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The Silence of non-Western International Relations Theory as a Camouflage Strategy: The Trauma of Qing China and the Late Ottoman Empire

Year 2021, Volume: 10 Issue: 1, 99 - 118, 10.12.2020
https://doi.org/10.20991/allazimuth.663742

Abstract

My main argument in this article is that there have been at least three important barriers to the development of non-Western international relations theory (NWIRT): intellectual barriers (traumatizing effects of the imposition of the “standard of civilization”); ideational barriers (dominance of Western concepts and contexts); and scientific barriers (imposition of the standard of science). I argue that the silence of NWIRT is substantially a side effect of the strategy of mimicking the West, which was developed as an intellectual defense mechanism or as a camouflage strategy for the (re)establishment and the survival of non-Western states after their traumatic encounter with the Western states. Therefore, the surfacing of NWIRT discussions in the last decades can be attributed primarily to the maturation of an internal condition that is the revival of self-confidence in the residuals of former empires due to their regaining of rising power status and, thus, can be seen as a new phase of the ‘revolt against the West.’ On the other hand, I argue that the rise of NWIRT discussions are also related to the ripening of an external condition: some European schools of IR have been attempting to intellectually balance against the hegemony of American mainstream IRT, therefore, publication of edited books and special issues on NWIRT can also be read as searching for intellectual alliance with NWIRT.

References

  • Acharya, Amitav. “Dialogue and Discovery: In Search of International Relations Theories beyond the West.” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 39, no. 3 (2011): 619–37. Acharya, Amitav, and Barry Buzan. “Why is There No Non–Western IR Theory? An Introduction.” International Relations of the Asia–Pacific 7, no. 3 (2007): 287–312. Acharya, Amitav, and Barry Buzan, eds. Non–Western International Relations Theory: Perspectives on and Beyond Asia. London and New York: Routledge, 2010. Adelson, Leslie A. “Touching Tales of Turks, Germans, and Jews: Cultural Alterity, Historical Narrative, and Literary Riddles for the 1990s.” New German Critique no. 80 (2000): 93–124. Alruwaih, Meshari. “The Agency of the Muslim IR Researcher in Developing a Theory of Islamic Agency in International Relations.” Asian Politics and Policy 7, no. 1 (2015): 39–56. Alagappa, Muthiah. “International Relations Studies in Asia: Distinctive Trajectories.” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 11, no. 2 (2011): 193–230. Appadurai, Arjun. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996. Aydınlı, Ersel. “The Turkish Pendulum between Globalization and Security: From the Late Ottoman Era to the 1930s.” Middle Eastern Studies 40, no. 3 (2004): 102–33. Aydınlı, Ersel, and Mathews, Julie. “Periphery Theorizing for a Truly Internationalized Discipline: Spinning IR Theory out of Anatolia.” Review of International Studies 34 (2008): 693–712. Ayoob, Mohammed. “Challenging Hegemony: Political Islam and the North–South Divide.” International Studies Review 9, no. 4 (2007): 629–43. ———. “Inequality and Theorizing in International Relations: The Case for Subaltern Realism.” International Studies Review 4, no. 3 (2002): 27–48. Behera, Navnita Chadha. “Re–imagining IR in India.” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 7, no. 3 (2007): 341–68. Bhabha, Homi K. The Location of Culture. London: Routledge, 1994. Biber, Ahmet Emre. “Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun dünya sistemine eklemlenme süreci ve az gelişmişliğin evrimi.” Uluslararası İnsan Bilimleri Dergisi 6, no. 1 (2009): 27–44. Bilgin, Pınar. “The ‘Western–Centrism’ of Security Studies: ‘Blind Spot’ or Constitutive Practice?” Security Dialogue 41, no. 6 (2010): 615–22. Bull, Hedley. “The Revolt Against the West.” In The Expansion of International Society, edited by Hedley Bull and Adam Watson, 217–28. Oxford: Clarendon, 1984. Buzan, Barry. An Introduction to the English School of IR. Cambridge: Polity, 2014. Chen, Ching–Chang. “The Absence of Non–Western IR theory in Asia Reconsidered.” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 11, no. 1 (2011): 1–23. DiMagio, Paul J., and Powell, Walter W. “The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields.” American Sociological Review 48, no. 2 (1983): 147–60. Drechsler, Wolfgang. “What is Islamic Public Administration and Why Should We Study it in the ‘Second World’?” Administrative Culture 15, no. 2 (2014): 123–42. Fidler, David P. “The Return of the Standard of Civilization.” Chicago Journal of International Law 2, no. 1 (2001): 137–57. Hoffman, Stanley. “An American Social Science: International Relations.” Daedalus 106, no. 3 (1977): 41–60. Horowitz, Richard. “International Law and State Transformation in China, Siam, and the Ottoman Empire during Nineteenth century.” Journal of World History 15, no. 4 (2005): 445–86. Huntington, Samuel. The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. New York: Simon and Scuster, 1996. Inoguchi, Takashi. “Are There any Theories of International Relations in Japan.” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 7, no. 3 (2007): 369–90. Kahler, Miles. “International Relations: Still an American Science?” In Ideas and Ideals: Essays on Politics in Honor of Stanley Hoffmann, edited by L Miller and MH Smith, 395–414. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1993. Kang, David C. “Hierarchy and Legitimacy in International Systems: The Tribute System in Early Modern East Asia.” Security Studies 19, no. 4 (2010): 591–622. Kidron, Carol A. “Surviving a Distant Past: A Case Study of the Cultural Construction of Trauma Descendant Identity.” Ethos 3, no. 4 (2004): 513–44. Klebleyev, Aziz. “Islamic Legacy beyond Islam: The Case of Uzbekistan.” Administrative Culture 15, no. 2 (2014): 143–56. Layne, Christopher. “The Unipolar Illusion Revisited: The Coming End of the United States’ Unipolar Moment.” International Security 31, no. 2 (2006): 7–41. Makarychev, Andrey, and Viatcheslav, Morozov. “Is ‘Non–Western Theory’ Possible? The Idea of Multipolarity and the Trap of Epistemological Relativism in Russian IR.” International Studies Review 15, no. 3 (2013): 328–50. Onar, Nora Fisher. “Historical Legacies in Rising Powers: Toward a (Eur)Asian Approach.” Critical Asian Studies 45, no. 3 (2013): 411–30. Phillips, Andrew. “Civilising Missions and the Rise of International Hierarchies in Early Modern Asia.” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 42, no. 3 (2014): 714. Qin, Yaqing. “Relationality and Processual Construction: Bringing Chinese Ideas into International Relations Theory.” Social Sciences in China 30, no. 3 (2009): 5–20. ———. “Why is there no Chinese IRT?” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 7, no. 2 (2007): 313–40. Savage, Jesse Dillon. “The Stability and Breakdown of Empire: European Informal Empire in China, Ottoman Empire and Egypt.” European Journal of International Relations 17, no. 2 (2010): 161–85. Shahi, Deepshikha, and Ascione, Gennaro. “Rethinking the Absence of Post–Western International Relations Theory in India: ‘Advaitic monism’ as an Alternative Epistemological Resource.” European Journal of International Relations 22, no. 2 (2016): 313–34. Smith, Steve. “The United States and the Discipline of International Relations: ‘Hegemonic Country, Hegemonic Discipline’.” International Studies Review 4, no. 2 (2002): 67–85. Tickner, Ann J. “A Critique of Morgenthau’s Principles of Political Realism.” In International Politics: Enduring Concepts and Contemporary Issues, edited by Robert J. Art and Robert Jervis, 15–27. New York: Pearson, Longman, 2005. Tickner, Ann J., and Andrei P. Tsygankov. “Responsible Scholarship in International Relations: A Symposium.” International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008): 661–66. Tickner, Arlene B. “Latin American IR and the Primacy of lo práctico.” International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008): 735–48. Tickner, Arlene B. “Seeing IR Differently: Notes from the Third World.” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 32, no. 2 (2003): 295–324. Tickner, Arlene, and Ole Wæver. “Conclusion: Worlding Where the West Once Was.” In International Relations Scholarship around the World, edited by Arlene Tickner and Ole Wæver, 328–42. London and New York: Routledge, 2009. ———. International Relations Scholarship around the World: Worlding beyond the West. New York: Routledge, 2009. Tingyang, Zhao. “Rethinking Empire from a Chinese Concept ‘All–under–Heaven’ (Tian–xia).” Social Identities 12, no. 1 (2006): 29–41. Tsygankov, Andrei P. “The Irony of Western Ideas in a Multicultural World: Russians’ Intellectual Engagement with the ‘End of History’ and ‘Clash of Civilizations’.” International Studies Review 5, no. 1 (2003): 53–76. ———. “Self and Other in International Relations Theory: Learning from Russian Civilizational Debates.” International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008): 762–75. Tsygankov, Andrei, and Pavel Tsygankov. “National Ideology and IR Theory: Three Incarnations of the ‘Russian Idea’.” European Journal of International Relations 16, no. 4 (2010): 663–86. Wæver, Ole. “The Sociology of not so International Discipline: American and European Developments in International Relations.” International Organisation 52, no. 4 (1998): 687–727. Wight, Martin. International Theory: The Three Traditions, edited by Gabriele Wight and Brien Porter. Leicester and London: Leicester, 1991. Zhang, Feng. “Rethinking the ‘Tribute System’: Broadening the Conceptual Horizon of Historical East Asian Politics.” Chinese Journal of International Politics 2, no. 4 (2009): 545–74. Zhang, Yongjin, and Barry Buzan. “The Tributary System as International Society in Theory and Practice.” Chinese Journal of International Politics 5, no. 1 (2012): 3–36.
Year 2021, Volume: 10 Issue: 1, 99 - 118, 10.12.2020
https://doi.org/10.20991/allazimuth.663742

Abstract

References

  • Acharya, Amitav. “Dialogue and Discovery: In Search of International Relations Theories beyond the West.” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 39, no. 3 (2011): 619–37. Acharya, Amitav, and Barry Buzan. “Why is There No Non–Western IR Theory? An Introduction.” International Relations of the Asia–Pacific 7, no. 3 (2007): 287–312. Acharya, Amitav, and Barry Buzan, eds. Non–Western International Relations Theory: Perspectives on and Beyond Asia. London and New York: Routledge, 2010. Adelson, Leslie A. “Touching Tales of Turks, Germans, and Jews: Cultural Alterity, Historical Narrative, and Literary Riddles for the 1990s.” New German Critique no. 80 (2000): 93–124. Alruwaih, Meshari. “The Agency of the Muslim IR Researcher in Developing a Theory of Islamic Agency in International Relations.” Asian Politics and Policy 7, no. 1 (2015): 39–56. Alagappa, Muthiah. “International Relations Studies in Asia: Distinctive Trajectories.” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 11, no. 2 (2011): 193–230. Appadurai, Arjun. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1996. Aydınlı, Ersel. “The Turkish Pendulum between Globalization and Security: From the Late Ottoman Era to the 1930s.” Middle Eastern Studies 40, no. 3 (2004): 102–33. Aydınlı, Ersel, and Mathews, Julie. “Periphery Theorizing for a Truly Internationalized Discipline: Spinning IR Theory out of Anatolia.” Review of International Studies 34 (2008): 693–712. Ayoob, Mohammed. “Challenging Hegemony: Political Islam and the North–South Divide.” International Studies Review 9, no. 4 (2007): 629–43. ———. “Inequality and Theorizing in International Relations: The Case for Subaltern Realism.” International Studies Review 4, no. 3 (2002): 27–48. Behera, Navnita Chadha. “Re–imagining IR in India.” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 7, no. 3 (2007): 341–68. Bhabha, Homi K. The Location of Culture. London: Routledge, 1994. Biber, Ahmet Emre. “Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun dünya sistemine eklemlenme süreci ve az gelişmişliğin evrimi.” Uluslararası İnsan Bilimleri Dergisi 6, no. 1 (2009): 27–44. Bilgin, Pınar. “The ‘Western–Centrism’ of Security Studies: ‘Blind Spot’ or Constitutive Practice?” Security Dialogue 41, no. 6 (2010): 615–22. Bull, Hedley. “The Revolt Against the West.” In The Expansion of International Society, edited by Hedley Bull and Adam Watson, 217–28. Oxford: Clarendon, 1984. Buzan, Barry. An Introduction to the English School of IR. Cambridge: Polity, 2014. Chen, Ching–Chang. “The Absence of Non–Western IR theory in Asia Reconsidered.” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 11, no. 1 (2011): 1–23. DiMagio, Paul J., and Powell, Walter W. “The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields.” American Sociological Review 48, no. 2 (1983): 147–60. Drechsler, Wolfgang. “What is Islamic Public Administration and Why Should We Study it in the ‘Second World’?” Administrative Culture 15, no. 2 (2014): 123–42. Fidler, David P. “The Return of the Standard of Civilization.” Chicago Journal of International Law 2, no. 1 (2001): 137–57. Hoffman, Stanley. “An American Social Science: International Relations.” Daedalus 106, no. 3 (1977): 41–60. Horowitz, Richard. “International Law and State Transformation in China, Siam, and the Ottoman Empire during Nineteenth century.” Journal of World History 15, no. 4 (2005): 445–86. Huntington, Samuel. The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. New York: Simon and Scuster, 1996. Inoguchi, Takashi. “Are There any Theories of International Relations in Japan.” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 7, no. 3 (2007): 369–90. Kahler, Miles. “International Relations: Still an American Science?” In Ideas and Ideals: Essays on Politics in Honor of Stanley Hoffmann, edited by L Miller and MH Smith, 395–414. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1993. Kang, David C. “Hierarchy and Legitimacy in International Systems: The Tribute System in Early Modern East Asia.” Security Studies 19, no. 4 (2010): 591–622. Kidron, Carol A. “Surviving a Distant Past: A Case Study of the Cultural Construction of Trauma Descendant Identity.” Ethos 3, no. 4 (2004): 513–44. Klebleyev, Aziz. “Islamic Legacy beyond Islam: The Case of Uzbekistan.” Administrative Culture 15, no. 2 (2014): 143–56. Layne, Christopher. “The Unipolar Illusion Revisited: The Coming End of the United States’ Unipolar Moment.” International Security 31, no. 2 (2006): 7–41. Makarychev, Andrey, and Viatcheslav, Morozov. “Is ‘Non–Western Theory’ Possible? The Idea of Multipolarity and the Trap of Epistemological Relativism in Russian IR.” International Studies Review 15, no. 3 (2013): 328–50. Onar, Nora Fisher. “Historical Legacies in Rising Powers: Toward a (Eur)Asian Approach.” Critical Asian Studies 45, no. 3 (2013): 411–30. Phillips, Andrew. “Civilising Missions and the Rise of International Hierarchies in Early Modern Asia.” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 42, no. 3 (2014): 714. Qin, Yaqing. “Relationality and Processual Construction: Bringing Chinese Ideas into International Relations Theory.” Social Sciences in China 30, no. 3 (2009): 5–20. ———. “Why is there no Chinese IRT?” International Relations of the Asia Pacific 7, no. 2 (2007): 313–40. Savage, Jesse Dillon. “The Stability and Breakdown of Empire: European Informal Empire in China, Ottoman Empire and Egypt.” European Journal of International Relations 17, no. 2 (2010): 161–85. Shahi, Deepshikha, and Ascione, Gennaro. “Rethinking the Absence of Post–Western International Relations Theory in India: ‘Advaitic monism’ as an Alternative Epistemological Resource.” European Journal of International Relations 22, no. 2 (2016): 313–34. Smith, Steve. “The United States and the Discipline of International Relations: ‘Hegemonic Country, Hegemonic Discipline’.” International Studies Review 4, no. 2 (2002): 67–85. Tickner, Ann J. “A Critique of Morgenthau’s Principles of Political Realism.” In International Politics: Enduring Concepts and Contemporary Issues, edited by Robert J. Art and Robert Jervis, 15–27. New York: Pearson, Longman, 2005. Tickner, Ann J., and Andrei P. Tsygankov. “Responsible Scholarship in International Relations: A Symposium.” International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008): 661–66. Tickner, Arlene B. “Latin American IR and the Primacy of lo práctico.” International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008): 735–48. Tickner, Arlene B. “Seeing IR Differently: Notes from the Third World.” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 32, no. 2 (2003): 295–324. Tickner, Arlene, and Ole Wæver. “Conclusion: Worlding Where the West Once Was.” In International Relations Scholarship around the World, edited by Arlene Tickner and Ole Wæver, 328–42. London and New York: Routledge, 2009. ———. International Relations Scholarship around the World: Worlding beyond the West. New York: Routledge, 2009. Tingyang, Zhao. “Rethinking Empire from a Chinese Concept ‘All–under–Heaven’ (Tian–xia).” Social Identities 12, no. 1 (2006): 29–41. Tsygankov, Andrei P. “The Irony of Western Ideas in a Multicultural World: Russians’ Intellectual Engagement with the ‘End of History’ and ‘Clash of Civilizations’.” International Studies Review 5, no. 1 (2003): 53–76. ———. “Self and Other in International Relations Theory: Learning from Russian Civilizational Debates.” International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008): 762–75. Tsygankov, Andrei, and Pavel Tsygankov. “National Ideology and IR Theory: Three Incarnations of the ‘Russian Idea’.” European Journal of International Relations 16, no. 4 (2010): 663–86. Wæver, Ole. “The Sociology of not so International Discipline: American and European Developments in International Relations.” International Organisation 52, no. 4 (1998): 687–727. Wight, Martin. International Theory: The Three Traditions, edited by Gabriele Wight and Brien Porter. Leicester and London: Leicester, 1991. Zhang, Feng. “Rethinking the ‘Tribute System’: Broadening the Conceptual Horizon of Historical East Asian Politics.” Chinese Journal of International Politics 2, no. 4 (2009): 545–74. Zhang, Yongjin, and Barry Buzan. “The Tributary System as International Society in Theory and Practice.” Chinese Journal of International Politics 5, no. 1 (2012): 3–36.
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Primary Language English
Journal Section Articles
Authors

Hayriye Asena Demirer This is me 0000-0002-6679-1015

Publication Date December 10, 2020
Published in Issue Year 2021 Volume: 10 Issue: 1

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Chicago Demirer, Hayriye Asena. “The Silence of Non-Western International Relations Theory As a Camouflage Strategy: The Trauma of Qing China and the Late Ottoman Empire”. All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace 10, no. 1 (December 2020): 99-118. https://doi.org/10.20991/allazimuth.663742.

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