Theorising praxis and practice(s). Notes on Silviya Lechner’s and Mervyn Frost’s Practice Theory and International Relations

Bibliographic Data

ID21873792
AuthorsGunther Hellmann (0000-0002-4011-7954, Goethe University Frankfurt, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume9
Issue1
Pages158-168
Publication date2020-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueGlobal Constitutionalism (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2045-3817 • E-ISSN: 2045-3825
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s204538171900042x
OpenAlexW3011673368
LanguageEN
References cited21

Silviya Lechner’s and Mervyn Frost’s book Practice Theory and International Relations offers a new approach to theorise international relations in terms of ‘practices’. It is a welcome contribution to an intensifying debate about ‘praxis’, ‘practice’ and ‘practices’ because Lechner and Frost actually engage key authors of praxis, such as Ludwig Wittgenstein, who, in IR, have often only been referenced in passing. While the rediscovery of Wittgenstein as praxis theorist is welcome, the reading of his approach to praxis is irritating because ‘internalism’ and ‘descriptivism’ – two concepts which Lechner and Frost highlight as central in both Wittgenstein’s work and their new practice theory – are interpreted in ways which are difficult to reconcile with Wittgenstein’s late philosophy. This critique offers a different reading of Wittgenstein’s approach to praxis and argues that such an alternative reading opens up an understanding of praxis which, if adopted more widely, would also free IR theorising from self-imposed strictures

Epistemology · Linguistics · Praxis · Sociology · Marxism and Critical Theory · Philosophy · Pragmatism in Philosophy and Education · Wittgensteinian philosophy and applications

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