"Those who control the present, control the past and those who control the past control the future." -George Orwell.
Brian Schmidt's The Political Discourse of Anarchy attempts to complicate the traditional narrative that exists about the field of international relations. He challenges two traditional perspectives on the history of the field by presenting an alternative history through the use of discourse analysis. Through careful archival research, Schmidt is able to reconstruct the long-forgotten historical discourse in the field. He challenges a reified understanding of ideas like anarchy and their conceptual place in our current understanding of international relations. By challenging these reified ideas, students of international relations are able to a gain a more nuanced history of the field. This nuanced history challenges core assumptions and provides alternative explanations for how and why the field is conceptualized the way it is.
Schmidt begins by highlighting the two traditional historical narratives that are told about international relations. One approach looks to the deep past to provide historical connection and legitimacy for modern debates. For example, scholars draw a line from Thucydides to Hobbes, from Locke to Morgenthau, all in an attempt to provide a progressive understanding of the field's historical evolution. The second approach is to argue that external events - such as war, colonialism, etc. - have defined the evolution of the field.
Schmidt then posits an alternative explanation for the history of the field. He describes it as a "critical internal discursive history" that aims to examine the academic debate that existed among scholars of the field over time. He discovers that changes in the understanding of concepts - such as the state, sovereignty, power, and anarchy - occurred primarily because of an internal discursive dialogue. This internal discursive dialogue led to the centralization of the concept of anarchy in the field of international relations and explains why we still discuss the topic so much to this day.
Schmidt provides a much needed contribution to our understanding of the historical evolution of the field of international relations. Rather than accepting traditional narratives about how the field evolved, reconstructing the internal academic discourse provides modern students of international relations a vantage point from which to understand the history of the field.
Brian Schmidt's The Political Discourse of Anarchy attempts to complicate the traditional narrative that exists about the field of international relations. He challenges two traditional perspectives on the history of the field by presenting an alternative history through the use of discourse analysis. Through careful archival research, Schmidt is able to reconstruct the long-forgotten historical discourse in the field. He challenges a reified understanding of ideas like anarchy and their conceptual place in our current understanding of international relations. By challenging these reified ideas, students of international relations are able to a gain a more nuanced history of the field. This nuanced history challenges core assumptions and provides alternative explanations for how and why the field is conceptualized the way it is.
Schmidt begins by highlighting the two traditional historical narratives that are told about international relations. One approach looks to the deep past to provide historical connection and legitimacy for modern debates. For example, scholars draw a line from Thucydides to Hobbes, from Locke to Morgenthau, all in an attempt to provide a progressive understanding of the field's historical evolution. The second approach is to argue that external events - such as war, colonialism, etc. - have defined the evolution of the field.
Schmidt then posits an alternative explanation for the history of the field. He describes it as a "critical internal discursive history" that aims to examine the academic debate that existed among scholars of the field over time. He discovers that changes in the understanding of concepts - such as the state, sovereignty, power, and anarchy - occurred primarily because of an internal discursive dialogue. This internal discursive dialogue led to the centralization of the concept of anarchy in the field of international relations and explains why we still discuss the topic so much to this day.
Schmidt provides a much needed contribution to our understanding of the historical evolution of the field of international relations. Rather than accepting traditional narratives about how the field evolved, reconstructing the internal academic discourse provides modern students of international relations a vantage point from which to understand the history of the field.
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