When and how did the modern world become an international one? Becoming International by Jens Bartelson challenges the widespread assumption that this system emerged as a result of a transition from empires to states, instead proposing that the international realm is but a continuation of imperial relations by other means. In his talk, Jens Bartelson elaborates on the assumptions underwriting the book and some of the historical and philosophical problems it gives rise to.
Jens Bartelson is Professor of Political Science at Lund University. His fields of interest include international relations and the history of international thought. Jens Bartelson has published extensively on core concepts in international thought and their history. He is the author of Becoming International (Cambridge University Press, 2023), War in International Thought (Cambridge University Press, 2017, winner of the Best Book Award of the ISA Theory Section), Visions of World Community (Cambridge University Press, 2009), The Critique of the State (Cambridge University Press, 2001), A Genealogy of Sovereignty (Cambridge University Press, 1995), as well as of numerous articles in leading journals across the human, legal, and social sciences.