Introduction

We are born with our basic expectations; with them we turn the world into ‘our world’ but must then live for ever in the prison of our world…But [then again], it is we who create our ‘prisons’ and we can also, critically, demolish them.[i]

Our basic expectations vis-à-vis ‘the international’ have turned our phenomenal existence into two seemingly irreconcilable cognitive prisons: ‘one world’ with homogenizing propensities (dominated by the West) and ‘many worlds’ with heterogenizing predispositions (embodied by the non-West). Every so often, these cognitive prisons—oscillating between the extreme homogenizing propensities of the West and heterogenizing predispositions of the non-West—become obstacles in implementing effective global partnerships that are required to tackle the challenges thrown by global crisis-situations, e.g., the spectres of world war, financial crisis, climate change, pandemic, and the like. Of late, several IR scholars have emphasized the need to craft innovative pathways to territorially de-center IR knowledge and rationally reconcile the West–non-West binaries. Against this backdrop, the ‘Global IR research programme’ has emerged as a resourceful framework. As the Global IR research programme seeks to territorially de-center IR knowledge and rationally reconcile the West–non-West binaries, it finds intellectual support from multiple auxiliary theories that derive stimulus from hitherto denigrated knowledge-forms flourishing in different corners of the world: for instance, one can mention Tianxia (all-under-heaven), Dao (the way), and Guanxi (relationality) from China; Advaita (nonduality), Anvikshaki (science of enquiry), and Dharma (right conduct) from India; Mu No Basho (place of nothingness), Basso Ostinato (recurrent underlying motif), and Engi (occurring relationality) from Japan; Gumannyi Sotsializm (humane socialism) from Russia; zikir, tekrar, and tevil (repetition, lack of repetition, interpretation) from Turkey; Margén de Maniobra (search for latitude) and Runa (human and non-human) from Latin America; and Ubuntu (collective personhood) from Africa, among others.

Nonetheless, the conditioned reflexes of many IR researchers and practitioners compel them to receive the emergent knowledge-forms by constrictively correlating their ‘source’ and ‘scope.’ Generally, the knowledge-forms having their source in the West are granted a global scope, whereas the knowledge-forms having their source in the non-West are given a local scope. These conditioned reflexes hinder the progress of the Global IR research programme. Because the state-of-the-art Global IR research programme remains expansively enriched with the knowledge-forms having their source in the non-West, it is usually suspected that these local non-Western knowledge-forms cannot grasp the larger global scenario. Philosophically, the cognitive prisons of ‘one world versus many worlds’ emanate from Kantian dualism that forms the rigid disconnected opposites of phenomena-noumena, science-metaphysics, subject-object, self-other, West–non-West, and so on. Going beyond the standard Kantian dualism, this article intends to substantiate how the Global IR research programme—driven by a cluster of Chinese, Indian, and Japanese cosmovisions—can activate a set of heuristic techniques to reconnect the Kant-inspired disconnected opposites, thereby demolishing the cognitive prisons that separate the one and many worlds. In this context, it is important to bear in mind that the selective focus on Chinese, Indian, and Japanese cosmovisions has been maintained for brevity purposes only. That is to say, the theoretical and praxeological scope of the Global IR research programme is in no way restricted to these cosmovisions; many more hitherto underexplored (non-)Western knowledge-forms can come forward to contribute to the Global IR research programme.

This article is divided into three sections. The first section explains the persisting perplexities related to the Global IR research programme. It offers an overview of how the cognitive prisons of ‘one world versus many worlds’ lead to an ambiguous appraisal of Global IR, which, in turn, points to some unsettled disputes in IR study: namely, (i) homogenous versus heterogenous, (ii) nationalism versus internationalism, and (iii) geographical versus philosophical. The second section locates the Kantian thinking at the source of IR’s familiar cognitive prisons, and then clarifies how the de-Kantian auxiliary theories can overcome these cognitive prisons, thereby vindicating Global IR from its alleged ambiguities and allowing it to transform some of the unsettled disputes in IR study. Finally, the third section sets out to enumerate several heuristic techniques for the prospective progressions of the Global IR research programme.

Global IR Research Programme: The Persisting Perplexities

One of the persisting perplexities facing the Global IR research programme is to rationalize how we concomitantly inhabit the one and many worlds. In conventional IR study, the answer to the question of one-and-many-ness of the world oscillates between two incompatible poles: (i) one world with many theories; and (ii) many worlds with many theories. A few IR scholars argue that we live in the ‘one world’ of globalizing capitalism that revolves around a single hegemonic power.[ii] This one world (historically dominated by the West) can be explained via different theoretical approaches that perform a ‘multi-level’ or ‘multi-regional’ enquiry of world politics.[iii] Customarily, the liberal, realist and constructivist theoretical approaches inform policy debates.[iv] By contrast, other scholars call for an openness to ‘many worlds’ that struggle for ‘a just world peace’ and incorporate the voices of indigenous people often relegated to the realm of myths/beliefs.[v] Though these voices are occasionally heard to prevent strategists from the temptation of hassled closure in policy-framing, they barely constitute real policy-measures.[vi] Still, these voices result in ‘worlding’, i.e., the making of many worlds (also embodied by the non-West).[vii]

Noticeably, the making of one and/or many worlds breeds rival theories. As these rival theories (that intensify the contestations of ‘one world versus many worlds’) aim to develop a multifaceted understanding of world politics, they end up creating the problem of epistemological relativism. Cristina Inoue and Arlene B. Tickner warn:

‘Worlding’ entails not only processes by which… ‘we’ determine who we are in relation to ‘others’…but also, how such sense-making exercises…actually constitute the worlds that we inhabit…While pluralizing the International Relations discipline is highly desirable, a few dilemmas emerge, such as how to avoid falling into spiral of epistemological relativism, how to construct a hybrid space between uniformity and difference…and how perhaps to create a middle path.[viii]

It is the goal to construct this ‘middle path’ or ‘hybrid space’ between uniformity and difference that steered the schemes of Global IR. To begin with, the agenda to ‘bring the non-West in’ became the pivotal point of Global IR.[ix] Nonetheless, the agenda to bring the non-West in—or ‘include the non-Western perspectives’—was shared by some parallel strands of non-Western IR, including post- and de-colonial IR. Edward Said’s notion of ‘contrapuntal reading’ tried to mix the ‘global moment of humanism’ with the ‘postcolonial moment of listening-to-and-hearing the voices of/from alternative loci of enunciation;’[x] in effect, it attempted to achieve an ‘anti-universalizing’ fusion between Western exceptionalism and non-Western exceptionalism.[xi] Also, Walter D. Mignolo’s concept of ‘delinking’ expected the non-Western knowledge-forms to dissociate from two foremost Western-centric macro-narratives: capitalism and communism. As this plan of de-linking backed pluriversality, it propagated ‘plural local exceptionalisms’, not ‘plural global universalisms.’[xii] Far from the intent to demolish the cognitive prisons of ‘one world versus many worlds’, the ‘non-assimilative stance’ of post/de-colonial IR restored them by replicating Kantian dualism: the Western IR separated Western worlds (as subject) from non-Western worlds (as object), whereas the post-/de-colonial IR reversed this knowledge-situation and separated non-Western worlds (as subject) from Western worlds (as object).[xiii]

Marco Vieira  draws inspirations from the ideas of Frantz Fanon and Jacques Lacan to suggest that the attempts to recover non-Western forms of self-identification are an illusory psychological mechanism to stabilise hybrid postcolonial subjectivities, not an actual restoration of non-colonial purified forms of existing in the world.[xiv] He argues that ‘the asymmetrical encounter between the colonised and the coloniser has fundamentally and extensively redefined human subjectivity in a way that largely negates decolonial emancipatory projects. This is the result of the all-encompassing penetration of Western coloniality (in its political, economic and cultural representations) into the spaces of pre-colonial or uncolonised forms of subjectivity.’ According to Kosuke Shimizu, many post-/de-colonialists have already pointed out that the ‘Western worlds’ (as subject) frequently condemned the so-called outdated, barbaric and uncivilized characteristics of the ‘non-Western worlds’ (as object).[xv] Nevertheless, in the eyes of the non-Western worlds, Western modernity was problematic. This was because the non-Western worlds (as subject) wanted to find a way for the reconciliation between Western modernity and their local cultures by problematizing the Western world as ‘other’ (or object). But then, in its attempt to find a way for the reconciliation between Western modernity and their local cultures by problematizing the Western world as ‘other’ (or object), the post-/de-colonial scholarships of the non-Western worlds ended up embracing the same Western Kantian style of dualist knowledge-production that endorsed subject-object separation. That is the reason why Richard Ned Lebow argues that ‘even postcolonialism [and de-colonialism], are Western in origin, reflect Western concerns, Western ways of thinking, and Western-conceived projects.’[xvi]

Though Global IR made efforts to break free from the shackles of Western-conceived projects, it was lamented that Global IR was attempting to ‘reinvent the wheel’ by imitating what was initiated by post-/de-colonial IR. Some scholars suggested that instead of being a loose platform to support the normative concerns of prevailing non-Western perspectives, Global IR must focus on ‘being not only normative but also intellectual.’[xvii] Here, the recommendation of ‘being intellectual’ implied the search for Global IR’s distinctive ‘conceptual cores’[xviii] or ‘ideological-theoretical dimensions.’[xix] Though several offshoots of Global IR succeeded in forming ‘middle-range-theories’, the dominance of American-based scholars vetoed the making of new full-fledged IR theories. John J. Mearsheimer remarked:

The dominance of American-based scholars is reinforced by the fact that they have developed a rich variety of theories that are very useful for comprehending the politics of the international system…This means…there is not a lot of room for new theories or even major twists on existing theories…there are limited opportunities in 2015 for scholars outside the United States – as well inside it – to develop wholly new theories.[xx]

This skeptical attitude toward the prospects of forming new full-fledged IR theories led to the apprehension that Global IR’s ‘project of turning Hoffman’s “American science” into something more sensitive to alternative…approaches [was merely a general cry] …translating this general cry into real theoretical proposals [was] far more difficult.’[xxi] Even when Global IR managed to build concepts from non-Western contexts and wanted to apply them not only locally but also to the larger global canvas, the importance attached to the use of local concepts created the confusion that Global IR demanded ethnocentric national traditions. Audrey Alejandro noted:

By incentivising the internationalisation of IR around the ‘national’ traditions, the ‘Global IR’ literature essentialises and legitimises certain positions as being the national – i.e., ‘the Indian[/Chinese/Japanese]’ – tradition…By doing so, it not only collapses the complexities of the co-construction of identities on the ground, but also subsumes it to the image of ‘Indianness[/Chineseness/Japaneseness]’ that the critical literature projects on to Indian[/Chinese/Japanese] scholars…I argue that Global IR is an ethno IR…Quoting a sentence from Amitav Acharya as an illustration: ‘Alienation occurs when one is asked to view the world through a Waltzian, Gramscian or Foucauldian prism instead of a Gandhian or Fanonian one’…This posture is not only damaging intellectually, it is also flirting dangerously with ethnicism.[xxii]

Alejandro’s annotations suffer from three severe slipups. First of all, they not only presume that any reference to ‘the national’ (e.g., Indianness, Chineseness, Japaneseness etc.) is bound to bear a homogenous tone, but also misconstrue ‘the national’ (with possible baggage of ethnicism) and ‘the international’ as mutually discordant domains. Second, they restrictively correlate the terms Waltzian, Gramscian, Foucauldian, Gandhian, Fanonian etc. with their ‘geographical sources’, not to their ‘philosophical forms.’ And third, they fail to distinguish between ‘non-Western IR’ (including post-/de-colonial IR) and ‘Global IR’, thereby furnishing an inaccurate account of the Global IR undertakings.

Global IR neither imagines ‘the national’ as a homogenous conceptual category nor establishes ‘the national’ and ‘the international’ as mutually discordant domains. Indian IR emphasizes the need to ‘avoid a monolithic conception of IR that emerges from India.’[xxiii] Acknowledging the fundamental ‘solidarity of life’ in the national and international domains, Indian IR argues that the ‘progress in the national [/local] domain demands progress in the [international/] global domain and vice versa.’[xxiv] Announcing the absence of a singular Sinocentrism, Chinese IR confirms that the ‘Chinese ideas enter into IR theory…not as the singular solution, but as one of many options.’[xxv] Making an effort to synchronise the physical, psychological and institutional aspects of worldly existence, Chinese IR introduces the principle of ‘world-ness’ that transcends the norms of (inter-)nationality: the principle of world-ness instructs to analyse the affairs of the world by a ‘world standard’ rather than a ‘national standard.’[xxvi] Furthermore, Japanese IR asserts that “there is no such thing as Japanese IR theory…there is a variety of ways of thinking relations between the self and the other, the West and the East…local and global. They become political only when interpreted in a particular space-time intersection. This is what we call singularity.”[xxvii] Exceeding this understanding of singularity, Japanese IR enquires how IR discourses cause suffering by victimizing peoples for the sake of temporally-spatially fixed ideals of national sovereignty or world order which are nothing more than passing ‘temporal visions’ or ‘subjective snapshots.’[xxviii]

In fact, the call for Global IR underlines the need to avoid ethnocentrism and exceptionalism irrespective of ‘source and form’: as such, the ‘Global’ credentials of any given theoretical frameworks (e.g., Waltzian, Gramscian, Foucauldian, Gandhian, Fanonian, and so on) have to be judiciously assessed on the basis of not only their ‘geographical sources’ (e.g., Western or non-Western) but also their ‘philosophical forms’ (e.g., dualist or monist).[xxix] While varied shades of dualist and monist philosophical forms have their geographical sources in the West and the non-West, the qualifications of Global IR theoretical frameworks rest on their ability to thrash the ‘West-non-West binary’: the impact of colonialism yesterday and globalization today have diluted the pristine origins of the labels ‘Western’ and ‘non-Western’; in the Global IR debate, these labels lose their analytical significance and exist only as terms of convenience.[xxx]

Contrasting a few premature works that engaged with non-Western knowledge-forms and ended up fixating on national schools with an inward-looking character, more recent literature on Global IR adopts an ‘embedded observer approach’ wherein the non-Western scholarships are treated as those ‘situated dialogues’ that seek to creatively open up spaces for critical discussions with counter-hegemonic potential both locally and beyond; surely, this kind of approach appreciates the non-Western agency without reproducing ethnocentrism and exceptionalism.[xxxi] Belying Mearsheimer’s forebodings, several scholars have aroused a range of non-ethnocentric Chinese, Indian, and Japanese cosmovisions to form new full-fledged Global IR theories. Chinese IR borrowed from the Confucian worldview to design the Tianxia theory (‘all-under-heaven’).[xxxii] Though this theory is criticized for having an uncritical attitude toward ethnocentrism, Xiaoting Li explains how the ‘dialogic spirit’ enables this theory to ‘keep exceptionalism at bay’:

Zhao…states candidly that Tianxia is a utopian ideal…that has never really existed in Chinese history…Nevertheless, in Zhao’s…opinion, that a utopia is hard to realize does not detract from its latent significance, which lies in reminding us of the discrepancy between ideal and reality. Zhao…admits that such discrepancies were nothing new in the historical Chinese empire, which failed to live up to the ideal of Tianxia in many quarters…this admission undercuts exceptionalist claims about China’s ability to make this world a better place…if China is no paragon in pursuing the realization of Tianxia, then there is no reason why Tianxia must become a Sinocentric order…Zhao’s more recent understandings of Tianxia…can serve as an intellectual bulwark against exceptionalism…the need for more…productive dialogues is more pronounced than ever among the entire East Asian IR community.[xxxiii]

While the Tianxia principles can serve as an intellectual bulwark against exceptionalism (including the potential danger of nativism associated with ‘national schools’), it is significant to keep in mind that there was much less interest in India in developing an IR school of its own because such a theoretical mission seemed to accentuate the likelihood of self-centrism. Acharya reported that this risk was foreseen by Kanti Bajpai, before anyone took note of India’s rise, when he warned that efforts to develop an IR theory out of India might carry the perils of lapsing into unsuspecting nativism or pursuing some essentialist Indian prophecy.[xxxiv] Yet, the awareness of the potential danger of nativism related to ‘national schools’ did not undervalue the promises of cultural and spiritual knowledge for crafting an Indian IR theory. When Deepshikha Shahi and Gennaro Ascione explored the ancient Indian philosophy of Advaita (‘non-duality’) for formulating a post-Western IR theory, they explicated how the ‘Advaitic philosophical insights surmount the narrow confines of nativism, ethnocentrism and other forms of ideological essentialism’:

The Indian scholars are apprehensive about the supposed nativist outlook [of] a ‘dualist’ form of knowledge wherein Indian IR theory could acquire an ethnocentric overtone: an Indian or Hindu or Asian or Eastern theory of IR in opposition to the non-Indian or non-Hindu or non-Asian or non-Eastern theory of IR. However, the very possibility of looking at knowledge through the prism of ‘Advaitic monism’ eliminates the likelihood of manufacturing a dualist form of knowledge…Unfortunately those who pejoratively shout ‘Nativism!’ have no notion at all of unfallen or monist regenerative nativism…the monist regenerative nativism is Advaita…atmanubhuti [non-dual self-consciousness] in all its forms…Advaita, which makes allowance for a merger between the ‘self’ and the ‘other(s)’ at the level of consciousness, qualifies as a non-nativist…epistemological resource for theorising post-Western IR.[xxxv]

As the Advaita theory appeals to invest in ‘dualism-monism reconciliation’ as an unexplored dialogic strategy to ‘induce a Global spirit in IR,’[xxxvi] Japanese IR theory—enriched with multiple knowledge-forms (including Nishida Kitaro’s philosophy)—advises to ‘reframe’ the idea of dialogue while communicating across boundaries for a Global IR. Notably, Nishida’s focus on abstract theorising makes it difficult to assess if he was sufficiently attentive to those neighbouring countries whose perception of Japan’s leadership role might be different from his own, but he never supported Japan’s imperialist monologue. Refuting an ‘imperialist gaze of IR’, Atsuko Watanabe and Felix Rösch opine:

Aiming to going global…might paradoxically run the risk of reiterating rather than dissolving the imperialist gaze of IR by falling back to a hegemonically imposed monologue…To avoid the risk…the dialogue we want to investigate is a product of “difference”…communicating globally and therefore beyond boundaries does not merely refer to what is generically common and human; rather it considers humanity to be the product of fruitful intercourse between its members…mankind’s division into many cultures…Our interest is therefore “excess”…“different pathways” to understand difference as excess…Better paraphrased as “universal singularity”…Nishida’s emphasis on Kobutsu (das Einzelne)…maintains that the “universal” is not fixed or timeless, but an open-ended project to be built according to the given historical circumstances by all those who share a commitment to the subversion of relations of domination within and beyond IR.[xxxvii]

These non-ethnocentric/non-exceptionalist Chinese, Indian, and Japanese auxiliary theories approve multiple dialogic pathways to boost the research agenda of Global IR—i.e., the agenda to territorially de-center IR knowledge and rationally reconcile the West–non-West binaries. In so doing, they enable the Global IR research programme to transform the ongoing disputes in IR study: i.e., (i) homogenous versus heterogenous, (ii) nationalism versus internationalism, and (iii) geographical versus philosophical. The next section revisits these ongoing disputes and enlightens how the aforementioned Chinese, Indian, and Japanese auxiliary theories of the Global IR research programme are better equipped to transform them.

Global IR Research Programme: The Conceivable Comebacks

When IR study gets involved with divergent Western and non-Western voices in the process of responding to global crisis-situations engulfing the present-day neoliberal world order, it inevitably faces a core unresolved tension: i.e., the tension between the ‘single/homogenous’ and ‘plural/heterogenous’ depictions of political realities. F. V. Kratochwil states:

[Q]uite different from the…argument that we are part of just another episode of the [single/homogenous] relentless historical process leading to ever more inclusive forms of political organization, the spread of universalism [by Western IR] is counteracted by the strong assertion of particularities [pluralities/heterogeneities by non-Western IR] …because the packed imagery of the visionary global culture is either trivial or shallow.[xxxviii]

In Western IR, the imagery of a single/homogenous global culture rides on a logical divide between the domains of ‘national/hierarchical’ and ‘international/anarchical’: one begins by accepting the conceptual dichotomy that the national and international domains are governed by separate organizing principles of hierarchy and anarchy respectively; in due course, the wearing away of nation-state’s territorial trap flattens this hierarchy-anarchy divide, thereby making more room for a global culture. M. N. Barnett and K. Sikkink elaborate:

[IR] was organized around the concept of anarchy [absence of world government]...and state [container of hierarchy], radiating power from the center to the territorial border, where it comes to a dead halt…anarchy narrative shaped a post-Second World War research agenda…Under the shadow of the cold war…when the once-neglected study of international political economy finally got the attention it deserved…a defining theme was…how the rise of global corporations could undermine the state’s autonomy and sovereignty. Beginning in the 1980s, and picking up steam in the 1990s, [there was a] desire to find an exit option from the [nation-state’s] territorial trap (Agnew 1994) ... [After] the end of the cold war...though the label of [IR] has had clear staying power, scholars of [IR] have gone global as they have become more comfortable with operating outside the [nation-state’s] territorial trap.[xxxix]

By operating outside the nation-state’s territorial trap, IR scholars of the West (or global North) perceive a disciplinary move away from the infamous hierarchy-anarchy-divide: when IR relaxes the national/hierarchical and international/anarchical divide, the planet shrinks and the interaction between different parts of the world increases, thereby marking the arrival of a single/homogenous global culture. But IR scholars of the non-West/global South push for a plural/heterogenous global culture and hold another opinion: ‘the nation-state in the global North was an accomplishment, while in the global South it was a project, needing to solidify its territorial base…[Consequently], scholars of the global South developed a range of theories – including dependency, postcolonial, world-systems…for them, hierarchy and not anarchy seemed to be the defining organizing principle of IR; [furthermore, IR] was always global.’

For IR scholars of the non-West/global South, IR was always global not only because the hierarchized positionality of the non-West/global South in the colonial period had worldwide impacts, but also because the rise of the non-West/global South against the decline of the West/global North in the post-2007 financial crisis phase is likely to have worldwide effects. But these ‘worldwide impacts/effects’—understood as ‘the global’ in post-/de-colonial or other non-Western IR theories—feed on the same Kantian ‘time-space-bounded’ human identities as expressed in Western IR theories. Like Western IR theories, these non-Western IR theories adhere to Kantian geographical-centrism, whereby human beings are scientifically placed in the phenomenal world-in-appearance (and prohibited from metaphysically entering into the noumenal world-in-itself). In the phenomenal world-in-appearance, human beings cannot experience an absence of time and space: Kant assumes that human beings always experience in time and space.[xl] So, the geographically-centred time-space-bounded categories of cultures, civilizations, societies, regions, states, etc., become necessary for determining human identities.[xli] So long as human identities are determined via geographically-centred time-space-bounded categories, the technologically meditated realities of ‘the global’ (unfolding in the global North or global South) are best defined as ‘compression of time and space’ or ‘annihilation of space by time.’[xlii] But then, this technologically meditated compression/annihilation is not enough to break free from the territorial trap. One still grapples with the ‘territorial trap of the territorial trap:’[xliii] even if a state’s territory is not taken as a political ideal, the subsequent trap of understanding territory largely as the ‘physical substratum’ of the sovereign nation-state persists. Thus, a kind of re-territorialization occurs, whereby the West and the non-West continue ‘to be seen as [time-space] bounded [categories]…defined by their difference from the other places which lay outside their borders.’[xliv] Not surprisingly, a group of scholars identifies a ‘West-West divide’ when they allocate the ‘Kantian paradise’ to the Europeans and the ‘Hobbesian world’ to the Americans.[xlv] What is more, another group of scholars detects a ‘West–non-West divide’ when they grapple with the problems of a ‘transcultural Kant’: e.g., the problems of reception that lead to a deliberate restructuring of Kant’s philosophy in Asia.[xlvi] Since the Kantian dualist knowledge-situation, along with its polarities of phenomena-noumena, science-metaphysics and subject-object, supplies a hackneyed IR theory/practice that remains anchored in geographically-centred ideas of territorialization, this kind of ‘West-West divide’ and ‘West–non-West divide’ is logically expected in the reception of Kant’s philosophy.

In a nutshell, the geographically-centred ideas of territorialization arising from Kantian dualism continue to control plural homogenous and/or heterogenous human identities; ‘any notion of deterritorialization involves traumatic losses of meaning and very real identity crisis.’[xlvii] Undeniably, Kantian dualism—manifesting itself as rigid polarities between phenomena-noumena, science-metaphysics and subject-object, etc.—exercised a longstanding impact on IR study.[xlviii] Kant chose to cut off the noumenal world (‘moral reasons’) from the phenomenal world (‘causal chains of constant conjunctions’) with an objective to establish peace in a cosmopolitan world order. However, his causal explanations of the phenomenal world were fraught with ‘ethical dilemmas’, which in turn, ended up naturalizing a ‘divisive politics.’ Analysing from a Tianxia perspective, Zhao Tingyang stated:

Kant [planned]…the ideal order of the commonwealth of autonomous sovereign states. [However], such perspectives cannot deal with the challenges of the deep conflicts of self-interest and culture… Before the world becomes a world of shared co-existence… Kant’s ideal could perhaps be put into practice in relatively favourable [homogenous] cultural conditions (like Europe) but is powerless to address adequately the political problems of the entire [heterogenous] world – [e.g.,] civilizational clashes, global financial warfare…The concept of human rights implies all sorts of ‘ethical dilemmas.’ Since every individual’s rights are absolute, then what to do about disputes between different individuals involving the violation of their rights? And what if the human rights of one geographic region and another geographic region were to come into conflict?...Modern politics…is obsessed with drawing all sorts of “borders” …Individual rights are a boundary for individual and sovereignty is a boundary for nation-states…these are part of a basic logic that splits up the world…to protect all these boundary divisions, modern politics is focused in seeking out external enemies…To clearly demarcate oneself from another, one need only to turn the original state of [noumenal] non-opposition into one of [phenomenal] oppositional conflict.[xlix]

For Kant, a scientific enquiry occurs when the ‘subjects’ encounter the geographically-centered phenomenal things that they give to themselves as ‘objects’ of knowledge-production. Surely, the moral-ethical knowledge does not originate from an encounter between the subjects and the geographically-centered phenomenal things, but from a noumenal metaphysical critique (often specified as ‘metaphysics of morals’ by Kant). Though Kant is not dismissive of metaphysics in favour of science, he endorses a discrepancy between the phenomenal and noumenal process of knowledge-production: while the phenomenal zone permits scientific knowledge-production, the noumenal zone allows metaphysical knowledge-production. But this Kantian dualism, which limits the ability of the subjects (i.e., actors or scholars who study actors) to a divisive politics that remains driven by a phenomenal geo-centric temporal-spatial logic, becomes blind not only to diverse forms of behaviour, dynamics and actors in world politics, but also to its own restricted scientific outlooks.[l] Instead, the scientific-metaphysical-project of Advaita discloses that the subjects can surpass the divisible temporal-spatial logic of phenomenal many-ness and act in accordance with the indivisible noumenal oneness: here, the subjects as ‘jivanmukta’ are defined as disinterested observers of the changing phenomenal world who remain unaffected by the fortunes of their personal lives and the vicissitudes of worldly temporal-spatial settings. Deepshikha Shahi clarifies:

The subject (as jivanmukta) acts in the phenomenal world, but does not derive inspirations from the divisible temporal-spatial logic of phenomenal many-ness…it is significant to be mindful of the continuous existence of a vast populace (subjects/actors) across the globe who have been demonstrating the capabilities to transcend the divisible temporal-spatial logic of phenomenal many-ness, and to act in accordance with the monist principle of indivisible noumenal oneness…a few Americans who encountered the charges of sedition…for speaking out against the divisible temporal-spatial logic of the First World War…a few Germans affiliated to the groups like White Rose who…confronted the charges of execution while protesting against the…Nazi Germany and defending the temporally-spatially indivisible conscience of humanity during the Second World War…[the] Indians who lost their lives while…chasing Gandhi’s policy which declared that the freedom from British colonialism could be attained not by the assertion of temporally-spatially divided identities, but by losing them…the Advaita Global IR theory affirms that we…regularly can and occasionally do derive direct inspirations from noumenal oneness.[li]

This ‘noumenal oneness’ finds expression in Nishida Kitaro’s conception of ‘pure experience’, a reality that precedes the subject-object division of the phenomenal world and calls for a political responsibility to recognize the flexible identities of human beings, nations, and regions (including the West and the non-West). Kosuke Shimizu writes:

[Unlike Kant], the concept of experience Nishida developed is not an experience we usually assume in everyday life. Rather it is ‘pure’ that means before any existence… The pure experience does not have meanings… There is no human being prior to an experience, and the subject and the object are before the division in the pure experience…If human beings are constructed every single moment of pure experience, how could one have an identity, which is presumably continuous?...Nishida answered to this question [of human identity] with his idea of mu no basho (place of nothingness)...He argued that the place of nothingness encompasses everything within it but does not exist in a fixed form…The pure experience is given meanings through the interpretation process of which language has importance…pure experience is rather unspeakable…However, we can search for expressions coming close to it. What are they in IR?…Nishida’s philosophy is substantially influenced by Buddhism…In Buddhism…Koan is a…practice of dialogue. It appears in the form of ‘an absurdity, paradox, or non sequitur’…This unconventional style of dialogue disturbs the conventional use of language, and reminds the practitioners the fragility and unfixedness of [the Western or non-Western] identity.[lii]

Evidently, the de-Kantian undercurrents running through these Chinese, Indian and Japanese theories assist in transmuting the disagreements over ‘homogenous versus heterogenous’, ‘nationalism versus internationalism’, and ‘geographical versus philosophical.’ Tianxia theory emphasizes the need to re-envision a world of shared co-existence to resolve the ethical dilemmas of homogenous and/or heterogenous individual, cultural and regional identities. Advaita theory recognizes the temporally-spatially indivisible conscience of humanity that devalues the divisive politics based on the temporal-spatial logic of nationalism and internationalism. Japanese IR theories introduce the idea of mu no basho (place of nothingness) to start a philosophical dialogue that problematizes the geographical fixity of human identities. To overcome the shortfalls of Kantian dualism, these Chinese, Indian and Japanese theories try to reunite the polarities of phenomena-noumena, science-metaphysics, subject-object etc. While these Global IR theories suggest some heuristic techniques to reunite these polarities, they remain capable of continual inter-theoretical-adjudication and join forces for guaranteeing the prospective progressions of the Global IR research programme.

Global IR Research Programme: The Prospective Progressions

Kant played a key role in devising a separation between science and metaphysics. In due course, science (as ‘knowledge’ about observable phenomena) became ‘Western’, and metaphysics (as ‘cosmology/worldview’ about unobservable noumena) became ‘non-Western.’[liii] Besides, the idea of science as an ‘object-centred view’ of phenomena came to regulate the beliefs and interests of different ‘international subjects.’[liv] Marwa Elshakry informs:

The history of science itself started off by asking if science was the specific product of Western civilization…Early scholars argued that it was not, while current historians don’t bother to ask the question… [One must ask] …What did people outside Europe make of the idea of “Western” science? How did their understanding of this change ideas, practices, and disparate categories of knowledge?... the discipline of the history of science itself was very much shaped by the search for a global narrative; but in the process it also invented a notion of Western science that flattened out knowledge communities and traditions and placed them into a single historical teleology. Perhaps by appreciating what was lost in the historicization of the idea of science…we may come to see how to write more genuinely global histories in the future.[lv]

With a resolve to disseminate the ‘global histories of science’, the auxiliary theories of the Global IR research programme take a de-Kantian turn and function in accordance with the following hard-core assumptions: the realm of ‘the international’ is a fusion of phenomena (world-in-appearance with subjective many-ness) and noumena (world-in-itself with objective oneness), and it is humanly possible to reconcile the visible many-ness of the phenomenal world with the invisible oneness of the noumenal world. To protect these hard-core assumptions, the auxiliary theories of the Global IR research programme suggest some heuristic techniques that seek to unveil the monist continuum interlinking the polarities of phenomena-noumena, science-metaphysics, subject-object, etc. Voicing an urge to reconnect these polarities, which, in turn, might bring together the one world (dominated by the West) and many worlds (embodied by the non-West), Amitav Acharya observes:

Scientific knowledge…must be intended to produce worldly knowledge…But one has to be careful here. A good deal of [insights] one might bring into IR…from the non-Western world may indeed be ‘worldly knowledge.’ But…[their] sources could be religion and cultural…They may lie at some vague intersection between science and spirituality or combine the material with the spiritual…Can we bring these insights into IR knowledge if we insist on a [Kantian] conduct of enquiry that demands a strict separation between this- and other-worldliness? ...There are lots of alien [de-Kantian] ways of producing knowledge out there, including the wisdoms of other civilisations…which are wonderfully and creatively ‘unscientific.’[lvi]

In fact, the urge to reconnect the polarities of science and metaphysics (and, by extension, the polarities of phenomena and noumena, subject and object, etc.) is very much reflected in Lakatos’s design of a research programme. Lakatos articulates:

[Any aspirational research] programme consists of methodological rules: some tell us what paths of research to avoid (negative heuristic), and others what paths to pursue (positive heuristic) …One may point out that the negative and positive heuristic gives a rough (implicit) definition of the conceptual framework…the history of science is the history of conceptual frameworks… Even science as a whole can be regarded as a huge research programme…But what I have primarily in mind is not science as a whole…I go much further…in blurring the demarcation between ‘science’ and ‘metaphysics’: I do not even use the term ‘metaphysical’ any more…I only talk about scientific research programmes whose hard core is irrefutable not necessarily because of syntactical but possibly because of methodological reasons which have nothing to do with logical form …‘metaphysics’ is a vital part of the rational reconstruction of science.[lvii][lviii]

Obviously, a Lakatosian research programme remains willing to employ metaphysics for the rational reconstruction of science and systematic development of a conceptual framework that surpasses the established logical form and sets up its own distinctive methodological rules. How do, then, the Chinese, Indian and Japanese auxiliary theories engage with metaphysics for the rational reconstruction of Western science? And how does this rational reconstruction of Western science surpass the Kantian logical form for designing a novel conceptual framework? Also, what are the methodological rules (or heuristic techniques) that these auxiliary theories postulate for protecting their conceptual framework from possible anomalies, thereby ensuring prospective progressions of the Global IR research programme? The inclination to mobilize metaphysics for restructuring the Kantian Western science has recurrently resonated in the writings of Chinese, Indian, and Japanese scholars. Chinese IR has gone beyond Kant by reinvigorating Confucianism as a ‘metaphysical component’ to formulate a Global IR theory.[lix] Indian IR has revived the extra-Kantian ‘metaphysical ethos’ of Advaita to formulate a Global IR theory.[lx] Correspondingly, Japanese IR has examined how the non-Kantian ‘metaphysical notion of historical consciousness’ can serve as a guideline to build a Global IR theory.[lxi]

The conceptual framework arising from these Chinese, Indian and Japanese Global IR theories revisualizes a world which is concurrently ‘one and many’: that is to say, the noumenal unity of a single world lies underneath the phenomenal diversity of plural worlds. Remarkably, the metaphysical reality of noumenal unity preserves the scientific reality of phenomenal diversity. As such, the metaphysical foundation of the conceptual framework of Global IR theories, which asserts the compulsory coexistence of ‘one and many worlds’, is not averse to science; it rather seeks to reconfigure the Kantian logical form of Western science by launching ‘integrated scientific-metaphysical research.’ The Tianxia theory is based on the metaphysics of the ‘way of nature’: it argues that the way of nature (tian/heaven) ‘does not require any confirmation because it is already wholly manifest in the modes of existence of myriad things’; while the metaphysical reality of tian (heaven above) has perfectly harmonious order, the tianxia (heaven below) must scientifically strive for a perfectly harmonious order. Thus, tianxia is a place where the ‘metaphysical and empirical converge.’[lxii] The Advaita theory endorses a strategy of ‘science-metaphysics conflation’: as it ascends from a ‘blurry juncture between science and metaphysics without rendering the phenomenal and noumenal realms and procedures of knowledge-production as mutually incommensurable’, the Advaita theory calls for the need to ‘find commonalities in scientific and metaphysical attitudes that otherwise seem to come from two disciplines at either end of the spectrum, namely Western science or Eastern religion.’[lxiii] The Japanese theories are influenced by Nishida Kitaro, who intends to have a metaphysical perspective that goes beyond both Eastern and Western traditions,[lxiv] and Tosaka, who synthesizes scientific morality and technological spirit.[lxv] As such, these theories maintain that the combination of scientific perception with metaphysical fantasies  makes it possible for socio-political problems to reach ordinary people with diverse values, thereby letting them analyse those problems as their own and make sense of the complex contemporary world affairs.[lxvi]

While Global IR theories propose an integrated scientific-metaphysical research programme to make sense of the complex contemporary world affairs, they may come across some anomalies (or ‘counter-evidence’, to use Lakatos’s terminology). Broadly speaking, these anomalies may appear as varying expressions of any (or all) of the following ‘unjustifiable claims’:

first, there exists a fundamental methodological discontinuity between Western science and non-Western metaphysics that the Global IR theories tend to ignore;

second, the Global IR theories reproduce binaries by emphasizing the dissimilarities between Western metaphysics (dualism) and non-Western metaphysics (monism); and

third, the Global IR theories seem more abstract (metaphysical) and less factual (scientific) and, thus, they exhibit a predisposition toward policy-irrelevance.

Several crisis-situations of world politics may be brought forward to exemplify these types of unjustifiable claims that enforce estrangements between the one and many worlds, or assume knowledge hierarchies between the West and the non-West. D. Andreucci and C. Zografos illustrate how the policy-responses to global climate crisis are routinely based on some of these unjustifiable claims that assume ‘West–non-West knowledge hierarchies’:

[D]ominant actors…mobilize “expert” knowledge that discursively constructs certain [‘other’] territories and populations as in need of improving …Representations of the ‘other’ are plural…however, knowledge production is imbued with…asymmetries of power. Critically unpacking colonial constructions of the other…is not to entail that other cultures [as ‘objects’] are the supine creations of the modern…while the ‘objects’ of such discursive constructions are not blank spaces that await the projection of colonial imageries, imagining such a blank or “uninscribed earth”…is intrinsic to colonial ways of “worlding”…Modern-colonial ways of seeing and mapping the earth and its inhabitants – as reproduced in contemporary development practice by institutions like the World Bank – do not take place independently of the pre-existing cultural and geographical diversity. Yet, they do filter such diversity through dominant – arguably neo-colonial and neo-liberal – systems of [scientific-]knowledge, with their own classification hierarchies…which divide up people and resources depending on their economic (or, at best, conservation) value.[lxvii]

To counter such West–non-West knowledge hierarchies, the Global IR research programme must activate some heuristic techniques. At the outset, the Global IR research programme knows that the mainstream IR scholars express a preference for empirical theories comparable to natural science theories that remain free of moral/metaphysical judgments.[lxviii] Disproving those who claim a methodological continuity between science and metaphysics,[lxix] these mainstream IR scholars emphasize a science-metaphysics methodological discontinuity and question the utility of metaphysics per se by proclaiming that the metaphysicians (unlike scientists) fail to generate consensus due to the absence of external methodological validation: allegedly, there is no external/additional methodological vantage point from which to evaluate the achievements of metaphysics, so the metaphysicians can only rely on a priori judgments to do so.[lxx] While the anomalies related to this alleged science-metaphysics methodological discontinuity may continue to produce puzzlements regarding the relative merits of science and metaphysics, the Global IR research programme must remind how the entire Kant-inspired Western science is itself situated upon the considerations of ‘time’ and ‘space’ as the subject’s a priori intuitions that apply to the knowledge of the phenomenal world only in so far as this world is perceived by the subject as an appearance: glaringly, there is no external methodological validation for the Kantian premise that human beings cannot experience the phenomenal world beyond time and space, and, thus, the geographically-centered time-space-bounded categories of cultures, civilizations, nation-states, etc., must be needed for determining human identities.[lxxi]

In fact, all kinds of science (Western or non-Western) have ‘metaphysical preconditions.’[lxxii] Above and beyond, the ‘science of metaphysics’ is logically prior to the ‘particular sciences’ (Western or non-Western).[lxxiii] Rather than passing value-judgements on the relative merits of science and metaphysics, the scholars working on the Global IR research programme must expose how the science-metaphysics dichotomy has formed false records of rational disparities between the West and the non-West. In this context, one must raise some underexplored questions as proposed by Yiftach Fehige:

Is the science that Christianity in the West has been interacting with over the past 500 years ‘Eastern’ in important respects?... The predominant narrow focus on Western Christendom in the scholarly analysis of the relationship between science and religion may be partly a function of the Eurocentrism…The more work is done on the relationship between science and religion [or metaphysics] at the intersection of East and West, the clearer it becomes that the modern science’s relation to religion and the East is more intrinsic than is commonly portrayed.[lxxiv]

To ensure progressive shifts in the Global IR research programme, an equally fruitful exercise is the mapping of the intersecting trajectories of Western and non-Western metaphysics. Appreciating the value of this exercise for fostering a harmonious West–non-West relationship, Kenneth K. Inada narrates:

The world has indeed become one, but nations and cultures of the world are still at variance with each other…There must be a unifying factor to show the way to harmonious relationship. One of the ways…is to reassess the nature and function of metaphysics… [In Western metaphysics], human minds began to concentrate on the obvious tangible entities which seem to give the impression of durability and stability… [the] attempt to crown human reason/mind over the total nature of human perceptions… accelerated the rise of the sciences… Yet we have begun to see signs of displeasure from the sciences…The reason for this is that the realm of the tangibles alone does not inform all that there is in nature…while Western experience is still essentially based on tangible and rationally deducible nature in perception…the Eastern experience is essentially built on an organic metaphysics [that] is two-faceted: one facet…relates to human endeavours in the realm of the senses, the other in subtle ways refers to the realm beyond human endeavours…the senses and non-sense realms reveal different natures but both are infrastructural and united…There is no dualism involved here, nor is there a monism for that matter. These terms, dualism and monism, are rigid metaphysical absolutes which the Chinese [or] Indians…did not conceive of from the very beginning.[lxxv]

It is this ‘organic metaphysics’ (or ‘naturalistic metaphysics’) that the auxiliary theories of the Global IR research programme invoke to perform a holistic study of worldly realities: ‘logically speaking, tianxia designates the entire world, i.e., both a natural world and a political world’;[lxxvi] Advaita ‘professes that the human beings are primarily natural beings, and secondarily socio-political beings;[lxxvii] and the Japanese theories divulge that the ‘world’ (composed of natural beings) exists as ‘one unified society’; the historicization of natural law [makes sure that] any dividing line [is] never stable but always in flux.’[lxxviii] For sure, these auxiliary theories call for a methodological merger of ‘epistemological monism’ (i.e., metaphysical precondition of noumenal unity) with ‘ontological pluralism’ (i.e., scientific postcondition of phenomenal diversity). This methodological merger implies the presupposition of an ‘always-already connected world.’ The Tianxia theory proclaims that the ‘existence presupposes co-existence.’[lxxix] The Advaita theory argues that ‘the perpetually connected world along with its multiple subjects and objects has no separate existence apart from [the presumed originating point of] brahman, the ‘single hidden connectedness.’[lxxx] And the Japanese theories accept that individual existence is in contradiction with an all-encompassing universal existence, but the ‘transcendental existence’ of selfhood always includes otherhood; thus, ‘to be morally aware is to see the self as the other.’[lxxxi] While these auxiliary theories varyingly arouse non-Western metaphysics (epistemological monism) as a substitute for Western metaphysics (epistemological dualism), they may be accused of reproducing binaries by positioning the Western and non-Western forms of metaphysics as polar opposites. Dismissing such misleading impressions, Deepshikha Shahi simplifies:

The thematic reinforcement of monism in Chinese IR, or Japanese IR, or Indian IR might create possible misleading impressions that the non-Eurocentric parts of the globe are emerging as flag-bearers of monism ‘in opposition to’ the traditional dualism of Eurocentric IR. Nevertheless…Global IR advocates a downright dismissal of such possible misleading impressions. It, rather, calls for a revolutionary reconciliation of dualism with monism in IR theory and practice, thereby confidently putting forward the argument that the ‘dualism-monism debate’ (which anticipates a reallocation of the epistemological hierarchies in IR theorization) is…expressive of the extent to which a reconciliation of ‘Eurocentric dualism’ with a few up-and-coming models of ‘non-Eurocentric monism’ could leverage a ‘Global’ theoretical-practical spirit in IR.[lxxxii]

Even as the Global IR research programme proposes a reconciliation of dualism with monism to leverage a ‘Global’ theoretical-practical spirit in IR, it may be suspected that the abstract meta-theoretical gesture of this research programme is bound to thwart its policy-relevance. While some scholars may argue that only factual (not abstract) theories are policy-relevant, [lxxxiii] other scholars may mention that the vision of separate scientific development might result in the execution of separate policy agencies, programmes and standard evaluation criteria in the West and the non-West.[lxxxiv] Though the Global IR research programme does not shut out the need for contextual sensitivity (or say, historical, socio-cultural, or politico-economic sensitivity) when it seeks to adjoin the local and global pictures of different worlds, it discards the obligation to pursue a predetermined geo-centric ‘unit-of-analysis or level-of-enquiry method’ in the process of policy designing and implementation. The Advaita theory declares that ‘the relations between the constituents of the world cannot be understood by following a rigid unit-of-analysis or level-of-enquiry: individuals and institutions at any political level (local, international or global) bear the same symptom of connectedness.’[lxxxv] Congruently, the Tianxia theory warns that ‘the research policies totally aimed at defeating the enemies [at the local, international or global level] are powerless in resolving international conflicts.’[lxxxvi] And the Japanese theories instruct that a nation must plan its policies in accordance with the thought that it operates as an intermediary between the levels of universal humanity and individuals.[lxxxvii]

Concluding Remarks

The Global IR research programme seeks a methodological merger of epistemological monism with ontological pluralism to adjoin the local and global pictures of different worlds before moving ahead with the process of policy designing and implementation. Yet, the predicaments pertaining to the possible parameters of ‘policy-responsibility’ is a concern-area that needs a sort of inter-theoretical adjudication. Though the auxiliary theories of this research programme unanimously share an anti-authoritarian (or anti-imperialist) policy-thrust, there seems to be an element of haziness regarding the expanse of policy-responsibility that they aspire to fulfill. The Tianxia theory shows an eagerness to undertake the policy-responsibility to pre-empt ‘the failure of the political.’ To do so, it raises an alarm that ‘as long as the world is oppositionally divided and conflicted, all societies will suffer the negative consequences of such exteriority.’[lxxxviii] For the purpose of avoiding the negative consequences of such exteriority, the Advaita theory adopts the policy-responsibility of ‘lokasamgraha’: i.e., the ‘supra-moral activity of the preservation of the natural world order’ by avoiding the regular approach of ‘defining self-identity in terms of non-identity with others.’[lxxxix] While one needs to further sharpen the relatedness of these obscure policy-orientations to the realities of contemporary world politics, the Japanese scholarship draws attention to a firm tension between ‘pluralism in theory’ and ‘universalism in practice’: it counsels that ‘the takeaway for our current age of “Western” decline and “non-Western” rise is that we must resist any utopian temptation emanating from any moral-ethical system to say “we will save the world”…before jumping into the engagement of “us” as non-Westerns to “change the world,” we need to stop at the question of who “we” really are…and…whether the “West” and the “East” are really divided.’[xc] In accordance with Lakatos’s edict that ‘one must treat budding programmes leniently; programmes may take decades before they get off the ground and become empirically progressive’, only time will tell how these auxiliary theories inter-adjudicate and set clear-cut parameters of policy-responsibility for proficiently protecting and progressing the Global IR research programme.[xci]

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[lxxiii] R. G. Collingwood, An Essay on Metaphysics (London, UK: Oxford University Press, 1940).

[lxxiv] Yiftach Fehige, “Introduction,” in Science and Religion: East and West, ed. Yiftach Fehige, (New York City, NY: Routledge, 2016), 1-2.

[lxxv] Kenneth K. Inada, “A Review of Metaphysics: East and West,” Chung-Hwa Buddhist Journal 4, no. 7 (1991): 361-367.

[lxxvi] Tingyang, “The Tianxia Conceptual Story,” 45.

[lxxvii] Shahi, “The Advaitic Theory of International Relations,” 135.

[lxxviii] Watanabe and Rösch, “Introduction: Japan as Potential,” 38.

[lxxix] Tingyang, “The Future of Tianxia Order,” 232.

[lxxx] Shahi, “Reality, Appearance and Unreality of International Politics: An Advaitic Review,” 62.

[lxxxi] Shimizu, The Kyoto School and International Relations.

[lxxxii] Shahi, “The Advaitic Theory of International Relations,” 137.

[lxxxiii] Walt, “International Relations.”

[lxxxiv] Alexandra Hofmänner and Elisio Macamo, “The Science Policy Script, Revised,” Minerva 59 (2021): 331-354.

[lxxxv] Shahi, “Conclusion,” 151.

[lxxxvi] Tingyang, “Introduction,” 12.

[lxxxvii] Shimizu, The Kyoto School and International Relations.

[lxxxviii] Tingyang, “The Tianxia Conceptual Story,” 114.

[lxxxix] Shahi, “Introduction,” 4; Shahi, “The Advaitic Theory of International Relations,” 134.

[xc] Shimizu, “A Non-Western Attempt at Hegemony,” 1-8.

[xci] Lakatos, “Introduction: Science and Pseudoscience,” 6.