Abstract
The aim of this article is to develop a framework within which the role and social construction of knowledge in International Relations can be understood and theoretically underpinned. In order to do so, the article discusses post-structuralist and neo-Gramscian answers to the structure–agency debate and argues that the role of knowledge remains rather implicit in both understandings on how structure and agency are mutually constituted. The main argument of the article is that the social construction of knowledge can only be understood, if International Relations are analysed in terms of a dialectically constituted relationship between structure and agency visible in and through processes whereby science and expert knowledge are referred to as true and policy relevant. On this basis, the article develops the concept of “epistemic selectivities”, which describes how the use of science and expert knowledge to underpin strategic action leads to hegemonic patterns in the way in which (scientific) expert knowledge is related to particular claims of policies and facts.
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More From: Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research
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