Discipline of Western Supremacy

Concluding the Deutscher Memorial Prize winning trilogy on 'Modes of Foreign Relations and Political Economy', this is a magisterial historical sociology of International Relations theory.In The Discipline of Western Supremacy Kees van der Pijl argues that, from the late European Middle Ages, Anglophone thinkers articulated an imperial world-view which was adopted by aspirant elites elsewhere. Nation-state formation under the auspices of the English-speaking West has henceforth informed thinking about international affairs. After decolonisation the study of comparative politics continued to develop under those same auspices as part of a comprehensive framework.As the first major sociological analysis of the field of International Relations, this book advances a comprehensive overview of mainstream IR as a set of theories which translate Western supremacy into intellectual hegemony.