The Contested Ethics of Democracy Promotion

This chapter explores the ethical justifications actors in international politics may have to promote democracy in other countries. Although ethical debates surrounding the promotion of democracy often remain rather implicit, this chapter seeks to show that it is not irrelevant for our understanding of the practice, or for the practitioners themselves, to think through more carefully the ethical underpinnings that actually and potentially frame this policy agenda. Paying attention to the ethics of democracy promotion is significant not least because we observe that a variety of differing, and contested, ethical assumptions and frameworks can be used to frame the activity by different actors, organizations, and political groups.</p

Planetary justice reconsidered:Developing response-abilities in planetary relations

This contribution puts forward a relational and posthumanist engagement with the idea of planetary justice. The planetary from this perspective should be conceived not to re-enforce, but rather to break apart, the idea that there is such a thing as a ‘planetary whole’. When we move away from ‘planetary wholes’, we also conceive of justice and ethical commitments differently from how they have been traditionally approached. Instead of attempting to create ‘justice on the planet’, we see that manifold concrete multispecies communities become central to generating ‘response-ability in planetary relations’. This article explores how this different orientation to planetary justice not only helps to break down the problematic spatial and temporal scales within which questions of justice are often framed but also points towards some different ways of responding ethically to the recent demands for planetary justice.</p

The Limits of Practice:Why Realism Can Complement IR’s Practice Turn

This paper argues that the current calls for a practice turn in IR are, while positive in many respects, are problematic and potentially limiting because they are premised on: a confused understanding of the role of philosophy and realist philosophy in particular and a restricted view of the role of sociological investigation. This arises from the problematic tendency of to lapse into advocacy of an anti-realist philosophical and sociological imagination. We suggest that the problems that practice theorists point to should lead not to knee-jerk anti-realism but rather can motivate a reinvigorated conversation with realism. This entails revisiting the role of philosophy, realism and sociology in the study of practices. We argue that far from being antithetical to practice theory, a reconsideration of realist philosophy helps make sense of the role of practice and provides those advocating practice theory with better tools to deal with the challenges which motivated the development of these theoretical stances. Reconsidering realism entails, however, a reconsideration of a wider social ontology within which practice takes place, and openness to the role of philosophical and theoretical abstractions in teasing out the role of practice.authorsversionPeer reviewe