Civilizations and World Order: Geopolitics and Cultural Difference (Global Encounters: Studies in Comparative Political Theory)

Civilizations and World Order: Geopolitics and Cultural Difference examines the role of civilizations in the context of the existing and possible world order(s) from a cross-cultural and inter-disciplinary perspective. Contributions seek to clarify the meaning of such complex and contested notions as “civilization,” “order,” and “world order”; they do so by taking into account political, economic, cultural, and philosophical dimensions of social life. The book deals with its main theme from three angles or vectors: first, the geopolitical or power-political context of civilizations; secondly, the different roles of civilizations or cultures against the backdrop of “post-coloniality” and “Orientalism”; and thirdly, the importance of ideological and regional differences as factors supporting or obstructing world order(s). All in all, the different contributions demonstrate the impact of competing civilizational trajectories on the functioning or malfunctioning of contemporary world order.

Chris Brown is Senior Lecturer in the London Centre for Leadership in Learning (LCLL) at IOE, UCL's Faculty of Education and Society, University College London, UK. With a long-standing interest in how evidence can aid the development of policy and practice, Chris has written and presented extensively on the subject and also leads a range of funded projects which seek to help practitioners identify and scale up best practice.

Richard A. Falk is the Albert G. Milbank Professor of International Law and Practice, Emeritus at Princeton University, and was Visiting Distinguished Professor in Global and International Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is a member of the Editorial Boards of The Nation and The Progressive, and Chair of the Board of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. He is a former advisory board member of the World Federalist Institute and the American Movement for World Government. He served a six-year term as United Nations Special Rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian Territories. During 1999–2000, Falk worked on the Independent International Commission on Kosovo. He is the author of over twenty books.

S. Sayyid is a Reader in School of Sociology and Social Policy at the University of Leeds, UK.

S. Sayyid is a reader in rhetoric at the University of Leeds. He is the founding editor of ReOrient: The Journal of Critical Muslim Studies. His publications include Recalling the Caliphate and the volume (co-edited with AbdoolKarim Vakil) Thinking through Islamophobia.

Fred Dallmayr is Packey J. Dee Professor Emeritus in the departments of Philosophy and Political Science at the University of Notre Dame.