Hence the disciplines of political science and international law often restrict the practice of foreign policy to the main actors of the system and bearers of sovereignty – nation states – which allegedly aim to defend their “national” interests vis-à-vis an “external” environment. In the face of a globalized world characterized by de-territorialisation and shifting boundaries of political authority, however, “foreign policy” has frequently been thought of as an anachronistic and almost old-fashioned political practice with decreasing political relevance.
In contrast to the above, this project conceives “foreign policy” as a distinct political practice which results from the need of “communities” to establish, maintain and foster social relationships with other “communities”. One of the main theoretical premises is that “foreign policy” should not be understood as a mere result of international (systemic) dynamics, but as one of the dynamic factors in the constitution and evolution/transformation of international order. The project starts from the interface between (international) law, history and political science, at which the historical dimensions of foreign policy and international relations are dealt with. It aims at the interdisciplinary analysis of the historical development of foreign policy, its justification narratives (“sovereignty”) and the correspondent notions of international order. The central theme of the analysis will be the modes by which foreign policy actors constitute themselves: that is, by which specific (norming) practices actors manifest themselves in relation to an (international) environment, how these practices affect historically contingent notions of international order and which processes of transformation have taken place in this context.
