Ending Empire: Lusotropicalism as an imperial ideology

Este artículo indaga en los fundamentos ideológicos del imperialismo portugués de posguerra, donde se detectan algunas tensiones conceptuales características de la justificación del dominio imperial en la modernidad tardía, como son la preocupación por el declive y la desviación de las ambiciones imperiales. De este modo, el artículo se centra en explorar cómo la teoría de Gilberto Freyre fue apropiada para legitimar las demandas portuguesas de sus posesiones de ultramar, y cómo la ideología del lusotropicalismo resultante siguió ejerciendo su influencia mucho después del fin del imperio portugués. Al destapar las tensiones estructurales y conceptuales de esta ideología, este artículo trata de desvelar algunos de los dilemas a los que se tiene que enfrentar cualquier esquema imperial en un mundo de estados con continuidad territorial y homogeneidad cultural, donde éstos se erigen como los únicos actores legitimados para reclamar la autoridad soberanaThis article is an inquiry into the ideological foundations of Portuguese postwar imperialism, arguing that these reveal some conceptual tensions characteristic of late-modern justifications of imperial governance, such as anxieties about imperial decline and a deflection of imperial ambitions. Doing this, the article focuses on how the social theory of Gilberto Freyre was appropriated to legitimize Portuguese claims to authority over its overseas possessions, and how the resulting ideology of lusotropicalism continued to resonate long after the demise of the Portuguese empire. By exposing the structure and conceptual tensions of this ideology, the article tries to reveal some of the dilemmas that any imperial scheme has to confront in a world in which territorially bounded and culturally homogeneous states constitute the sole legitimate claimants to sovereign authorit

Blasts from the Past: War and Fracture in the International System

This article is a brief inquiry into the changing meaning of war in Western political thought, with special reference to its role in fracturing the contemporary international system. I argue that contemporary debates about the changing nature of war have failed to note what I take to be the most important change in our understanding of war in recent decades—the return of the long-suppressed view that regards war as a productive force in human affairs. I substantiate this argument by showing how war was long believed to be productive of sociopolitical order in general, and of the modern state and the international system in particular. I then proceed to show how similar conceptions of war inform contemporary practices of military intervention and nation-building, and how the acceptance of this view among scholars has made them complicit in its legitimization and reproduction

Towards a genealogy of 'society' in International Relations

The concept of society and its cognates have long been widely invoked in order to understand International Relations. Theories of international society distinguish between a society of states and a mere system of states, and theories of world society assume that the world constitutes a single social space. In order to come to terms with the social character of International Relations, constructivists of different stripes have invoked a societal context within which the construction of identities and norms takes place. As I shall argue in this article, these usages draw on conceptions of society that emerged during the early phases of modern sociology, and have then been projected onto alien historical and cultural contexts. In order to avoid the anachronism and Eurocentrism that invariably have resulted from these uncritical usages, I argue that academic International Relations should seek to accommodate those forms of human association that cannot be subsumed under a recognisably modern concept of society by incorporating insights from postcolonial sociology into its theoretical core

The language of law and the laws of language

The Status of Law in World Society by Friedrich Kratochwil is a sophisticated attempt to reassert the importance of international law in a globalised world by grounding it in the actual practices of legal reasoning. Yet this attempt to ground normativity in practice strikes me as problematic. As I shall argue, what law is cannot be determined with reference to legal practices only, but will depend on the fulfillment of certain background requirements which themselves stand in need of further justification. Thus the recourse to linguistic practice is beset by an ambivalence that stems from the fact that language and law always already are intertwined, an ambivalence that cannot therefore be overcome with recourse to either. If it is the case that law has a language of its own, we must also be prepared to admit that language has its own laws. What then is gained by the recourse to linguistic practice is not so much a resolution but rather a temporary displacement of indeterminacy from the realm of law to that of language

Ending Empire: Lusotropicalism as an imperial ideology

This article is an inquiry into the ideological foundations of Portuguese postwar imperialism, arguing that these reveal some conceptual tensions characteristic of late-modern justifications of imperial governance, such as anxieties about imperial decline and a deflection of imperial ambitions. Doing this, the article focuses on how the social theory of Gilberto Freyre was appropriated to legitimize Portuguese claims to authority over its overseas possessions, and how the resulting ideology of lusotropicalism continued to resonate long after the demise of the Portuguese empire. By exposing the structure and conceptual tensions of this ideology, the article tries to reveal some of the dilemmas that any imperial scheme has to confront in a world in which territorially bounded and culturally homogeneous states constitute the sole legitimate claimants to sovereign authority