Anthropocene, Capitalocene and Liberal Cosmopolitan IR: A Response to Burke et al.’s ‘Planet Politics’

Abstract

This article is a collective response to Anthony Burke et al's 'Planet Politics', published in this journal in 2016, and billed as a 'Manifesto from the end of IR'. We dispute this claim on the basis that rather than breaking from the discipline, the Manifesto provides a problematic global governance agenda which is dangerously authoritarian and deeply depoliticising. We substantiate this analysis in the claim that Burke et al reproduce an already failed and discredited liberal cosmopolitan framework through the advocacy of managerialism rather than transformation; the top-down coercive approach of international law; and use of abstract modernist political categories. In the closing sections of the article, we discuss the possibility of different approaches, which, taking the Anthropocene as both an epistemological and ontological break with modernist assumptions, could take us beyond IR's disciplinary confines.

Critiquing Latour’s Explanation of Climate Change Denial: Moving Beyond the Modernity/Anthropocene Binary

“…We will return to this context below, in our ambition to contextualise the hope Latour places in a new language. It is also worth mentioning Philippe Descola's influential observation (referenced in David Chandler, Erika Cudworth and Stephen Hobden's response to 'Burke et al Planet Politics Manifesto') 111 , that human relations to nature can be represented by 'four ontologies -animism, totemism, naturalism, and analogism' 112 as well as Geoff Mann and Joel Wainwright's identification of four potential social formations emergent as a result of climate change. Notably, only one of Mann and Wainwright's future scenarios, 'Climate X', appears to be decolonial in and of itself.…”

Mudança global do clima as cidades no Antropoceno: escalas, redes e tecnologias

“…A literatura científica ainda está bem dividida entre autores que consideram o Antropoceno uma poderosa concepção, capaz de guiar a sociedade a uma atuação mais efetiva na governança climática (Burke et al, 2016;Hamilton, 2016;Haraway, 2016; Franchini, Viola e Barros-Platiau, 2017) e aqueles que são críticos de tal ideia (Wapner, 2014;Fagan, 2016;Chandler, Cudworth e Hobden, 2017; Bauer e Ellis, 2018).…”

The critical turn of resilience: Mapping thematic communities and modes of critical scholarship

“…Lorraine Elliott (2015), Sherilyn MacGregor (2010), and others have dedicated much of their scholarly work to the intersection of international relations and the environment. More recently, a debate featured in Millennium brought into question the viability of international relations to address the environmental and security crises that are punctuating our contemporary world (Burke et al, 2016; Chandler et al, 2018). With respect to the papers analysed for this community, the realisation of military strategy and war converge with political and environmental uncertainty, raising questions of preparedness in the face of mounting environmental pressures.…”