Culture and International Relations contextually re-examines the history of international relations in order to explore how the discipline has imported and employed the concept of culture. The author challenges the notion that IR has only been interested in culture since the end of the Cold War by tracing different understandings of culture throughout its history.
The book presents a critical reflection on how the presence of «culture» in theory and practice of international relations is reflected in IR as a research field. The book consists of three parts: The culture in International Relations scholarship, culture in the practice of International Relations and culture in International Law.
Combining the perspectives of 18 international scholars from Europe and the United States with a critical discussion of the role of culture in international relations, this volume introduces recent trends in the study of Culture and International History. It systematically explores the cultural dimension of international history, mapping existing approaches and conceptual lenses for the study of cultural factors and thus hopes to sharpen the awareness for the cultural approach to international history among both American and non-American scholars. The first part provides a methodological introduction, explores the cultural underpinnings of foreign policy, and the role of culture in international affairs by reviewing the historiography and examining the meaning of the word culture in the context of foreign relations. In the second part, contributors analyze culture as a tool of foreign policy. They demonstrate how culture was instrumentalized for diplomatic goals and purposes in different historical periods and world regions. The essays in the third part expand the state-centered view and retrace informal cultural relations among nations and peoples. This exploration of non-state cultural interaction focuses on the role of science, art, religion, and tourism. The fourth part collects the findings and arguments of part one, two, and three to define a roadmap for further scholarly inquiry. A group of" commentators" survey the preceding essays, place them into a larger research context, and address the question "Where do we go from here?" The last and fifth part presents a selection of primary sources along with individual comments highlighting a new genre of resources scholars interested in culture and international relations can consult.
This book, originally published in 1986, analyses and describes the significance of cultural relations in international affairs. It traces the beginnings of cultural relations in the 19th century and their evolution. Consideration is given to the nature and organization of global ‘cultural diplomacy’, with a particular focus on France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the USA. This book will be of interest to students in international affairs and modern history, but also to those working in government departments and agencies.
Meeting a major challenge, twenty-four scholars collaborated to produce this unprecedented volume on the cultural dimensions of international relations. This field of study, long considered too vast, has up to now been neglected by scholars in the humanities and international relations. This 18-chapter book provides a theoretical overview, examines the present status of scholarship where international relations and the humanities intersect, and studies the impact of cultural differences in shaping foreign policy. U.S. international political culture receives special attention. Other cultures given close examination include Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. The book concludes with a discussion of the key issues in culture and international relations. The importance of culture in international relations has long been recognized yet neglected. This volume fills this void of scholarship. It has three objectives: to survey studies completed to date; to determine the impact of cultural differences upon the foreign policy making process; and, most importantly, to push forward the frontiers of knowledge in this field.
Cultural diversity, because it is perceived to have significant security, developmental, and social implications, is fast becoming one of the major political issues of the day. At the international level, it overlaps with the now extensive debates on multiculturalism within states. This work shows how cultural diversity challenges the understanding of international relations as relations between states and, by looking at the issue through the magnifying glass of an international organization, offers innovative insights into the interplay between various levels of international society. The book examines in particular the role of UNESCO, the only United Nations agency responsible for culture and the main forum for international diplomacy on the issue of cultural diversity.
"The political and academic worlds are fractured by two competing discourses: the universalism of human rights and cultural relativism. This fracture is represented by the deep separation of cultural analysis and theories of international politics. Derek Robbins in a brilliant interrogation of European thinkers from Montesquieu to Pierre Bourdieu seeks to replace cultural relativism with cultural relationism as a step towards reconciling Enlightenment universalism and anthropological insistence on cultural difference. Inter alia he reflects on the tensions between political and social science and takes up the challenge from Raymond Aron to construct a sociology of international relations. A dazzling achievement." - Bryan S. Turner, The Graduate Center, CUNY Through historical studies of some of the work of Montesquieu, Comte, Durkheim, Boas, Morgenthau, Aron and Bourdieu, Derek Robbins examines the changing and competing conceptualisations of the political and the social in the Western European intellectual tradition. He suggests that we are now experiencing a new ‘dissociation of sensibility’ in which political thought and its consequences in action have become divorced from social and cultural experience. Developing further the ideas of Bourdieu which he has presented in books and articles over the last twenty years, Robbins argues that we need to integrate the recognition of cultural difference with the practice of international politics by accepting that the ‘field’ of international political discourse is a social construct which is contingent on encounters between diverse cultures. ‘Everything is relative’ (Comte) and ‘everything is social’ (Bourdieu), not least international politics.
Critically evaluates how international relations theories have conceived culture, and advances a new account of cultural diversity and international order.
