Description
Book SynopsisWhether inspired by the Frankfurt School or Antonio Gramsci, the impact of critical theory on the study of international relations has grown considerably since its advent in the early 1980s. This book offers the first intellectual history of critical international theory. Richard Devetak approaches this history by locating its emergence in the rising prestige of theory and the theoretical persona. As theory''s prestige rose in the discipline of international relations it opened the way for normative and metatheoretical reconsiderations of the discipline and the world. The book traces the lines of intellectual inheritance through the Frankfurt School to the Enlightenment, German idealism, and historical materialism, to reveal the construction of a particular kind of intellectual persona: the critical international theorist who has mastered reflexive, dialectical forms of social philosophy. . In addition to the extensive treatment of critical theory''s reception and development in intern
Trade ReviewTo think ethically is ... to think politically; while to think politically is also to think ethically. The beauty of Devetak's Critical International Theory is the clarity with which it demonstrates that the ways in which we think about international relations both are implicated in and contribute to these practices. * Cian O'Driscoll, EIA (Ethics & International Affairs), 34, No. 4 *
Table of ContentsIntroduction 1: International Relations before Critical Theory: Methodenstreit and the Rise of Theory 2: Revisiting the Sources of Critical International Theory 3: International Relations meets Critical Theory 4: Critique and Crisis: Critical International Theory Today 5: Critical International Theory in Historical Mode Conclusion: Reorienting Critical International Theory
