Hello everyone, and welcome to this new blog, where it is hoped that we can start some form of conversation about #occupyingirtheory.

We’ve had a lot of interesting discussion on the #occupyirtheory/ipe Facebook group over the last week or so, which as of today has 76 members! This will surely grow further in the coming weeks. So it is important now to start a meaningful conversation about what sort of constructive projects this sort of energy can be invested into. In case you haven’t been following the Facebook group postings to date, here is where we are:

• Journal of Critical Globalization Studies: Amin Samman and the JCGS editors have made a generous offer to provide a formal academic venue for several short critical pieces (2-3 pages each) on the #occupywallstreet phenomenon itself, as well as what it means for the study of world politics. They are terming this a “a special scholarly commentary forum”. JCGS is an online journal. The advantage here is that we’ll get to move quickly (it’ll be really cool to have this up and running by ISA). If you are interested in writing a 2-3 page fragment or comment for this commentary forum, would you please send me an email and let me know by, say, November 2? That way you’ll have about 3-4 weeks to write your comment and then we’ll have about 1-2 weeks to have some back and forth on them, edit them, or whatever seems most necessary.
• An open letter: something we could generate some consensus around, and all put our names to. What does it mean to actually #occupyir/ipe? As others have already suggested on the Facebook page, we have a discipline already quite occupied by an ontology that prohibits certain forms of discussion. Maybe we could come up with a statement that serve as a critique of the narrowness of our discipline, but also some sort of commitment to have a broader discussion in some sort of (critical?) solidarity with the movement?
• #OCCUPY-ISA: A couple of you wrote to suggest doing something at the upcoming ISA conference … its too late for something formal at ISA San Diego obviously, but something INFORMAL and OUTSIDE the traditional panel structure would be absolutely achievable. We can ask the organizers if they have some sort of space we can use…. or… we could just #occupy a space. Others have suggested the idea of making this an initiative across multiple conferences – a really fabulous idea.
• Pedagogy: This project recognizes our place as educators. Asli and Anna suggest something on the pedagogy side. Let me just quote from an email from Anna Agathangelou: “… it is crucial for us to reflect but also articulate the ways we teach and the ways this teaching itself becomes a revolutionary movement and may play a crucial role in embodying what I call a ‘truly global’ and ‘truly just’ world.  How do we, in the space and place of the university and colleges, major sites of unequally developed political interventions, resistances, and repressions, understand these movements in a much larger trajectory with and beyond the narrowly punctuated Europe and US?  How do connect more directly our own struggles (i.e., restructuring of the university around  not having access to books and our own writings due to the legal regimes/copyright issues; health access; using all our resources to pay tuition etc etc; having contractual positions with no benefits etc) with how we articulate critical IR and IPE? … While all of us in different ways have been working to debunk violent paradigms such as neoliberalism, islamophobia, sexism, homophobia etc in our research and our classrooms and elsewhere, we see that these movements are disrupting many of these violent relations bit by bit.  So, how do we understand these movements, take seriously our participation in them and how do we place ourselves in support of them?” I have received many strong expressions of support on Anna’s ideas here, so perhaps there is a possibility we could work on this angle? Some have suggested the idea of a textbook, perhaps along the lines of Edkins and Zehfuss. I actually use this textbook in my own classes and find it very effective – I’m thinking this idea could morph into something like a ‘users guide’ or strategy guide for students of IR and IPE, but focused on activism, micro-level interventions, counter-spectacular moments, etc.

So, that’s it for now folks. Obviously go ahead and use this site as you wish. But definitely have a think about that CFP from JCGS, and let me hear back from you on whether you think you’d like to write 2-3 page (or less, or more?) contribution, and the theme you are interested in. Thanks!