Stories of priam and job, the slaughter of their families, and twenty theses on the suggestiveness of good for the person of IR

Stephen Chan

pp. 99-126

in: Stephen Chan, Peter Mandaville, Roland Bleiker (eds), The zen of international relations, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2001

Abstract

There is in IR a concern for truth, justice and good. These, however, tend to be argued as abstract principles or, at least, as abstracted ones, removed from any "real" world. IR has become, as many sought, a tributary of a German ideal philosophy. There is not, however, much expressed concern for the true person, the good man or woman. If, however, we imagined a rigorous praxis, so that the person of IR became also a person of truth, of justice and of good, what sort of person would that be? In what way may such a person be imagined? This essay offers suggestive answers to these questions.