Toward a Paradigm Shift in International Relations Studies

(Re)Claiming World Peace
2025
ISBN: 978-3-031-72095-6
Verlag: Springer Nature Switzerland

Buch, Englisch, 125 Seiten, Format (B × H): 153 mm x 216 mm, Gewicht: 301 g

Reihe: Palgrave Studies in International Relations

This book argues that not only has the present international relations (IR) paradigm failed to preserve global peace in our time, it has also proved to be an obstacle in this regard, and for this reason a paradigm shift is urgently required. With a view to demonstrating the IR paradigm’s failure to secure global peace, moreover, a Foucauldian-inspired discourse analysis is used here to flesh out an archaeology of what I call knowledge relations within IR studies.

This analysis reveals that within IR’s paradigmatic corridors of knowledge the theoretical/analytical category of war has been privileged, i.e., elevated to the level of chief subject and object of analysis vis-à-vis peace. In order to show how this is the case, moreover, this book examines the paradigm’s mainstream debates, e.g., those on human nature, power, and the state of nature, and by implication state sovereignty and nationalism, in addition to its authoritative subfields, in particular peace studies, international relations theory, global governance, and security studies. Each of these works reproduces, indeed glorifies, war to the exclusion of a lasting global peace, and in large part by promoting certain knowledges that are racial, colonial, gendered, and consequently bellicose.

All this connotes that the IR paradigm is grounded in a regime of knowledge that tells us everything about the dynamics of war and nothing substantive about realizing peace—hence the pressing need for a paradigm shift. Put differently, under the auspices of IR studies, contemplating peace is fruitless, a mere scholarly mirage, and precisely because achieving it under this paradigmatic status quo is not, and will never be, a condition of possibility. If anything, this book demonstrates that we have not even begun to speak truth to knowledge in the cause of global peace.

Zielgruppe

Research

Autoren/Hrsg.

Pourmokhtari, Navid

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Internationale Beziehungen

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Chapter 1- A Brief Account of a Kuhnian Paradigm and Paradigm Shift.- Chapter 2- Why a Foucauldian-Inspired Discursive Approach to IR studies?.- Chapter 3 - The Present IR Paradigm: Genesis and Foundational Assumptions.- Chapter 4-Theory-as-Discourse: Neorealism and Neoliberalism as IR Paradigm Maintainer Theories.- Chapter 5- The IR Paradigm: Human Nature, the State of Nature and the Discourse on State Sovereignty.- Chapter 6- The Current IR Paradigm and Dominant Discourses: International Policies and Global Practices.- Conclusion-The Case for a Paradigm Shift in IR: Knowledge Surveillance, Knowledge Fundamentalism and the Present IR Paradigm’s Disciplinary Gaze.

Über Autor(innen)

Navid Pourmokhtari teaches at Concordia University of Edmonton.Hisresearch interests lie in comparative politics and international relations studies with a focus on gender and feminism, social movements and revolutionary studies, and international peace and security studies. Pourmokhtari’s first book, entitled , was published in 2021. His other recent publications have appeared in , , , , the , , , , and the