The Obstacles of Emancipation in the Analysis of International Relations

A neutral view of science is one of the main features of scientific theory and one of the fundamental claims of the main stream in the theorizing of international relations. On the other hand, the critical theories in international politics, believing that the analytical shortcomings in this field are rooted in narrow-mindedness of the mainstream, have criticized the positivist, rationalist, materialist, and hegemonic attitudes of this current. The main question is whether it is possible to bridge between the critical approaches and the characteristic of scientific neutrality, and in this way to eradicate the barriers to free thought in the dominant approach and its origin. This paper argues that the four factors mentioned have formed the most important major obstacles to free thought and emancipation in the field of international relations theories through the imposition of meta theoretical foundations, Purposefulness in understanding issues, preventing the global distribution of issues and finally the commitment to secularization of science. The last factor however plays a pivotal role. One of the achievements of this paper is that it uses an analytical method to establish a connection between secularist roots in international politics and barriers to free thinking and an unbiased view. An issue from which the critical approach is not immune.