For almost a decade now, observers have been debating the fate of the Liberal International Order. In her recent book Before the West: The Rise and Fall of Eastern World Orders (Cambridge University Press 2022), Professor Ayşe Zarakol has argued that there were world orders emanating from Asia before the modern era comparable in some ways to our international order. In this public lecture, Professor Zarakol will discuss the implications such a broadening of our historical horizon about order-making should have on our current thinking about the Liberal International Order. By working with history we can have more leverage to think about two particularly pertinent issues of the day: the relationship between order legitimation and forms of contestation, on the one hand, and the relationship between structural pressures such as climate change and order fragmentation, on the other.
Ayse Zarakol is a Professor of International Relations at the University of Cambridge, where she also has an appointment as a Politics Fellow at Emmanuel College. Her research is at the intersection of historical sociology and IR, focusing on East-West relations in the international system, history and future of world order(s), conceptualisations of modernity and sovereignty, rising and declining powers, and Turkish politics in a comparative perspective. Her research has been recognised by a number of funding institutions and professional associations: she has held fellowships funded by the Council on Foreign Affairs (as IAF), CRASSH (University of Cambridge), the Norwegian Nobel Institute and the University of Copenhagen/ERC. She currently sits on the editorial boards of the following journals: International Organization, Review of International Studies, International Theory, International Relations, International Studies Review, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, Global Constitutionalism, Relaciones Internacionales and New Area Studies.