Aesthetics and World Politics
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Aesthetics and World Politics Roland Bleiker 9781403_989765_01_previii.tex 22/7/2009 13: 40 Page i Rethinking Peace and Conflict Studies Series Editor: Oliver P. Richmond, Professor, School of International Relations, University of St. Andrews Editorial Board: Roland Bleiker, University of Queensland, Australia; Henry F. Carey, Georgia State University, USA; Costas Constantinou, University of Keele, UK; A.J.R. Groom, University of Kent, UK; Vivienne Jabri, King’s College London, UK; Edward Newman, University of Birmingham, UK; Sorpong Peou, Sophia Univer- sity, Japan; Caroline Kennedy-Pipe, University of Sheffield, UK; Professor Michael Pugh, University of Bradford, UK; Chandra Sriram, University of East London, UK; Ian Taylor, University of St. Andrews, UK; Alison Watson, University of St. Andrews, UK; R.B.J. Walker, University of Victoria, Canada; Andrew Williams, University of St. Andrews, UK. Titles include: Roland Bleiker AESTHETICS AND WORLD POLITICS Morgan Brigg THE NEW POLITICS OF CONFLICT RESOLUTION Responding to Difference Susanne Buckley-Zistel CONFLICT TRANSFORMATION AND SOCIAL CHANGE IN UGANDA Remembering after Violence Jason Franks RETHINKING THE ROOTS OF TERRORISM Vivienne Jabri WAR AND THE TRANSFORMATION OF GLOBAL POLITICS James Ker-Lindsay EU ACCESSION AND UN PEACEMAKING IN CYPRUS Roger MacGinty NO WAR, NO PEACE The Rejuvenation of Stalled Peace Processes and Peace Accords Carol McQueen HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTION AND SAFETY ZONES Iraq, Bosnia and Rwanda Sorpong Peou INTERNATIONAL DEMOCRACY ASSISTANCE FOR PEACEBUILDING Cambodia and Beyond Sergei Prozorov UNDERSTANDING CONFLICT BETWEEN RUSSIA AND THE EU The Limits of Integration 9781403_989765_01_previii.tex 22/7/2009 13: 40 Page ii Oliver P. Richmond THE TRANSFORMATION OF PEACE Bahar Rumelili CONSTRUCTING REGIONAL COMMUNITY AND ORDER IN EUROPE AND SOUTHEAST ASIA Chandra Lekha Sriram PEACE AS GOVERNANCE Power-Sharing, Armed Groups and Contemporary Peace Negotiations Stephan Stetter WORLD SOCIETY AND THE MIDDLE EAST Reconstructions in Regional Politics Rethinking Peace and Conflict Studies Series Standing Order ISBN 978–1–4039–9575–9 (hardback) & 978–1–4039–9576–6 (paperback) You can receive future titles in this series as they are published by placing a standing order. Please contact your bookseller or, in case of difficulty, write to us at the address below with your name and address, the title of the series and one of the ISBNs quoted above. Customer Services Department, Macmillan Distribution Ltd, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS, England 9781403_989765_01_previii.tex 22/7/2009 13: 40 Page iii Aesthetics and World Politics Roland Bleiker Professor of International Relations University of Queensland, Australia 9781403_989765_01_previii.tex 22/7/2009 13: 40 Page iv © Roland Bleiker 2009 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, Saffron House, 6–10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2009 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN 978–1–4039–8976–5 hardback This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. 10987654321 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham and Eastbourne 9781403_989765_01_previii.tex 22/7/2009 13: 40 Page v for e This page intentionally left blank 9781403_989765_01_previii.tex 22/7/2009 13: 40 Page vii Contents Introduction 1 1. The Aesthetic Turn in International Political Theory 18 2. Art after 9/11 48 3. The Sublime Nature of Global Politics 67 4. Poetic World Politics 84 5. Poetry after Auschwitz 97 6. Poetic Resistance to Cold War Politics 112 7. Come See the Blood in the Streets 128 8. Poetics and the Politics of Memory 141 9. The Poetic Search for Identity and Community 152 Conclusion 171 Notes 189 Acknowledgements 226 Bibliography 231 Index 253 This page intentionally left blank 9781403_989765_02_intro.tex 16/7/2009 15: 3 Page 1 Introduction Is it trivial, or perhaps even irresponsible, to explore aesthetic themes at a time when the world is engulfed by war, genocide, terrorism, poverty, climate change and financial turmoil? Why indulge in painting, poetry or music when lives and livelihoods are at stake? Can we really afford to entertain questions of taste while concrete political action is urgently required? This book offers a passionate but systematically sustained defence of an aesthetic engagement with politics. Yes, we should embrace aesthetics as an essential aspect of understanding world politics; yes, questions of taste are central to who we are and what we do; and, yes, we can – and indeed should – indulge in artistic endeavours. During destitute times we might, in fact, need aesthetic inspiration more than ever to find innovative solutions to entrenched conflicts and difficult political challenges. By making the case for aesthetics I write against the grain of much pre- vailing international relations scholarship. Alexander Wendt, one of the discipline’s leading scholars, argues in an equally passionate manner that ‘poetry, literature and other humanistic disciplines are not designed to explain global war or Third World poverty’. This is why he believes that ‘if we want to solve those problems our best hope, slim as it may be, is social science’.1 Wendt is a sophisticated scholar. Quoting him here out of con- text does injustice to the complexity of his work. I do so only because his statement perfectly captures the prevalent wisdom in international relations scholarship: that the business of world politics is too serious to take risks when dealing with its key dilemmas; that only well-proven social scientific inquiries can give us the certitude we need to navigate through the metaphorical – and real – minefields of world politics. The premise of this book rests on the opposite assumption: that hope for a better world will, indeed, remain slim if we put all our efforts into one set of knowledge practices alone, no matter how compelling they may seem. The problems that currently haunt world politics, from terrorism to poverty, are far too serious not to employ the full register of human intelligence to under- stand and deal with them. This is why politics is, as Ekkehart Krippendorff 1 9781403_989765_02_intro.tex 16/7/2009 15: 3 Page 2 2 Aesthetics and World Politics once put it, ‘too important to leave to politicians, or to political scientists for that matter’.2 One of the key challenges ahead consists of legitimising a greater vari- ety of approaches to the study of world politics. Aesthetics is an important and necessary addition to our interpretative repertoire. To pinpoint the exact nature of this contribution is not easy, but it can probably be captured best by terms such as creativity and imagination. Aesthetic sources can offer us alter- native insights into international relations; a type of reflective understanding that emerges not from systematically applying the technical skills of analysis which prevail in the social sciences, but from cultivating a more open-ended level of sensibility about the political. We might then be able to appreciate what we otherwise cannot even see: perspectives and people excluded from prevailing purviews, for instance, or the emotional nature and consequences of political events. Aesthetics, in this sense, is about the ability to step back, reflect and see political conflict and dilemmas in new ways. This is why aesthetics refers not only to practices of art – from painting to music, poetry, photography and film – but also, and above all, to the type of insights and understand- ings they engender. There are, then, good reasons to return to an earlier and much broader Romantic notion of the aesthetic. The Romantics sought to validate the whole register of human perceptions and sensations – not only the practices of reason and logos that triumphed in the wake of the Enlight- enment, but also a range of other, more sensuous and perhaps more tangible, yet equally important forms of insights.3 There is deep scepticism towards an aesthetic engagement with politics, not only from social scientists, but also from many artists. The latter,