Recognition and Difference in World Political Thought.

The concept of recognition bridges ontological and empirical methods in international studies. Recognition explains how people strive for voice and representation vis-à-vis global institutions while also designating the work of imagination and the basis for human communication. However, models of recognition either as political representation or as the work of imagination both depend upon that which cannot be recognized, represented, and communicated â€" to those phenomena that are different, chaotic, and emergent. The connection of the two forms of recognition through encounters with difference and emergency thus gives new importance to empirical work in which researchers create value for unrecognized phenomena. This paper outlines the relationship between recognition and difference as conceived in the Copernican turn in continental thought from Immanuel Kant's ‘common sense’ through the contemporary notions of difference and diversity. It then applies some fundamental discoveries of the Copernican turn to contemporary journalism, international communication, and theories of a possible world state. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]