From Thucydides to 1648: The “Missing” Years in IR and the Missing Voices in World History

TY - JOUR

T1 - From Thucydides to 1648: The “Missing” Years in IR and the Missing Voices in World History

AU - Blachford, Kevin

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © The Author(s) (2020). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Studies Association. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: [email protected].

PY - 2021/11

Y1 - 2021/11

N2 - International relations (IR) defines itself as a discipline by adhering to a Westphalian narrative centered on 1648. The following paper argues that IR should broaden its engagement with history to consider the international prior to 1648 and to examine global and transnational historical accounts that challenge the states in anarchy framework. This paper examines how pre-modern history is often used within IR as a foil for which western modernity and its superiority is defined. It concludes by arguing for the need to re-read the processes of modernity and imperialism that are commonly seen as the prelude to the familiar Eurocentric stories told in IR.

AB - International relations (IR) defines itself as a discipline by adhering to a Westphalian narrative centered on 1648. The following paper argues that IR should broaden its engagement with history to consider the international prior to 1648 and to examine global and transnational historical accounts that challenge the states in anarchy framework. This paper examines how pre-modern history is often used within IR as a foil for which western modernity and its superiority is defined. It concludes by arguing for the need to re-read the processes of modernity and imperialism that are commonly seen as the prelude to the familiar Eurocentric stories told in IR.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85119516389&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1093/isp/ekaa012

DO - 10.1093/isp/ekaa012

M3 - Article

SN - 1528-3577

VL - 22

SP - 495

EP - 508

JO - International Studies Perspectives

JF - International Studies Perspectives

IS - 4

ER -