Uncertainty and Its Discontents: Worldviews in World Politics

Description

This volume provides the first major study of worldviews in international relations. Worldviews are the unexamined, pre-theoretical foundations of the approaches with which we understand and navigate the world. Advances in twentieth century physics and cosmology and other intellectual developments questioning anthropocentrism have fostered the articulation of alternative worldviews that rival conventional Newtonian humanism and its assumption that the world is constituted by controllable risks. This matters for coming to terms with the uncertainties that are an indelible part of many spheres of life including public health, the environment, finance, security and politics - uncertainties that are concealed by the conventional presumption that the world is governed only by risk. The confluence of risk and uncertainty requires an awareness of alternative worldviews, alerts us to possible intersections between humanist Newtonianism and hyper-humanist Post-Newtonianism, and reminds us of the relevance of science, religion and moral values in world politics.

Peter J. Katzenstein's work addresses issues of political economy, security and culture in world politics. His recent books include Protean Power: Exploring the Uncertain and Unexpected in World Politics (co-edited with the late Lucia Seybert, Cambridge University Press, 2018) and the forthcoming Downfall: The End of the American Order (co-edited with Jonathan Kirshner). He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Science in 1987, the American Philosophical Society in 2009 and the British Academy in 2015. In 2020 he was named the 26th recipient of the Johan Skytte Prize.

'As a most enlightening study on worldviews in world politics, this book explores the post-Newtonian multiverse full of uncertainties, potentialities and possibilities, challenging IR students to open up the Newtonian universe of the discipline where the rational belief in determinacy, control and causality dominates.' Yaqing Qin, Shandong University and China Foreign Affairs University 'Uncertainty and Its Discontents: Worldviews in World Politics is the best book on worldviews since Max Weber's Economy and Society. In it, Katzenstein and collaborators explore the argument that the reason why IR scholars have so much difficulty integrating uncertainty into their scientific theories is their adherence to a mechanistic Newtonian scientific worldview, which natural scientists moved away from during the last century and instead adopted a post-Newtonian quantum/relationist scientific worldview. Although Katzenstein finally settled for a middle ground between both worldviews, and not all his collaborators agree that IR should make a sweeping turn in scientific worldviews, one day, perhaps soon, the book may be recognized as having played a role in starting a shift in how IR scholars do science. It should be read, therefore, not only by sympathizers to Katzenstein's views but particularly by scholars who still live in a mechanistic and predictable world of risk.' Emanuel Adler, University of Toronto