Jonathan Hui‘s dissertation defence.
Abstract
What constitutes the “practical” nowadays and how is it to be assessed? Can the concept of “cosmotechnics”, how technologies align with broader cosmic goals, be refined by recourse to Chinese traditions? In responding to these questions, I argue for a relational approach that considers technology and practical thinking, or techno-praxis, as a lens for interpreting political affairs. Drawing from philosopher Yuk Hui’s concept of cosmotechnics and the Neo-Confucian ti-yong (essence – function) dyad, a framework is proposed that synthesizes the technological and practical (qi-yong) in a dyad of its own. This dyad centers practices of power as conducted via technologies and institutions, which together are dominant forms of
knowledge and action in contemporary societies. As demonstrations, the qi-yong dyad is deployed within the field of international relations and the study of world orders to see how different senses of practicality (Chinese IR theories and CCP mandates, respectively) make sense of and relate to their instruments of interest (technological use and the CCP as organization). This dissertation helps situate discussions around technology, politics, and strategic behaviour, with the aim of contributing cosmotechnics and cosmopolitics as frameworks for the 21st century. By elevating dyadic thinking and its patterning through the Chinese philosophical tradition, I aim to contribute towards analyzing, practicing, and exploring international studies within turbulent and changing times.
While qi-yong or techno-praxis are the primary dyadic center of this framework, how and in what fashion they relate are the other major theoretical focus of the dissertation. Drawing on Gregory Bateson’s theory of cultural contact, this involves making explicit the patterning of technical activities as an analytical space, and as part of general theorizations of patterning and their significance. Put succinctly, patterns are living abstractions that guide the conduct of technical activities, serving to highlight aspects of the relation of technics and practice. Such patterns can be reciprocally generative, symmetrically competitive, openly complementary, highly distanced, lopsidedly consuming, etc. As such, the patterns of techno-praxis are primarily constituted through technical knowhow and the ways they’re institutionalized and legitimized, with statecentric IR and global governance scholarship being one possibility. This dissertation sets out a framework for studying the patterned relations of technics and practices via readings of Chinese IR theorists and CCP approaches to technology under Deng Xiaoping and Xi Jinping, and attempts to bring Yuk Hui’s cosmotechnics into conversation with IR. Following his contention that the ti-yong dyad of “Western science, Chinese culture” forwarded after the Opium Wars remains dominant, there remains a desperate need for responding to how technics and technologies are integrated with human activities and practices, with practices of power being the focus of this project. In so doing, the hope is to not transcend (or discard) binaries like East/West, mind-body, or techno-praxis, but to shift towards the variety of possible relations and how their changing patterns can be constructively engaged from within.
Supervisor: Dr. Audra Mitchell
Committee: Dr. Christina Han and Dr. Jennifer Liu
Internal/External: Dr. Byron Williston
External: Dr. Astrid Nordin, Kings College London
Chairperson Dr. Tristan Long
There are limited spaces available to attend the defence. Email events@balsillieschool.ca if you would like to attend in person or virtually.
