Abstract
Can International Relations (IR) be studied without reproducing its violence? This is the central question of this article. To investigate this, the first step is to expose the violence that we argue remains at the heart of our discipline. The article thus begins by exploring the disciplinary practices firmly grounded in relations of coloniality that plague disciplines more broadly and IR in particular. An analysis of IR’s epistemic violence is followed by an autoethnographic exploration of IR’s violent practices, specifically the violent practices in which one of the article’s authors knowingly and unknowingly engaged in as part of an impact-related trip to the international compound of Mogadishu International Airport in Somalia. Here the article lays bare how increasing demands on IR scholars to become ‘international experts’ having impact on the policy world is pushing them more and more into spaces governed by colonial violence they are unable to escape. The final section of this article puts forward a tentative path toward a less violent IR that advocates almost insignificant acts of subversion in our disciplinary approach and practices aimed at exposing and challenging this epistemic and structural violence. The article concludes that IR does not need to be abandoned, but rather, by taking on a position of discomfort, needs to acknowledge its violence and attempt to mitigate it – one almost insignificant step at a time.
Highlights
In 2008, Brooke Ackerly and Jacqui True (2008: 694) asked the question: ‘How can we study power and identify ways to mitigate its abuse in the real world when we, as international relations researchers, participate in the powerful projection of knowledge in this world?’ Their answer, part of a feminist path towards responsible International Relations (IR) scholarship, took what had so far remained in the margins of IR – a focus on what was falling through the cracks of disciplinary boundaries, on those who remained unrecognised as agents of IR and as theorists of IR and on the role of the researcher – and brought it to the centre of IR research
The disciplinary practices of IR have changed in several important ways in the past decade and the question needs to be revisited in an era of growing pressures on academics, in particular to have ‘impact’ on policymakers
While this tended to be the remit of mainstream scholars, the pervasiveness of the ‘impact agenda’ in IR has meant that critical scholars have been called upon and pressed to become ‘international experts’
Summary
In 2008, Brooke Ackerly and Jacqui True (2008: 694) asked the question: ‘How can we study power and identify ways to mitigate its abuse in the real world when we, as international relations researchers, participate in the powerful projection of knowledge in this world?’ Their answer, part of a feminist path towards responsible International Relations (IR) scholarship, took what had so far remained in the margins of IR – a focus on what was falling through the cracks of disciplinary boundaries, on those who remained unrecognised as agents of IR and as theorists of IR and on the role of the researcher – and brought it to the centre of IR research. We argue in Part 2 that interdisciplinarity has opened up new theoretical and practice-oriented lines of inquiry that are better equipped to respond to emerging challenges and questions, this search for answers in other disciplines has often become an end in itself that leaves intact the more fundamental assumptions that give rise to disciplinary violence.
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
