What/who is still missing in International Relations scholarship? Situating Africa as an agent in IR theorising

Abstract

This paper engages with non-Western, specifically African, scholarship and insight with the goal of highlighting the importance of African contributions to IR theorising. We highlight the Western dominance in IR theorising and examine the inadequacy of the major analytical constructs provided by established IR theory in capturing and explaining shifting reality in Africa. We argue that African insights, experience and ideas present a challenge to dominant IR constructs and knowledge within the international system, and that these insights, when taken seriously, would enrich our understanding of IR. We show this by problematising some central (often taken-for-granted) IR concepts such as the state, liberalism and individualism and underscore the need to reconstruct more encompassing ‘stories’ and images to innovate, revise and potentially replace some of the conventional ‘stories’ that have been told in IR.

Keywords:

• Non-Western
• IR theory
• Africa
• state
• individualism
• liberalism

Notes

1. Tickner, “Seeing IR Differently,” 296.

2. Hoffman, “An American Social Science.” See also Krippendorf, “The Dominance of American Approaches.”

3. Wæver, “The Sociology of a not so International Discipline.”

4. Smith, ‘The United States and the Discipline of International Relations.”

5. Yew, The Disjunctive Empire of International Relations.

6. Agathangelou and Ling, “The House of IR.”

7. While the term ‘Western’ is contested, we use it to denote the countries of Europe and North America. The extent to which there is ‘Western’ IR is also subject to debate, but this is defined here as the canon of thought that has developed around UK and particularly US practices of the IR discipline, and of which it is a product. The view that there is no ‘Western’ periphery in the discipline is untenable. See, for example, Friedrichs, “International Relations Theory in France.”

8. See, for example, Dunn and Shaw, Africa’s Challenge; Smith, “Has Africa got Anything to Say?”; and Thomas and Wilkin, “Still waiting after all these Years.” The adjectives used in this paper vary from ‘mainstream’ to ‘traditional’, ‘orthodox’, ‘Western’, ‘Northern’ and ‘Eurocentric’, but all imply a definite and identifiable body of theory or ‘received wisdom’ in the discipline. See Brown, “Africa in International Relations.”

9. The argument here is that, while the international system is changing to reveal the prominence of hitherto ‘peripheral’ countries such as China, Brazil, India and South Africa, among others, International Relations/Studies is not changing enough to reflect this global economic–political change. It is not that, all of a sudden, there has emerged the need to add the non-Western world to IR. It has always been part of the field of study; however, the theories and concepts used to understand the dynamics the abovementioned countries are carbon copies of what was conceptualised to deal with Western problems, and thus not workable. This is the current dilemma IR finds itself in. Pierre Lizée examines this dichotomy in his book, A Whole New World.

10. Nkiwane, “The End of History?”

11. Ibid.

12. See Sindjoun, “L’Afrique dans la science des relations internationals”; Zeleza, Manufacturing African Studies; Grovogui, “Rituals of Power”; and Nyango’oro, Civil Society and Democratic Development.

13. On how Ibn Khaldun might speak to IR, see Cox, “Towards a Posthegemonic Conceptualization”; and Pasha, “Ibn Khaldun and World Order.” On China, see Deng, “The Chinese Conception of National Interest”; Chan, Chinese Perspectives on International Relations; Zhang, “System, Empire and State”; and Mitter, “An Uneasy Engagement.” On Japan, see Jones, “If not a Clash then What?”

14. See Harman and Brown, “In from the Margins?” See also Dunn and Shaw, Africa’s Challenge to International Relations Theory; Cornelissen et al., Africa and International Relations; Lavelle, “Moving in from the Periphery”; Bilgin, “Thinking past ‘Western’ IR?”; and Tickner and Waever, International Relations Scholarship.

15. Tickner, “Seeing IR Differently,” 302.

16. As Bilgin quite rightly argues, ‘“Western” and “non-Western” particularly African experiences as well as their various interpretations have interlaced in so many ways that “non-Western” ways of thinking about and doing world politics are not always devoid of “Western” concepts and theories and vice versa’. Bilgin,“Thinking past ‘Western’ IR,” 7.

17. See Harman and Brown, “In from the Margins?”

18. Ake, Social Science as Imperialism; and Gareau, “Another Type of Third World Dependency.” For details on epistemic oppression in Africa, see Andrews, and Okpanachi, “Trends of Epistemic Oppression.”

19. Lemke, “African Lessons,” 114.

20. Ibid., 85.

21. Wæver, “The Rise and Fall,” 149.

22. Gruffyd Jones, Decolonizing International Relations, 225.

23. Inayatullah and Blaney, International Relations.

24. Gruffyd Jones, “Introduction.”

25. Shilliam, International Relations and Non-Western Thought, 2.

26. Gruffyd Jones, “Introduction,” 10.

27. Griffiths et al., Fifty Key Thinkers.

28. Tickner, “Seeing IR Differently,” 296.

29. Thomas and Wilkin, “Still waiting after all these Years.”

30. Cited in de Carvalho et al., “The Big Bangs of IR.”

31. Acharya, and Buzan, “Why is there no Non-Western International Relations Theory?”

32. Mignolo, “Epistemic Disobedience.”

33. Smith, “Singing our World into Existence.”

34. Ibid., 514.

35. Waever, “The Sociology of a not so International Discipline.”

36. Jordan et al., “One Discipline or Many?,” 65.

37. See Bilgin, “Thinking past ‘Western’ IR?” See also Qin, “Why there is no Chinese International Relations Theory?”

38. Acharya, “Global International Relations.”

39. Hobson, “Is Critical Theory always for the White West?”

40. Henderson, “Hidden in Plain Sight.”

41. Shilliam, “Non-Western Thought and International Relations,” 2 (emphasis in the original).

42. Saurin, “International Relations as Imperial Illusion.”

43. Ibid., 24.

44. Ibid., 31.

45. Halperin, “International Relations Theory.”

46. We focus on stories from Africa, because we suggest it is the region most ignored in IR theorising. But the problems associated with omitting or ignoring Africa are also present when theorists omit other areas from their conceptualisations.

47. Quoted in Smith, “Has Africa got Anything to Say?,” 281.

48. Zegeye and Vambe, “Knowledge Production and Publishing,” 336.

49. Zegeye and Vambe, “Knowledge Production and Publishing,” 342.

50. Ibid.

51. See Smith, “Has Africa got Anything to Say?”

52. Bilgin, “Thinking past ‘Western’ IR?,” 6.

53. See Alatas, “Academic Dependency”; Fricker, “Hermeneutical Injustice”; and Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview.”

54. Mazrui, The African Condition, 47.

55. Anyidoho, quoted in Smith, “Has Africa got Anything to Say?,” 273 (emphasis in the original).

56. Smith, “Has Africa got anything to Say?,” 276.

57. Using ‘stories’ from Africa conceptualised in the form elaborated below borrows from and builds on the work of Smith, “Has Africa got anything to Say?”

58. See Boele van Hensbroek, Political Discourses in African Thought.

59. Blaney and Inayatullah, “International Relations from Below,” 664.

60. Neufeld argues that part of the reason why IR lacks amenability or flexibility is a result of the field’s preoccupation with positivism – the positivist ‘logic of investigation’. Neufeld The Restructuring of International Relations Theory, 1.

61. Malaquias, “Reformulating International Relations Theory,” 12.

62. Ibid.

63. Smith, “Has Africa got Anything to Say?,” 278.

64. Malaquias, ‘Reformulating International Relations Theory,” 15.

65. Smith, “Has Africa got Anything to Say?,” 278.

66. Ibid.

67. Malaquias, “Reformulating International Relations Theory.”

68. Ibid.

69. Ibid., 17.

70. Ayoob, “Subaltern Realism.”

71. Mohammed Ayoob, quoted in Tickner, “Hearing Latin American Voices,” 310.

72. Alao and Olonisakin, ‘Post-Cold War Africa.’

73. Nkiwane, “Africa and International Relations.”

74. Ibid., 287.

75. Quoted at ibid.

76. Nkiwane, “Africa and International Relations,” 288.

77. On realism and power, see Tickner, “Hans Morgenthau’s Principles.” On security, see Buzan et al., Security. On the state, see Ashley, “Untying the Sovereign State.” On sovereignty, see Walker, Security.

78. Fukuyama, “The End of History?”

79. Nkiwane, “The End of History?”

80. Ibid.

81. See Saul, “‘For Fear of being Condemned’.” See also Nkiwane, “Africa and International Relations,” 286.

82. Ibid.

83. Richard Saunder, cited in Nkiwane, “Africa and International Relations,” 287.

84. Nkiwane, “The End of History?,” 287.

85. Keating, “Ethical Reflections.”

86. Ibid.

87. Boele van Hensbroek, Political Discourses in African Thought.

88. Smith, “Has Africa got Anything to Say?,” 278.

89. Ibid.

90. Nkiwane, “Africa and International Relations.”

91. Smith, “Has Africa got Anything to Say?,” 278.

92. This section draws substantially from Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview”; and Tieku, “The Challenge of Africa’s Embedded Personhood.”

93. Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview,” 37.

94. Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview,” 38.

95. Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview.” See also Wendt, “The State is a Person.”

96. Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview.” See also March and Olsen, “The Institutional Dynamics.”

97. Risse-Kappen, “Explaining the Nature of the Beast.”

98. Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview.” See also Goldstein and Keohane, Ideas and Foreign Policy; and Keck and Sikkink, Activists beyond Borders.

99. Okere, quoted in Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview,” 41.

100. Ibid.

101. Ibid.

102. Ibid.

103. Ma and Schoeneman, quoted in Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview,” 41.

104. Tieku “Collectivist Worldview.”

105. Ibid., 41.

106. Ibid.

107. Ibid.

108. Ibid.

109. Kapuscinski, quoted in Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview,” 42.

110. See Calderisi, quoted at ibid.

111. Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview,” 42.

112. Ibid.

113. Clapham, quoted in Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview,” 42.

114. Tieku, “Collectivist Worldview,” 43.

115. Smith, “Has Africa got Anything to Say?”

116. Clapham, Africa and the International System, 4.