Waiting for IR Godot? In search of transformative encounters between Middle Eastern Studies and International Relations

Irene Costantini,Ruth Hanau Santini

doi:10.1017/ipo.2021.48

Abstract

AbstractWithin the Special Issue ‘Reaching for allies? The dialectics and overlaps between International Relations and Area Studies in the study of politics, security, and conflicts’, this article investigates the post-2011 changing relationship between International Relations (IR) and Middle Eastern Studies (MES). The article departs from the assumption that the reading and writing of security in, on and from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has historically been trapped between the projection of security from abroad and endogenous security narratives. We argue that within the post-Arab uprisings renewed scholarly attention, with studies on security in, on and from the MENA region expressing an all-time methodological pluralism and the increasing and original application of bottom-up and non-military security understandings to regional security, societal and human security are among the most promising notions for transformative dialogue between IR and MES. In broader theoretical terms, we show how the ongoing debate on post-Weberian notions of statehood and post-Westphalian sovereignty point to an already transformative dialogue between IR and MES. The article illustrates this trend with two case studies – on Tunisia and on Iraq – pointing to changing security concepts reflecting changing security practices.

Highlights

Within a special issue dedicated to the dialogue and overlaps between Area Studies and international relations, this article serves the purpose of looking at their relationship from the vantage point of Middle Eastern Studies (MES) and with a focus on security
They testify to the pluralization of the understandings and the practices of security and to the contradictions that arise when different dimensions of security are taken into consideration
What security is and means is subject to change throughout time, geographical space and what is considered the object of security

Summary

Introduction

Within a special issue dedicated to the dialogue and overlaps between Area Studies and international relations, this article serves the purpose of looking at their relationship from the vantage point of Middle Eastern Studies (MES) and with a focus on security The choice of such focus is justified by the fact that the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, in itself a security-oriented construct (Amanat 2012), has traditionally been at the centre of international efforts at defining and addressing security/insecurity in international politics, albeit different historical periods having looked at security in and from the region in different ways. The unipolar moment that followed revised some of the prevalent notion of security and since the turn of the 21st century, there has been a scholarly shift towards more bottom-up, inward-oriented and non-military focused approach in the study of prevailing themes associated with security, dominated by terrorism, state failure and all its related corollary of poverty, crime and regional conflict

Irene Costantini and Ruth Hanau Santini

Conclusion