This book addresses the ‘crisis of critique’ of Frankfurt School Critical Theory in International Relations and puts forward a proposal for how it can be overcome. It starts from the premise that the present conjuncture, marked by capitalist crisis and a fracturing international order, urgently calls for critical perspectives capable of clarifying the state of global affairs and the emancipatory struggles within it. Critical Theory in International Relations should be well placed to provide answers to this demand, yet it finds itself today in a state of decline. Its prevailing form – that of a universalist cosmopolitan project – reflects a narrow Eurocentric perspective and the concerns of a time now past, while the Frankfurt School tradition as a whole struggles to develop new modes of analysis and new political imaginaries that are appropriate to the current historical situation. The book diagnoses this situation of intellectual and political crisis and seeks to trace a way out. It does so by providing a comprehensive account of the development of Critical Theory in International Relations and the ways in which it has applied Frankfurt School thought to the study of international politics. It then makes a provocative case as to the exhaustion of the cosmopolitan and Habermasian paradigm of critique that has guided Frankfurt School research on international politics for the past thirty years. Finally, it puts forward a proposal for the revitalisation of Critical Theory in IR through a renewed emphasis on the critique of political economy and sketches a research agenda which can make the tradition relevant again to contemporary political questions.
Author(s): Davide Schmid
Series: Palgrave Studies in International Relations
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2023
Language: English
Pages: 213
City: Cham
Acknowledgements
Contents
About the Author
1 Introduction
Critical Theory and the International
Argument
Book Structure
References
2 The Crisis of Critique
Defining Frankfurt School Critical Theory
A General Definition of Frankfurt School Critical Theory
Frankfurt School Theory in International Relations
Cosmopolitan Democracy
Critical International Relations Theory
Standstill
The Rise and Fall of Cosmopolitan Democracy
The Slow Decline of Critical IR Theory
The Crisis of Critique of Frankfurt School Theory
Conclusion
References
3 Two Histories of the Frankfurt School
A Conventional History of the Frankfurt School
Three Phases of Frankfurt School Thought
Critique
An Alternative History of the Frankfurt School
The Early Frankfurt School Theory of Late Capitalism
The Political Economic Dimension of Early Frankfurt School Theory
The Impasse of Early Frankfurt School Theory
The Habermasian Turn Reconsidered
Conclusion
References
4 The Habermasian Paradigm
The Social-Theoretical Foundations of Habermasian Critical Theory
The Theory of System and Lifeworld
Habermas’s Theory of Capitalism
The Antinomies of Habermasian Theory
Problems of Analysis
Problems of Critique
Conclusion
References
5 Habermas and Cosmopolitan Democracy
Habermas and the Postnational Constellation
The Functionalist Analysis of Globalisation
The Hermeneutics of International Norms
The Possibility of Cosmopolitanism
The European Union
The Pitfalls of Habermas’s Cosmopolitanism
Explanatory Failings
The Limits of Cosmopolitan Utopianism
Conclusion
References
6 Linklater and Critical International Relations Theory
Linklater’s Theory of International Politics
Linklater’s Early Works: From International Political Theory to Critical IR Theory
Linklater’s Later Works: From the Study of Harm to Process Sociology
The Failings of Linklater’s Critical Theory of IR
Explanatory-Diagnostic Failings
Anticipatory-Utopian Limits
Conclusion
References
7 The Way Ahead
Introduction
A New Strategy of Critique
Ontology
Methodology
Philosophy
Politics
A New Research Agenda for Critical Theory
The Economy
Social Reproduction
Ecology
The Political
The International
Critique of Ideology
Conclusion
References
8 Conclusion
References
Index
