Normative trade-offs in the study of self and other in IR

Abstract

This chapter reflects on some normative challenges facing critical International Relations (IR) scholarship as it analyzes Iver Neumann’s key contributions to the study of difference and otherness in IR. I argue that IR scholars, who are interested in critically exposing practices of differentiation and Othering, have to contend with two normative challenges. The first is how not to facilitate Othering while celebrating cultural difference as relevant. The second related challenge is how to expose and unsettle Eurocentric practices of Othering without facilitating the production of self-righteous, uncritical, and non-reflexive attitudes in societies that are constituted as Other. In this chapter, I first analyze how Iver Neumann has dealt with these challenges in his evolving scholarship. Subsequently, I claim that these normative challenges may be experienced partly differently by scholars situated in non-Western contexts. This claim is supported with a self-reflection about my own contributions to the study of Self/Other relations as a scholar based in Turkey. I conclude the chapter by highlighting aspects of Iver Neumann’s work, which should guide scholars of Self and Other in the contemporary context of rising nativism and authoritarianism.