Book Review: Richard Devetak, Critical International Theory: An Intellectual History

2019 ◽  
pp. 147892991988860
Author(s):  
Thomas Furse
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual History ◽  
International Theory

Critical International Theory

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Devetak
Keyword(s):  
Critical Theory ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Intellectual History ◽  
Historical Materialism ◽  
Frankfurt School ◽  
German Idealism ◽  
Social Philosophy ◽  
International Theory ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Civil Government

Whether 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 international relations, the book recovers a rival form of theory that originates outside the usual inheritance of critical international theory in Renaissance humanism and the civil Enlightenment. This historical mode of theorising was intended to combat metaphysical encroachments on politics and international relations and to prioritise the mundane demands of civil government over the self-reflective demands of dialectical social philosophies. By proposing contextualist intellectual history as a form of critical theory, Critical International Theory: An Intellectual History defends a mode of historical critique that refuses the normative temptations to project present conceptions onto an alien past, and to abstract from the offices of civil government.

Book review: Karl Marx on Technology and Alienation, written by Amy E. Wendling

2014 ◽  
Vol 22 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 505-519
Author(s):  
Tom Bunyard
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual History ◽  
Karl Marx ◽  
Human Essence ◽  
Scientific Paradigms ◽  
Interesting Contribution ◽  
The Status ◽  
Immanent Critique ◽  
Capitalist Ideology ◽  
Interest In Technology

Amy Wendling contends in this book that Marx’s concern with alienation is not restricted to his early, more explicitly Hegelian writings, and that it can be seen to evolve throughout his work in tandem with his interest in technology. This evolution, according to Wendling, is marked by his transition between two successive scientific paradigms, both of which pertain to the status of labour and machinery within society. Wendling claims that Marx uses the distinction between them as a means of conducting an immanent critique of capitalist ideology. Consequently, although it is primarily a work of intellectual history, this book offers an interesting contribution to the hermeneutics of Marx’sCapital. In addition, it also bears relation to contemporary discussions concerning real subsumption and the abolition of labour. The book’s general argument raises questions as to the degree to which a conception of alienation must rely upon notions of human essence, and upon an idea of a ‘natural’ and ‘authentic’ humanity. Wendling’s responses to those questions are described as problematic within this review, but they are also acknowledged to be both pertinent and intriguing.

Conclusion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Devetak
Keyword(s):  
Critical Theory ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Intellectual History ◽  
Contextual Approach ◽  
International Theory

This chapter restates the purpose of the book and sketches a way for critical international theory to be reoriented towards a historical mode of theorizing. Accepting the humanist and civil Enlightenment view that historical modes of knowledge are just as valuable as philosophical modes, the Conclusion suggests that critical international theory could do worse than think about addressing the ‘literate statesman’ and pursuing more modest reformist agendas aimed at combating the encroachment of metaphysics on politics. After distinguishing the contextual approach to history from post-Marxist and constructivist theories, the chapter proposes thinking of contextual intellectual history as a form of critical theory that can help international relations cultivate the ethical comportments and personae required to pursue the ends of civil Enlightenment. It also enables us to historicize our conceptions of theory, the international, and the critical.

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