Description
Sovereignty in the study of global politics is highly anthropocentric. The entities that are understood to produce power and authority, whether state or non-state, exist solely within the human realm. The question that follows is whether this anthropocentrism is problematic. In this paper, I contend that it is, particularly when considered within the context of anthropogenic climate change. I argue that shifting away from the ideological disposition of human domination over nature that drives anthropogenic climate change requires understanding how the same ideological disposition has shaped the development of hegemonic sovereignty discourses. By critiquing the dualist human/nature ontological framework on which those discourses depend, I support calls for International Relations to adopt a pluri-versal approach to sovereignty, where alternative political imaginaries of power and authority – and particularly those that might be better suited to addressing a warming planet – contest and transgress the constraints of a uni-versal (patriarchal, racist, anthropocentric) sovereignty. This paper is part of a larger thesis on the development of a more-than-human reconfiguration of sovereignty within the context of anthropogenic climate change.
