Political Science Workshop: The Grand Split? How The World is Dividing
Panel Two: A Different World Order – new challenges for International Relations
Aaron Ettinger
The Pedagogy of Global Disorder or “There’s No Textbook for This”
If we are in the midst of a Grand Split, then it is the responsibility of IR researchers to explain that inflection point. The same applies to IR teachers but with different challenges and imperatives. This paper/presentation will address the “taught discipline” of IR and how IR scholars can adapt their pedagogical agendas to meet the moment. This includes (a) recontextualizing the place of the IR/political science canon; (b) confronting the challenge of balancing empirical depth with a vastly expanding empirical scope in our teaching; and (c) diversifying pedagogy so that the limits of the professor’s knowledge do not become the outer perimeter of what is possible in the classroom. This discussion draws from my recent article “Global International Relations and Worlding Beyond the West: A Pedagogical Critique” published in International Studies Review (2023).