The Challenges Postcolonial Theory Poses to Dominant Understandings of International Relations Dominated by Western Political Thought one of many critical perspectives that seek to challenge our understanding of conventional international relations. international relations (IR). Postcolonial theory is best viewed as a site of critical inquiry or a set of shared ideas rather than as a single theory or unified body of thought. It essentially analyzes how society, states and inhabitants of formerly colonized countries experience IR. Furthermore, it continues to challenge much of past and present international politics and reinforces the idea that international politics requires a global perspective. It is interested in both how European nations conquered and controlled Third World cultures and how these groups have since responded to and resisted these encroachments. Postcolonialism, as a body of theory and study of political and cultural change, has gone through and continues to go through three major stages. First, a first awareness of the social, psychological and cultural inferiority imposed by being in a colonized state. Second, the struggle for ethnic, cultural and political autonomy and finally a growing awareness of cultural overlap and hybridity. In order to identify its challenges, it is important to understand the use of the term “post”. This is not to say that the effects or impact of colonial rule are long gone, but it does highlight the impact that colonial and imperial histories still have on the formation of a colonial way of thinking about the world and how Western forms of knowledge and power marginalize the non-Western world. Furthermore, he refuses to treat “postcolonial” as a synonym for European decolonization. The world can only be considered "postcolonial" if we assume that historical patterns of economic control and command necessarily ended with formal colonial rule. Patterns of continuity amid change mean that international power relations have moved beyond colonialism in some respects while remaining deeply colonial in others. Ultimately, it goes further and goes beyond the traditional focus of IR on states, but instead focuses on themes such as identity, the problem of grand narratives, etc. Its aim is to give voice to people and regions stifled by colonialism, to deconstruct and destabilize the discourses surrounding colonialism and to attempt to transcend colonial discourse patterns. That said, this essay will explore some of the main challenges that postcolonial theory offers to the dominant understanding of international relations, such as its disregard for the importance of history, the problem of identity and otherness, the IR theories' neglect of the critical intersections of race, gender, and class in the workings of global power that reproduce a hierarchy. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay. Disregard for the Importance of History One of the main challenges that postcolonial theory poses to our understanding of mainstream international relations is its complete disregard for the importance of history and the provincialization of Europe. This calls into question much of the centrality given to Europe ashistorical source and origin of the international order (and the history included therein is always that of the victors). Unfortunately, much IR theory shows very little interest in history because "history is unimportant to the feature of international order which is seen as the transhistorical fact of anarchy." According to Waltz, “the persistent anarchic character of international politics explains the striking similarity in the quality of international life across the millennia.” He recognizes that there have been different international systems over centuries and millennia, differing depending on whether their main political units were city-states, empires, or nations, but different "international political systems, such as markets economic, are of individualistic origin, generated spontaneously and involuntarily. Therefore, not only is history unnecessary given that the fundamental nature of international life has changed little over the millennia, but it would also be difficult to construct an intelligible account of historical changes in the international arena. , another major challenge that postcolonialism presents to IR is that even when history is used, the discipline is built on Eurocentric foundations. This is essential for both critical and conventional theories of IR, because by basing our theories on Eurocentric assumptions or viewpoints, we fail to include the multiple perspectives and voices that are essential to our understanding of "international" politics . Many conventional IR theories are considered reliable because of their positivist and relatively scientific principles. If we accept the principle that the basis of all IR theories is Western-centric, then these conventional theories with a positivist perspective can be seen as a way of hiding the truth that these theories are entirely Eurocentric. In today's world, it is generally assumed that there is a contrast between the rich, modern West and the rest of the poor, underdeveloped world. By the West, we mean Europe and North America, with the more recent addition of the Middle East and Japan. However, as the process of modernity originated in Europe, it is then seen as the history of Europe and the extension of European norms and values across the world. This then means that the rest of the world appears to exist in a sort of subordinate state. Europe is considered fully developed and modern and believes that the rest of the world needs to catch up. When European powers began to colonize, they began to write the history of the regions they had conquered. This account of history was written from their own perspective and subsequently portrayed Europeans as civilized due to their "seemingly" sophisticated social and political institutions. While people living in countries located in Africa and parts of Asia lived in severely underdeveloped and almost backward countries. This topic has been studied in depth by researcher Dipesh Chakrabarty in his book Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference. In which he argued that the discipline of history, as it developed during the Enlightenment, was rooted in the idea of human progress. Chakrabarty argued that there were subthemes rooted in particular national histories. He said the purpose of this type of story was to show people how societies developed or failed. This led to history being written in a particular way that praised or benefitedcolonizers, even if it concerned and for the colonized regions. They wrote history that supported and explained the reasons for colonization and why nations “needed” intervention. This adaptation of colonial history sought to explain why some colonized regions lacked certain essential qualities, such as a commitment to democracy, human rights, or capitalist enterprise. The emphasis was not on the positive aspects of the cultures they encountered, but rather on what they lacked, and although they were the first to write such adaptations of the story, many locals of these colonized nations studied in these European-style schools. , wrote the same thing because that's all the story they knew. A consequence that we still suffer from today, as most writings are written to congratulate the Western world for colonizing these "failed nations" rather than showing the realities of what happened and incorporating all the cultures and experiences in our history. Furthermore, leading critic and postcolonialist Franz Fanon noted in his book Black Skins, White Masks, that colonized blacks had not only suffered from the oppression and domination of European rulers, but also from extreme indoctrination that had convinced them that they were not only inhuman but inferior to white people. man. He asserted that the only answer was for the black man and the colonized to free themselves from the psychological control of their masters by completely rejecting this mentality. This was made extremely difficult because the colonizers had destroyed their identity and their entire pre-colonial past. Rather, the precolonial fragments that existed had to be reorganized in creative and new ways, in conjunction with the colonial system of government and culture, to forge a new unity. Even if true, there are important traditions of oppositional forms of historical writing around the world. In the West, like socialist or feminist history, it can be argued that they remain rooted in a global paradigm of progress and development. Thus, socialist historians always maintain a narrative of progress, the difference being that it is progress toward working class revolution. There has been a tendency to focus on the white working class, ignoring black workers. Feminists have their own narrative of progress, towards the liberation of women from patriarchal controls. But again, feminist historians tend to view women as white, leaving black women invisible. Once again, these are programs born from the West and in which the West is considered to be in the lead. of the way Western scholars and other writers have long perceived the Orient. Orientalism is the process by which the Orient was constructed as an exotic other by European studies and culture. Orientalism is not so much a true study of other cultures as a broad Western generalization about Eastern, Islamic, and/or Asian cultures that tends to erode and ignore their substantial differences. Said claimed that Europeans divided the world into two parts, East and West or West and East. However, he saw this as a completely artificial boundary posed based on the concept of us and them. Said argued that "with regard to the West during the 19th and 20th centuries, it had been assumed that the Orient and all that it contained was, if not manifestly inferior, at least in need of corrective study on the part of the West. Orientalism is therefore a knowledge of the Orient which places oriental things ina classroom, court, prison, or textbook for examination, judgment, discipline, or government. (Said, Orientalism, p40) His main problems with IR theories were that the division between the monolithic West and the East was man-made. Debates about identity are important and absent in many mainstream theories. By identity, I mean the way an individual and/or group defines themselves. Identity is important to self-concept, social mores, and national understanding, often involving both essentialism and otherness. By not having such discussions, divisions are created and the idea of us versus them is intensified. He argued that it was important to see people as more diverse than these binaries because "the terrible reductive conflicts that group people under falsely unifying rubrics like 'America,' 'the West,' or 'the Islam” and invent collective identities for large numbers of individuals who are in fact very diverse, cannot remain as powerful as they are and must be fought. The basis of Said's argument here is that the concept of Orient used by the West is not the actual Orient, rather it is a constructed understanding of what citizens believe. the orientation to be. This fundamental misunderstanding is based on centuries-old descriptions and entrenched power dynamics between the West and the West. International relations and security studies can be used as examples of orientalist discourse, primarily because the The West is presented as a force for good and that, therefore, any intervention is legitimized. This then feeds into the common tendency in IR to separate us from “others”, by which I mean the social and/or psychological ways in which one group excludes or marginalizes another group. By declaring someone “other,” people tend to emphasize what makes them different or opposed to another, and this carries over into how they represent others, particularly through stereotypical images. The dominant theories are not interested in the question of culture and its relations with States. Since states simply exist and by nature pursue their interests, the rules that govern interactions between states are not considered to have anything to do with culture. Most IR theorists assume that culture belongs to other disciplines and is therefore irrelevant to mainstream theories. However, if we constantly ignore history or make everything Eurocentric, otherness is almost inevitable, because anything we do not understand, we immediately distance ourselves from creating us versus them when it cannot be. -not be necessary. The West considers itself more capable of talking about it. the other than the other itself, which gives no voice to the other or, in Said's example, the OrientPost colonialism/Feminism. Finally, another more current challenge of traditional IR is that of Eurocentrism in matters of feminism. Postcolonial feminism is essentially a critique of white Euro-American attempts to “save” women outside of the Western world. Postcolonial feminists pay particular attention to the continuing damage that Euro-American imperialism and global capitalism have inflicted on the populations of Eastern countries, as well as the violent exploitation of women in less "developed" regions of the world which results. The white savior complex is used by Euro-American politicians through the trope of the "third world woman", oppressed by a supposedly backward regime, to justify war and occupation in non-Euro-American countries. , as has.

Essay / The Challenges Postcolonial Theory Poses to Dominant Understandings of International Relations Dominated by Western Political Thought one of many critical perspectives that seek to challenge our understanding of conventional international relations. international relations (IR). Postcolonial theory is best viewed as a site of critical inquiry or a set of shared ideas rather than as a single theory or unified body of thought. It essentially analyzes how society, states and inhabitants of formerly colonized countries experience IR. Furthermore, it continues to challenge much of past and present international politics and reinforces the idea that international politics requires a global perspective. It is interested in both how European nations conquered and controlled Third World cultures and how these groups have since responded to and resisted these encroachments. Postcolonialism, as a body of theory and study of political and cultural change, has gone through and continues to go through three major stages. First, a first awareness of the social, psychological and cultural inferiority imposed by being in a colonized state. Second, the struggle for ethnic, cultural and political autonomy and finally a growing awareness of cultural overlap and hybridity. In order to identify its challenges, it is important to understand the use of the term “post”. This is not to say that the effects or impact of colonial rule are long gone, but it does highlight the impact that colonial and imperial histories still have on the formation of a colonial way of thinking about the world and how Western forms of knowledge and power marginalize the non-Western world. Furthermore, he refuses to treat “postcolonial” as a synonym for European decolonization. The world can only be considered "postcolonial" if we assume that historical patterns of economic control and command necessarily ended with formal colonial rule. Patterns of continuity amid change mean that international power relations have moved beyond colonialism in some respects while remaining deeply colonial in others. Ultimately, it goes further and goes beyond the traditional focus of IR on states, but instead focuses on themes such as identity, the problem of grand narratives, etc. Its aim is to give voice to people and regions stifled by colonialism, to deconstruct and destabilize the discourses surrounding colonialism and to attempt to transcend colonial discourse patterns. That said, this essay will explore some of the main challenges that postcolonial theory offers to the dominant understanding of international relations, such as its disregard for the importance of history, the problem of identity and otherness, the IR theories' neglect of the critical intersections of race, gender, and class in the workings of global power that reproduce a hierarchy. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay. Disregard for the Importance of History One of the main challenges that postcolonial theory poses to our understanding of mainstream international relations is its complete disregard for the importance of history and the provincialization of Europe. This calls into question much of the centrality given to Europe ashistorical source and origin of the international order (and the history included therein is always that of the victors). Unfortunately, much IR theory shows very little interest in history because "history is unimportant to the feature of international order which is seen as the transhistorical fact of anarchy." According to Waltz, “the persistent anarchic character of international politics explains the striking similarity in the quality of international life across the millennia.” He recognizes that there have been different international systems over centuries and millennia, differing depending on whether their main political units were city-states, empires, or nations, but different "international political systems, such as markets economic, are of individualistic origin, generated spontaneously and involuntarily. Therefore, not only is history unnecessary given that the fundamental nature of international life has changed little over the millennia, but it would also be difficult to construct an intelligible account of historical changes in the international arena. , another major challenge that postcolonialism presents to IR is that even when history is used, the discipline is built on Eurocentric foundations. This is essential for both critical and conventional theories of IR, because by basing our theories on Eurocentric assumptions or viewpoints, we fail to include the multiple perspectives and voices that are essential to our understanding of "international" politics . Many conventional IR theories are considered reliable because of their positivist and relatively scientific principles. If we accept the principle that the basis of all IR theories is Western-centric, then these conventional theories with a positivist perspective can be seen as a way of hiding the truth that these theories are entirely Eurocentric. In today's world, it is generally assumed that there is a contrast between the rich, modern West and the rest of the poor, underdeveloped world. By the West, we mean Europe and North America, with the more recent addition of the Middle East and Japan. However, as the process of modernity originated in Europe, it is then seen as the history of Europe and the extension of European norms and values across the world. This then means that the rest of the world appears to exist in a sort of subordinate state. Europe is considered fully developed and modern and believes that the rest of the world needs to catch up. When European powers began to colonize, they began to write the history of the regions they had conquered. This account of history was written from their own perspective and subsequently portrayed Europeans as civilized due to their "seemingly" sophisticated social and political institutions. While people living in countries located in Africa and parts of Asia lived in severely underdeveloped and almost backward countries. This topic has been studied in depth by researcher Dipesh Chakrabarty in his book Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference. In which he argued that the discipline of history, as it developed during the Enlightenment, was rooted in the idea of human progress. Chakrabarty argued that there were subthemes rooted in particular national histories. He said the purpose of this type of story was to show people how societies developed or failed. This led to history being written in a particular way that praised or benefitedcolonizers, even if it concerned and for the colonized regions. They wrote history that supported and explained the reasons for colonization and why nations “needed” intervention. This adaptation of colonial history sought to explain why some colonized regions lacked certain essential qualities, such as a commitment to democracy, human rights, or capitalist enterprise. The emphasis was not on the positive aspects of the cultures they encountered, but rather on what they lacked, and although they were the first to write such adaptations of the story, many locals of these colonized nations studied in these European-style schools. , wrote the same thing because that's all the story they knew. A consequence that we still suffer from today, as most writings are written to congratulate the Western world for colonizing these "failed nations" rather than showing the realities of what happened and incorporating all the cultures and experiences in our history. Furthermore, leading critic and postcolonialist Franz Fanon noted in his book Black Skins, White Masks, that colonized blacks had not only suffered from the oppression and domination of European rulers, but also from extreme indoctrination that had convinced them that they were not only inhuman but inferior to white people. man. He asserted that the only answer was for the black man and the colonized to free themselves from the psychological control of their masters by completely rejecting this mentality. This was made extremely difficult because the colonizers had destroyed their identity and their entire pre-colonial past. Rather, the precolonial fragments that existed had to be reorganized in creative and new ways, in conjunction with the colonial system of government and culture, to forge a new unity. Even if true, there are important traditions of oppositional forms of historical writing around the world. In the West, like socialist or feminist history, it can be argued that they remain rooted in a global paradigm of progress and development. Thus, socialist historians always maintain a narrative of progress, the difference being that it is progress toward working class revolution. There has been a tendency to focus on the white working class, ignoring black workers. Feminists have their own narrative of progress, towards the liberation of women from patriarchal controls. But again, feminist historians tend to view women as white, leaving black women invisible. Once again, these are programs born from the West and in which the West is considered to be in the lead. of the way Western scholars and other writers have long perceived the Orient. Orientalism is the process by which the Orient was constructed as an exotic other by European studies and culture. Orientalism is not so much a true study of other cultures as a broad Western generalization about Eastern, Islamic, and/or Asian cultures that tends to erode and ignore their substantial differences. Said claimed that Europeans divided the world into two parts, East and West or West and East. However, he saw this as a completely artificial boundary posed based on the concept of us and them. Said argued that "with regard to the West during the 19th and 20th centuries, it had been assumed that the Orient and all that it contained was, if not manifestly inferior, at least in need of corrective study on the part of the West. Orientalism is therefore a knowledge of the Orient which places oriental things ina classroom, court, prison, or textbook for examination, judgment, discipline, or government. (Said, Orientalism, p40) His main problems with IR theories were that the division between the monolithic West and the East was man-made. Debates about identity are important and absent in many mainstream theories. By identity, I mean the way an individual and/or group defines themselves. Identity is important to self-concept, social mores, and national understanding, often involving both essentialism and otherness. By not having such discussions, divisions are created and the idea of us versus them is intensified. He argued that it was important to see people as more diverse than these binaries because "the terrible reductive conflicts that group people under falsely unifying rubrics like 'America,' 'the West,' or 'the Islam” and invent collective identities for large numbers of individuals who are in fact very diverse, cannot remain as powerful as they are and must be fought. The basis of Said's argument here is that the concept of Orient used by the West is not the actual Orient, rather it is a constructed understanding of what citizens believe. the orientation to be. This fundamental misunderstanding is based on centuries-old descriptions and entrenched power dynamics between the West and the West. International relations and security studies can be used as examples of orientalist discourse, primarily because the The West is presented as a force for good and that, therefore, any intervention is legitimized. This then feeds into the common tendency in IR to separate us from “others”, by which I mean the social and/or psychological ways in which one group excludes or marginalizes another group. By declaring someone “other,” people tend to emphasize what makes them different or opposed to another, and this carries over into how they represent others, particularly through stereotypical images. The dominant theories are not interested in the question of culture and its relations with States. Since states simply exist and by nature pursue their interests, the rules that govern interactions between states are not considered to have anything to do with culture. Most IR theorists assume that culture belongs to other disciplines and is therefore irrelevant to mainstream theories. However, if we constantly ignore history or make everything Eurocentric, otherness is almost inevitable, because anything we do not understand, we immediately distance ourselves from creating us versus them when it cannot be. -not be necessary. The West considers itself more capable of talking about it. the other than the other itself, which gives no voice to the other or, in Said's example, the OrientPost colonialism/Feminism. Finally, another more current challenge of traditional IR is that of Eurocentrism in matters of feminism. Postcolonial feminism is essentially a critique of white Euro-American attempts to “save” women outside of the Western world. Postcolonial feminists pay particular attention to the continuing damage that Euro-American imperialism and global capitalism have inflicted on the populations of Eastern countries, as well as the violent exploitation of women in less "developed" regions of the world which results. The white savior complex is used by Euro-American politicians through the trope of the "third world woman", oppressed by a supposedly backward regime, to justify war and occupation in non-Euro-American countries. , as has.

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