Speaker
Prof.
Lisa Guenther
(Queen's University, Canada)
Description
Peruvian scholar Aníbal Quijano coined the term coloniality to name the deep imbrication of colonial violence with modernity itself. In this paper, I examine the coloniality of international law, which emerged in the early modern period as a legal framework for managing European colonial exploits. Drawing on Vitoria’s 1539 lecture, De Indis, and Merleau-Ponty’s 1959-60 lecture notes on the philosophy of history, I reflect on the conditions under which the philosophical tradition and political history of international law may be reclaimed, reactivated, and reoriented for decolonial philosophy and politics.