Alexander E Davis Livres

An analysis of the origins of the field of International Relations from a decolonial perspective

Today’s debates about transgender inclusion and public restrooms may seem unmistakably contemporary, but they have a surprisingly long and storied history in the United States—one that concerns more than mere “potty politics.” Alexander K. Davis takes readers behind the scenes of two hundred years’ worth of conflicts over the existence, separation, and equity of gendered public restrooms, documenting at each step how bathrooms have been entangled with bigger cultural matters: the importance of the public good, the reach of institutional inclusion, the nature of gender difference, and, above all, the myriad privileges of social status. Chronicling the debut of nineteenth-century “comfort stations,” twentieth-century mandates requiring equal-but-separate men’s and women’s rooms, and twenty-first-century uproar over laws like North Carolina’s “bathroom bill,” Davis reveals how public restrooms are far from marginal or unimportant social spaces. Instead, they are—and always have been—consequential sites in which ideology, institutions, and inequality collide.

Challenging the conventional narrative of International Relations' origins, this book reveals its ties to the Round Table, a network of late 19th-century imperialists from British societies. Rather than emerging solely from the aftermath of WW1, IR was shaped by efforts to enhance imperial governance and control global affairs. The authors explore how the Round Table’s methodologies influenced the discipline, highlighting the overlooked significance of the Global South and the intersection of imperial racial ideologies with early IR scholarship.

The book explores how Eurocentric assumptions about India influence the foreign policies of Anglosphere states and shape international relations theory. By employing postcolonial and constructivist perspectives, it critiques the underlying biases that persist in the Anglosphere's understanding of India, highlighting the need for a more nuanced approach to international relations that acknowledges these historical and cultural contexts.