Anthropocene, Posthumanism and a Historical Materialist Critique of the ‘Ecological’ Promise of International Relations Theory

Abstract

This study focuses on a critical analysis of the Anthropocene narratives that are increasingly occupying the center of the discussion in the International Relations (IR) theory and attempts to address the promises and problems of the IR as a social discipline in the age defined as the Anthropocene. The main point of these studies constitutes an effort to overcome the duality between human and nature. Posthumanists reject the Anthropocene studies on the grounds that the meaning attributed to the concept reproduces anthropocentrism and mainstream IR studies. The study argues that the focus of the discussions should be shifted from the problematic of anthropocentrism to the changing relationship between society and nature. Accordingly, it claims that ecological crisis can only be understood as it is considered within the framework of the social structures and historical material relations that constitute these structures. In this respect, the criticism and approach in the study coincides with the historical materialist analysis, directed especially onto the relationship between society and nature in the social sciences.

Keywords

Capitalocene, Ecological Crisis, Anthropocentrism, Society-Nature Duality, Ahistoricism

Citation

Yelda Elcandırlı, "Anthropocene, Posthumanism and a Historical Materialist Critique of the 'Ecological' Promise of International Relations Theory", International Relations, Volume 18, Issue 71, 2021, pp.87-107, DOI: 10.33458/uidergisi.912034

Affiliations

• Yelda ELCANDIRLI, Dr. Lecturer, Osmaniye Korkut Ata University, Department of International Relations