Planetary Crises and the Difficulty of Being Modern
| Published date | 01 June 2018 |
| Author | Dipesh Chakrabarty |
| DOI | 10.1177/0305829818771277 |
| Date | 01 June 2018 |
| Subject Matter | Keynote |
https://doi.org/10.1177/0305829818771277
Millennium: Journal of
International Studies
2018, Vol. 46(3) 259 –282
© The Author(s) 2018
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DOI: 10.1177/0305829818771277
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Planetary Crises and the
Difficulty of Being Modern
Dipesh Chakrabarty
The University of Chicago, USA
Abstract
This article questions whether the presently dominant ideas about globalisation and global warming
work with very different conceptions of the ‘globe’ that are both connected and yet opposed
to each other. The discussion on globalisation may be seen as an extension of homocentric
narratives of modernity that see humans as separate from the natural world. The global warming
literature, on the other hand, has led to a serious renewal of critical calls to abandon the nature/
culture distinction. This article tracks some of the ethical difficulties of being modern at a time
when collective human aspirations carry planetary implications. In the process, the article brings
into conversation some post-human and post-colonial perspectives on our time.
Keywords
globalisation, global warming, modernity, post-colonialism, post-humanism, Latour
Résumé
Cet essai pose la question de savoir si les idées qui dominent actuellement le débat sur la
mondialisation et le réchauffement climatique seraient fondées sur deux notions de « planète » très
différentes, à la fois liées et opposées. Les discussions sur la mondialisation peuvent être perçues
comme une émanation des discours homocentriques sur la modernité qui conçoivent les êtres
humains comme séparés du reste du monde naturel. La littérature sur le réchauffement climatique a
au contraire conduit à réaffirmer de sérieux appels à l’abandon de cette distinction entre nature et
culture. Cet essai recouvre certaines des difficultés éthiques qu’il y a à être moderne à un moment
où les aspirations collectives humaines ont un impact sur la planète tout entière. Ce faisant, il
introduit dans le débat des perspectives post-humaines et postcoloniales sur notre époque.
Mots-clés
mondialisation, réchauffement climatique, modernité, postcolonialisme, post-humanisme, Latour
Corresponding author:
Dipesh Chakrabarty, Department of History, The University of Chicago, 1126 E. 59th Street, Chicago, IL
60637, USA.
Email: dchakrab@uchicago.edu
771277MIL0010.1177/0305829818771277Millennium: Journal of International StudiesChakrabarty
research-article2018
Keynote
260 Millennium: Journal of International Studies 46(3)
1. Sanjay Seth makes a useful distinction between ‘international relations’, literally relations
between nations, and the discipline of International Relations. Sanjay Seth, ‘Introduction’, in
Postcolonial Theory and International Relations ed. Sanjay Seth (London: Routledge, 2003),
3. As someone interested in world history, I could speak of international relations only in the
former sense.
2. Anthony Burke, Stefanie Fishel, Audra Mitchell, Simon Dalby, and Daniel J. Levine, ‘Planet
Politics: A Manifesto from the End of IR’, in Millennium: Journal of International Studies
44, no. 3 (2016): 499–523; D. Chandler, E. Cudworth and S. Hobden, ‘Anthropocene,
Capitalocene and Liberal Cosmopolitan IR: A Response to Burke et al.’s “Planet Politics”’,
Millennium: Journal of International Studies 46, no. 2 (2018): 190–208; Cameron Harrington,
‘The Ends of the World: International Relations and the Anthropocene’, Millennium: Journal
of International Studies 44, no. 3 (2016): 478–98; Clara Eroukhmanoff and Matt Harker, eds.,
Reflections on the Posthuman in International Relations: The Anthropocene, Security and
Ecology (Bristol: E-International Relations Publishing, 2017). Available at: http://www.e-
ir.info/2017/09/29/new-book-reflections-on-the-posthuman-in-international-relations. Last
accessed April 21, 2018.
Resumen
Este ensayo contempla la posibilidad de que las ideas dominantes actuales sobre la globalización y
el calentamiento global construyan dos concepciones muy diferentes de «globo», al mismo tiempo
conectadas y, sin embargo, contrapuestas. El debate sobre la globalización puede entenderse
como una extensión de las narrativas homocéntricas de la modernidad que ven a los humanos
como seres independientes del mundo natural. La bibliografía acerca del calentamiento global, en
cambio, vuelve a insistir seriamente sobre la necesidad de abandonar la distinción entre naturaleza
y cultura. El presente trabajo examina algunas de las dificultades éticas que implica ser moderno
en una época en que las aspiraciones humanas colectivas conllevan consecuencias planetarias. En
el desarrollo se atiende a perspectivas poshumanistas y poscolonialistas sobre nuestro tiempo.
Palabras clave
globalización, calentamiento global, modernidad, poscolonialismo, poshumanismo, Latour
The Planet and the Globe
I felt both honoured and surprised to be invited to deliver the Keynote address at the 2017
Millennium Conference on International Relations (IR), for it goes without saying that I have
no specialist knowledge about IR, the discipline.1 But as a student of the times we inhabit, I
have often found myself pondering a meta-question that I hope will interest you: Is the ‘globe’
of globalisation the same as the ‘globe’ of global warming? Or does the word ‘globe’ conjure
up here two connected but rather different ways of picturing the planet and the place of
humans in its history? In raising this question, I hope to address issues that have already con-
cerned some of you – I have in mind not only the work of scholars such as Sanjay Seth, Siba
Grovogui, Mustapha Kamal Pasha, John M. Hobson, and others who have commented on IR
literature from postcolonial/global perspectives, but also the debates that have been initiated
by scholars of International Relations in the pages of Millennium: Journal of International
Studies and elsewhere on questions of the non-human and ‘planet politics’.2
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