This short commentary aims to think through the need to return to a more “integrated” feminist IR through a focus on some of the ways in which feminist political economy (FPE) scholars, such as ourselves, might better integrate a focus on gendered forms and practices of violence into our analysis. We do this via an intervention into debates about the nature of the “everyday” political economy. At the same time, we hope that this intervention might also draw attention to the need for a clearer understanding of the gendered structures and practices of the global political economy in feminist security studies (FSS).

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This article examines the content and process of imperialist discourse on the 'Indian woman' in the writings of two North American women, one writing at the time of 'first wave' feminism, the other a key exponent of the 'second wave' of the movement. By analysing these writings, it demonstrates how the content of the discourse was reproduced over time with different but parallel effects in the changed political circumstances, in the first case producing the Western imperial powers as superior on the scale of civilisation, and in the second case producing Western women as the leaders of global feminism. It also identifies how the process of creating written images occurred within the context of each author's social relations with the subject, the reader and the other authors, showing how an orientalist discourse can be produced through the author's representation of the human subjects of whom she writes; how this discourse can be reproduced through the author's uncritical use of earlier writers; and how the discourse can be activated in the audience through the author's failure to challenge established cognitive structures in the reader.

Beginning with two vivid examples that illustrate the Handbook’s core arguments—that politics is performative, performance is political, and that both of these matter to understanding our worlds—the introduction provides a current, contextual account of the shared syntax of politics and performance. It defines key terms, such as politics, performance, theatricality, and performativity, that inform the Handbook contributions. Through accessible and provocative engagements with new ways of thinking about politics and performance in both disciplinary and interdisciplinary modes, the introduction shows that these categories are interwoven and entangled in complex and consequential ways. It outlines the states of the art in theater and performance studies and politics, respectively, capturing key points of interconnection between these discourses in order to build on, extend, and reshape interdisciplinary conversations. Finally, it reflects on key challenges and opportunities that attend bringing the two broad fields together for mutual enrichment and building a new, hybrid field of study. Underlining the co-constitutive nature of performance and politics, the introduction suggests that such a framework is critical to promoting an interdisciplinary approach to understanding the complex political world of the twenty-first century.