Browsing by Subject "Political theory"

Now showing 1 - 6 of 6

Open Access
“Contrapuntal reading” as a method, an ethos, and a metaphor for global IR
(Oxford University Press, 2016) Bilgin, P.
How to approach Global International Relations (IR)? This is a question asked by students of IR who recognize the limits of our field while expressing their concern that those who strive for a Global IR have been less-thanclear about the “how to?” question. In this article, I point to Edward W. Said’s approach to “contrapuntal reading” as one way of approaching Global IR that embraces diversity and reflects multiple and overlapping experiences and perspectives of humankind. More specifically, I suggest that contrapuntal reading offers students of IR a method of studying world politics that focuses on our “intertwined and overlapping histories,” past and present; an ethos for approaching IR through raising the “contrapuntal awareness” of its students and offering an anchor for those who translate the findings of different perspectives; and a metaphor for thinking about Global IR as regional and global, one and many. © The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Studies Association. All rights reserved.
Open Access
A genealogy of political theory: A polemic
(Palgrave Macmillan, 2019) Alexander, James
Here is a sketch of a genealogy of political theory for the last century. This is a genealogy in Nietzsche’s sense: therefore, neither unhistorical taxonomy, nor a history of political theory as it is written by historians, but a typology in time. Four types of modern political theory are distinguished. These are called, with some justification, positive, normative, third way and sceptical political theory. Seen from the vantage of the twenty-first century, they form an instructive sequence, emerging as a series of reactions to the canonical political theory that was established in the universities in the late nineteenth century. None of the four should be excluded from our conception of what political theory has been, though most of them, when seen genealogically, reveal their defects more clearly than they do when treated purely theoretically. Since this is a sceptical finding, the genealogy is a polemic against the first three types of modern political theory in favour of the last.
Open Access
The relevance of the eighteenth century to modern political theory
(SAGE, 2022) Alexander, James
The eighteenth century is still the bottleneck of the history of political theory: the century that separates pre-economic theorists such as Machiavelli, Bodin and Hobbes from post-economic theorists such as Hegel, Mill and Marx. Political thinking became immeasurably much more complicated in the eighteenth century: and yet historians, after at least half a century of extremely judicious scholarship, still have difficulty explaining its significance for contemporary theory. Sagar’s Adam Smith Reconsidered is an important contribution to the attempt to clarify just how modern political theorists should look backward – without hastening back to the abstractions of the seventeenth century or remaining confined to particular involutions of the nineteenth century. Its specific originality is in drawing attention to two important ideas of Adam Smith, seldom seen clearly or at all, ‘the quirk of rationality’ and ‘the conspiracy of merchants’. Political theorists as well as historians of political thought will benefit from familiarising themselves with these ideas.
Open Access
A sketch of a system of theory and practice
(Sage Publications Ltd, 2015) Alexander, J.
Most political theorists are committed to one particular view about the relation between theory and practice. It is argued in this article that there are in fact four possible ways of relating theory and practice, which are distinguished in terms of the answers that are given to two distinct questions. Derived from this is the suggestion that all political theorists can be classified according to whether they are sanguine, phlegmatic, melancholic or choleric. The purpose of this sketch of a system is to indicate the questionable nature of much of what passes for modern political theory - especially that of the now dominant sanguine tradition, which has for several decades especially concerned itself with the 'impact' theory can have on practice. © 2015 Political Studies Association and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
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The "New Class": Analysis of the concept, the hypothessis and the idea as a research tool
(1981) Pryor, Frederic L.
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The theory of games and the balance of power
(1986) Wagner, Harrison R.