Global, Urban, and Environmental Studies (GLUE)

Lecture by PD Dr. Ulrich Franke, University of Bremen (Germany), Visiting Research Scholar in Global Studies

Classical pragmatism is usually referred to as the first contribution to the history of western philosophy and social thought from North America. In the “American science” (Stanley Hoffmann) of IR, however, pragmatism had to come a long way.

Taking on key figures of pragmatist thought, PD Dr. Ulrich Franke from the University of Bremen (Germany), Visiting Research Scholar in The New School’s Global Studies Program this spring term, will talk about classical pragmatism’s vast potential for advancing the study of world politics. Franke will present a framework for analysis that combines Charles Sanders Peirce’s conception of belief as a rule for action, George Herbert Mead’s dialectics of “I” and “me”, as well as John Dewey’s understanding of the public as a structure of collective action with pragmatists’ methodological ideas about the concept of abduction. For the sake of illustration, findings from security studies, German foreign policy, and the study of inter-organizational relations will be presented and connected to an agenda for future research.