Collectivist Worldview: Its Challenge to International Relations

Abstract

This chapter unpacks individualist and collectivist worldviews in social science scholarship to show that many scholars in the English-speaking international relations (IR) community look at the world through the prism of individualism, which usually renders unheard the interna- tional experiences and voices of people in the global South. The neglect in IR theories and discourse of experiences and voices of the invisible majority undercuts our ability to gain a comprehensive understand- ing of global life. Key collectivist features of Africa’s IR are critically examined in the chapter and their ontological origins traced. The suggestion is that taking these collectivist features seriously and incor- porating them into the analytical toolkits of IR would better enable scholars to gain a broader and deeper understanding of international affairs.