Cinematic IR,the Sublime,and the Indistinctness of Art

This article begins with some intellectual-historical reflections on the aesthetic turn in IR theory, the concept of the sublime in aesthetics, and the confluence of these two streams in the context of ongoing developments in world politics. With particular reference to the cinematic tributary of the aesthetic turn, it is argued that aesthetic IR's self-presentation as `critical' leads to a dilemma: either works of art are irrelevant to IR, or aesthetic IR fails to make good its claim to offer a specific and original contribution. Aesthetic IR has still not satisfactorily confronted the implications of its move beyond the traditional disciplinary boundaries of IR. The incorporation of the sublime may have the potential to broaden the range of aesthetic IR, but it does not offer a way forward as long as no sustained attempt has been made to address the fundamental problem of how to specify the claims being made by the field.