Introduction

This book offers a timely exploration of the still burgeoning field of International Political Theory (IPT). IPT is approached in this volume not merely as a subfield at the margins of the discipline of International Relations (IR) but rather as a key dimension of theorising international relations that challenges disciplinary, theoretical, methodological, and geographical boundaries and inseminates other theoretical IR traditions. Chapters in this volume approach IPT as a theoretical tradition that emphasises and interrogates the philosophical, historical, ethical, normative, institutional, and aesthetic dimensions of international relations and world politics. In so doing, they explore IPT as a European theoretical tradition to stress that, paradoxically, it is only by provincializing Europe and its intellectual traditions that one may finally appreciate what is truly universal in them. This is a refreshingly different take on IPT sure to be of interest to students and scholars of IPT, IR and political theory.