and the EU (2014), Politics of Transatlantic Trade Negotia-
tions (2014), EU Foreign Policy (2013), International Relations: A European
Perspective (2009), Europe: A Civilian Power? (2005) and European Union
and New Regionalism (ed.) (2001, 2007 and 2014). He is Coordinator of
the Erasmus Mundus doctoral and research program GEM (‘Globalization
Europe Multilateralism’, 2010–20) and has taken part in the public debate
about the future of the EU and IR for many decades.
Xuetong Yan is Professor and Dean of the Institute of International Relations,
Tsinghua University, Beijing, Secretary-General of the World Peace Forum
and the founder of The Chinese Journal of International Politics. He is Vice
President of the China Association of International Relations Studies and
China Association of American Studies and a member of the Consultation
Committee of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce. Prof. Yan received his PhD
in political science from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1992; an
MA in IR from the Institute of International Relations in 1986; and a BA in
English from Heilongjiang University in 1982. Prof. Yan has been selected as
one of the Most Cited Chinese Researchers by Elsevier for three consecutive
years from 2014 to 2016. He has published more than 100 articles on IR. His
recent books include Leadership and the Rise of Great Powers (2019); Inertia
of History: China and the World in Next 10 Years (2013); and Ancient Chinese
Thought, Modern Chinese Power (2011).