Experiencing the end and afterlives of International Relations/theory

Having raised the question of whither the international at the end of International Relations a few years ago, this article treats the state of International Relations theory as a continuing endist issue for discussion. Of interest is the restructuring of the field in the post-Cold War years, partly as a result of debates about epistemologies and partly in light of the failure of realisms to lead International Relations to the door of the Soviet and Eastern Bloc collapse, which many thought it could. As the world globalized, so did International Relations, turning itself into a field of differences — theoretical, geographical, philosophical, methodological, and so on. Is this the end of International Relations or its new afterlife? I argue that there are signs that old topics of International Relations, like war, are being taken up in new ways and in new collaborations, such as those that feminist International Relations has forged. At the same time, many camps display the old International Relations tendency to elevate abstract thinking above quotidian international relations, even in the face of clear evidence that the agency of people played a major role in shifting Cold War and Middle East configurations of power. International Relations’ camps should strive less for their own distinctive analysis and more for communication with colleagues, ordinary people making today’s international relations and policy proponents.