Today, global thought is in crisis. Geopolitical tensions are fraught, international governance has failed to meaningfully prevent grave humanitarian and climate-related crisis, reactionary and populist powers are on the ascendance, and ethnic, racist and gender-based violence has only entrenched itself across many geographies. The decoupling between the rhetoric and “representative” actions of States and their publics has never been more polarised. Theory and praxis are astoundingly disconnected as various potential apocalypses loom on the horizon.
Some say the “future is cancelled,” making the historical-form of present-day institutions obsolete. We are oversaturated with data on species extinction, climate tipping points, topsoil erosion, resource exhastion, extreme weather events, political deception and outright falsification, yet this information is rarely converted into practical action at the level of governing power. A generalised crisis of institutions marks, for many, the dissolution of culture for present and succeeding generations. Censorship has become a “new normal” as globalised public forums are owned by monolithic corporate actors wedded to the profit motive. Yet these globalised digital networks and new mediums continue to exert structural influence on the expressions and modalities of thought, shining a spotlight on how we understand and interact with globality and disparate events in space and time. Undeniably, global thought today is increasingly dynamic, active, mobile, experimental, informal, yet simultaneously incarcerated, powerless, dominated, punished.
Where such contradictions may have once excited predictions of an imminent new dialectical moment, a post-dialectical melancholia has interpolated many political cultures on the Left. Climate change, the failures of international governance, spectating and consuming atrocities, the erosion of democracy into ever more authoritarian forms, leads us to ask: what is the condition of global thought today? How can we respond to this historical moment? How does thought respond to its own inefficacy? How does thought survive the encounter with entrenched power? When does thought end, and action begin – and what does this mean for the social field and the possibility of institutions? How can we think with the marginalised, the oppressed, the suffering, the subaltern, from our position in the global north? In our globalised world, where visibility is determined by socially assigned value, questions of solidarity and performative activism arise; what does a liberatory, decolonial thought appear as today? How can thought meaningfully repair, restore, care for and reconstitute the social world?
For our debut issue, we ask for submissions that address this current crisis in global thought.
We seek original articles that explore this topic with an interdisciplinary lens and combining insights from a variety of fields, including but not limited to philosophy, sociology, political theory, anthropology, and history. The questions posed above are meant as an inspirational yet non-exhaustive list of possible approaches to the overarching theme.
Submission Guidelines:
We aim to foster a non-hierarchical and egalitarian publishing environment that brings forward diverse paradigms and interconnects disciplines and geographies. We therefore invite submissions from students and scholars at all stages of their academic journey, as well as from activists, practitioners, and creatives.
Please submit an abstract of 200-400 words, including five keywords, to our email address ([email protected]) by May 15th. We aim to communicate the outcome of our decision by May 29th. More details are available on our website (https://inter-journal.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk/).
If you have any questions or encounter any problems with your submission, do not hesitate to email us.
Once accepted, the final submission must range between 5000-8000 words, as per our journal policy (https://inter-journal.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk/submission-and-reviewer-guidelines/).
Further information will be communicated in the acceptance email.
INTER- (ISSN 2976-7628) is a peer-reviewed journal hosted by Open Journal Systems (OJS) and committed to open access publications. All published articles will be identified with a DOI, making them searchable, citable, and part of the wider academic community.
We look forward to receiving your contributions and to publishing a stimulating and thought-provoking issue.