I have pursued an academic career after serving as a United Nations official in peacekeeping for ten years. I made that decision when I grew increasingly concerned about the effects of international intervention on the lives of the people they are meant to serve. My scholarly work critically reflects on those activities and on international ethics. I firmly believe in the relevance of philosophical and theoretical reflections for practice. My research on international intervention has been inspired by Michel Foucault. My latest book explores the significance of quantum ontological imaginaries for ethical justification of international politics. I adopt a non-dogmatic style of teaching that stimulates reflections on unquestioned assumptions of political action and of international intervention and development in particular. I consider outreach as central to my work as an academic and I am deeply engaged with Haiti. Phone: 540- 231-2750 Address: Department of Political Science (0130) Major Williams Hall, Room 509 Virginia Tech 220 Stanger Street 24061 Blacksburg, VIrginia
This forum invites a reflection on how we may understand ethics in global studies in light of the... more This forum invites a reflection on how we may understand ethics in global studies in light of the growing debate on thinking through quantum for the social sciences and humanities more broadly. Quantum principles such as entanglement and indeterminism challenge the notions of individuality and subjectivity and the validity of universal principles as sufficient guidelines for agency, all notions that constitute the foundations of modern deontological ethics. Science is not a separate sphere of society. Its concepts migrate across “disciplines” and end up constituting languages, accepted methodologies, and worldviews. The contributors to this special issue investigate how the shift from a Newtonian metaphysics to a quantum metaphysics may offer conceptual tools for transforming our understanding of causality, self and otherness, the human and the nonhuman, and how we may consequently live together in the world and act ethically in it.
This article recounts the efforts of a group of subsistence farmers (earning approximately $1.00 ... more This article recounts the efforts of a group of subsistence farmers (earning approximately $1.00 per day in income) in a mountainous rural part of Haiti who, working with a young social entrepreneur from their community, have self-organized to develop more economic opportunities by improving their farming practices communally. We posit that they have done so on the basis of the Haitian value of konbit, a form of social sharing and solidarity, and thus, on a foundation of what Michael Polanyi has termed tacit knowledge of their situational context. We suggest that efforts to secure development be rooted in initiatives aimed at catalyzing residents’ self-mobilization capacities and tacit communal knowledge and values, even if, or when, such an approach requires more time or resources to obtain desired outcomes. We also highlight critical perspectives of the now ubiquitous concept of resilience to explore the possibilities and limitations of agency that emerge from tacit knowledge in the context of continuing neoliberalism and its accompanying structural violence. We conclude that Polanyi’s ideas of freedom and agency provide a much more robust foundation on which to build a conceptualization of development and political–economic change than is offered by today’s prevailing neoliberal ‘resilience’ imaginary.
In my response to the contributors to this forum on Ontological Entanglements I take a few steps ... more In my response to the contributors to this forum on Ontological Entanglements I take a few steps down the crossroads they have explored. I reflect on the critiques they moved, on the generative potential of quantum ontological research they highlighted and sketch possible avenues for future inquiry. First, I clarify the position of Ontological Entanglements vis a vis feminist and queer theories. While my work deeply relies on this literature, its scope is different. Quantum ontological critique explores how science, as a field of truth, shapes political imaginaries, to include gender. It challenges the prevailing Newtonian substantialism of the discipline of International Relation, addresses the broader implications of scientific ontological imaginaries for the political, and proposes an ethos based on non-substantialist ontological and casual stories. Furthermore, I start exploring the generative potential of the conversations trailblazed by the contributors to this forum: the intr...
This article explores the relevance of ontological assumptions for justifications of agency and e... more This article explores the relevance of ontological assumptions for justifications of agency and ethics. It critiques Kantian ethics for being based upon an ontological imaginary that starts from the substantialism of Newtonian physics. Substantialism shapes Western political philosophy’s view about who we are as subjects and how the world works. In this ontological imaginary, validation of ethics is based upon universality and abstractions. Furthermore, Kantian ethics underscores an anthropocentric and theocratic vision of how to govern societies. I argue Kantian criteria are not only insufficient to make good choices but are also conducive to wrong ones, since they elicit self-appeasement in international intervention, and contribute to the conceptual repertoire of coloniality. I propose that an ontology of entanglements opens possibilities for overcoming the shortcomings of an ethos based upon abstractions and possibly for correcting some of its moral failures. In a quantum ontolo...
Abstract This article explores a program designed to encourage a structure of local development c... more Abstract This article explores a program designed to encourage a structure of local development committees (LDCs) to galvanize possibilities for residents’ exercise of political agency to engender social learning for shared decision-making for development through higher education in Haiti. It also examines a grassroots effort among a group of rural Haitian farmers to develop a local response to changing agricultural conditions aimed at improving their crop production and yields. We compare and contrast our findings concerning these endeavors with those of a government-sponsored LDC program implemented in Jamaica in recent years. We conclude that one of our Haitian cases, which paradoxically did not involve a formal LDC, stimulated ordinary and transformative learning in support of what Polanyi called a polycentric order among the farmers involved (Mezirow, J., 2000, Learning to think like an adult, in J. Mezirow, ed, Learning as transformation: critical perspectives on a theory in progress, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Publishers, pp. 3–33; Polanyi, M., 1965, The Logic of Liberty: Reflections and rejoinders, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Original work published 1951).
Ontological Entanglements, Agency and Ethics in International Relations Exploring the Crossroads, 2019
While the relevance of ontological commitments for epistemology and methodology in International ... more While the relevance of ontological commitments for epistemology and methodology in International Relations have been the subject of growing debate for several years, the implications for ethics and political agency of embracing an ontology of entanglement have remained unexplored. This work focuses on the importance of addressing the ontological and epistemological assumptions of the discipline of International Relations.
There is increased awareness of the limits of abstract principles as ways of adjudicating real life political and ethical choices regarding International Intervention and international development for both practitioners and scholars. The work challenges IR prevailing ontological imaginaries rooted upon Newtonian physics and argues that non-substantialist ontological positions nurture a political ethos that privileges ‘modest’ engagements of practical solidarity and weights political choices with regard to the consequences and distributive effects they may produce in the context where they are made rather than based upon their universal normative aspirations. While the book is firmly rooted in metatheory,The book also highlights the easiness with which political failures are dismissed as unintended consequences and argues that the current crisis in Syria, and genocides in Srebrenica and Rwanda have shown that advocating abstract ethical principles, be they the Responsibility to Protect, impartiality, or following rules can lead to disaster and can foster violent and exclusionary practices. It also exemplifies how an alternative ethos can be practiced through the example of an international NGO in Haiti.
International Studies Review, nternational Studies Review, Volume 19, Issue 3, September 2017, Pages 362–380,, 2017
In this article I address the relevance of ontologies of entanglement for rethinking ethics and a... more In this article I address the relevance of ontologies of entanglement for rethinking ethics and agency in International Relations. I elaborate my argument by addressing the politically conservative effects of substantialist onto-epistemological positions in the discipline. I argue such positions stifle possibilities for political agency and may foster violent and exclusionary practices. I engage with critical realism's reconceptualization of structures and causality and with Alexander Wendt and Karen Barad's work on quantum physics to explore the ethical and political relevance of an ontology of entanglement. In an entangled universe in transformation there are no certitudes and no externalities. As agents, we contribute to set in motion morphogenetic processes that we do not direct. Finally, I revisit William Connolly and Michel Foucault to propose a reconceptualization of ethics as an attitude and a method that embraces responsibility, modesty, cultivation of the self and prudent assessment of the situation at hand and of political agency as an engagement that seizes micropolitical opportunities for change and unsettles certitudes.
Disastri naturali: strategie d'azione internazionale tra gestione del rischio e risp... more Disastri naturali: strategie d'azione internazionale tra gestione del rischio e risposta umanitaria. ...
This forum invites a reflection on how we may understand ethics in global studies in light of the... more This forum invites a reflection on how we may understand ethics in global studies in light of the growing debate on thinking through quantum for the social sciences and humanities more broadly. Quantum principles such as entanglement and indeterminism challenge the notions of individuality and subjectivity and the validity of universal principles as sufficient guidelines for agency, all notions that constitute the foundations of modern deontological ethics. Science is not a separate sphere of society. Its concepts migrate across “disciplines” and end up constituting languages, accepted methodologies, and worldviews. The contributors to this special issue investigate how the shift from a Newtonian metaphysics to a quantum metaphysics may offer conceptual tools for transforming our understanding of causality, self and otherness, the human and the nonhuman, and how we may consequently live together in the world and act ethically in it.
This article recounts the efforts of a group of subsistence farmers (earning approximately $1.00 ... more This article recounts the efforts of a group of subsistence farmers (earning approximately $1.00 per day in income) in a mountainous rural part of Haiti who, working with a young social entrepreneur from their community, have self-organized to develop more economic opportunities by improving their farming practices communally. We posit that they have done so on the basis of the Haitian value of konbit, a form of social sharing and solidarity, and thus, on a foundation of what Michael Polanyi has termed tacit knowledge of their situational context. We suggest that efforts to secure development be rooted in initiatives aimed at catalyzing residents’ self-mobilization capacities and tacit communal knowledge and values, even if, or when, such an approach requires more time or resources to obtain desired outcomes. We also highlight critical perspectives of the now ubiquitous concept of resilience to explore the possibilities and limitations of agency that emerge from tacit knowledge in the context of continuing neoliberalism and its accompanying structural violence. We conclude that Polanyi’s ideas of freedom and agency provide a much more robust foundation on which to build a conceptualization of development and political–economic change than is offered by today’s prevailing neoliberal ‘resilience’ imaginary.
In my response to the contributors to this forum on Ontological Entanglements I take a few steps ... more In my response to the contributors to this forum on Ontological Entanglements I take a few steps down the crossroads they have explored. I reflect on the critiques they moved, on the generative potential of quantum ontological research they highlighted and sketch possible avenues for future inquiry. First, I clarify the position of Ontological Entanglements vis a vis feminist and queer theories. While my work deeply relies on this literature, its scope is different. Quantum ontological critique explores how science, as a field of truth, shapes political imaginaries, to include gender. It challenges the prevailing Newtonian substantialism of the discipline of International Relation, addresses the broader implications of scientific ontological imaginaries for the political, and proposes an ethos based on non-substantialist ontological and casual stories. Furthermore, I start exploring the generative potential of the conversations trailblazed by the contributors to this forum: the intr...
This article explores the relevance of ontological assumptions for justifications of agency and e... more This article explores the relevance of ontological assumptions for justifications of agency and ethics. It critiques Kantian ethics for being based upon an ontological imaginary that starts from the substantialism of Newtonian physics. Substantialism shapes Western political philosophy’s view about who we are as subjects and how the world works. In this ontological imaginary, validation of ethics is based upon universality and abstractions. Furthermore, Kantian ethics underscores an anthropocentric and theocratic vision of how to govern societies. I argue Kantian criteria are not only insufficient to make good choices but are also conducive to wrong ones, since they elicit self-appeasement in international intervention, and contribute to the conceptual repertoire of coloniality. I propose that an ontology of entanglements opens possibilities for overcoming the shortcomings of an ethos based upon abstractions and possibly for correcting some of its moral failures. In a quantum ontolo...
Abstract This article explores a program designed to encourage a structure of local development c... more Abstract This article explores a program designed to encourage a structure of local development committees (LDCs) to galvanize possibilities for residents’ exercise of political agency to engender social learning for shared decision-making for development through higher education in Haiti. It also examines a grassroots effort among a group of rural Haitian farmers to develop a local response to changing agricultural conditions aimed at improving their crop production and yields. We compare and contrast our findings concerning these endeavors with those of a government-sponsored LDC program implemented in Jamaica in recent years. We conclude that one of our Haitian cases, which paradoxically did not involve a formal LDC, stimulated ordinary and transformative learning in support of what Polanyi called a polycentric order among the farmers involved (Mezirow, J., 2000, Learning to think like an adult, in J. Mezirow, ed, Learning as transformation: critical perspectives on a theory in progress, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Publishers, pp. 3–33; Polanyi, M., 1965, The Logic of Liberty: Reflections and rejoinders, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Original work published 1951).
Ontological Entanglements, Agency and Ethics in International Relations Exploring the Crossroads, 2019
While the relevance of ontological commitments for epistemology and methodology in International ... more While the relevance of ontological commitments for epistemology and methodology in International Relations have been the subject of growing debate for several years, the implications for ethics and political agency of embracing an ontology of entanglement have remained unexplored. This work focuses on the importance of addressing the ontological and epistemological assumptions of the discipline of International Relations.
There is increased awareness of the limits of abstract principles as ways of adjudicating real life political and ethical choices regarding International Intervention and international development for both practitioners and scholars. The work challenges IR prevailing ontological imaginaries rooted upon Newtonian physics and argues that non-substantialist ontological positions nurture a political ethos that privileges ‘modest’ engagements of practical solidarity and weights political choices with regard to the consequences and distributive effects they may produce in the context where they are made rather than based upon their universal normative aspirations. While the book is firmly rooted in metatheory,The book also highlights the easiness with which political failures are dismissed as unintended consequences and argues that the current crisis in Syria, and genocides in Srebrenica and Rwanda have shown that advocating abstract ethical principles, be they the Responsibility to Protect, impartiality, or following rules can lead to disaster and can foster violent and exclusionary practices. It also exemplifies how an alternative ethos can be practiced through the example of an international NGO in Haiti.
International Studies Review, nternational Studies Review, Volume 19, Issue 3, September 2017, Pages 362–380,, 2017
In this article I address the relevance of ontologies of entanglement for rethinking ethics and a... more In this article I address the relevance of ontologies of entanglement for rethinking ethics and agency in International Relations. I elaborate my argument by addressing the politically conservative effects of substantialist onto-epistemological positions in the discipline. I argue such positions stifle possibilities for political agency and may foster violent and exclusionary practices. I engage with critical realism's reconceptualization of structures and causality and with Alexander Wendt and Karen Barad's work on quantum physics to explore the ethical and political relevance of an ontology of entanglement. In an entangled universe in transformation there are no certitudes and no externalities. As agents, we contribute to set in motion morphogenetic processes that we do not direct. Finally, I revisit William Connolly and Michel Foucault to propose a reconceptualization of ethics as an attitude and a method that embraces responsibility, modesty, cultivation of the self and prudent assessment of the situation at hand and of political agency as an engagement that seizes micropolitical opportunities for change and unsettles certitudes.
Disastri naturali: strategie d'azione internazionale tra gestione del rischio e risp... more Disastri naturali: strategie d'azione internazionale tra gestione del rischio e risposta umanitaria. ...
Max Stephenson and Laura Zanotti explore the contested, but increasingly relevant, role that nong... more Max Stephenson and Laura Zanotti explore the contested, but increasingly relevant, role that nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) play in resolving conflict and bringing about peace and security in the global arena.
The authors draw on case studies from Haiti, Serbia, and Northern Ireland to highlight the range of ways that NGOs are involved in postconflict reconstruction efforts. In the process, they not only explore the outcomes and effects of various past strategies, but also caution strongly against one-size-fits-all approaches to peacebuilding and offer food for thought about the complexities facing NGOs and international donors as they engage in postconflict situations.
Walls play multiple social, political, economic and cultural roles and are linked to the fundamen... more Walls play multiple social, political, economic and cultural roles and are linked to the fundamental question of how human beings live together. Globalization and urbanization have created high population density, rapid migration, growing poverty, income inequality and frequent discontent and conflict among heterogeneous populations. The writers in this volume explore how walls are changing in this era, when social containers have become porous, proximity has been redefined, circulation has intensified and the state as a way of organizing political life is being questioned. The authors analyze how walls articulate with other social boundaries to address feelings of vulnerability and anxiety and how they embody governmental processes, public and social contestation, fears and notions of identity and alterity. This book’s authors explore walls as the consequence of a changing web of social relationships. Whether walls are physical objects on the landscape or metaphors for difference among specific groups or communities, the writers consider them as heterotopias, powerful sites around which ways of living together are contested and transformed. They also investigate how architectural planning concerning walls may de facto become a means of waging war, as well as how demolishing walls may give way to new ways of imagining security.
While the relevance of ontological commitments for epistemology and methodology in International ... more While the relevance of ontological commitments for epistemology and methodology in International Relations have been the subject of growing debate for several years, the implications for ethics and political agency of embracing an ontology of entanglement have remained unexplored. This work focuses on the importance of addressing the ontological and epistemological assumptions of the discipline of International Relations.
There is increased awareness of the limits of abstract principles as ways of adjudicating real life political and ethical choices regarding International Intervention and international development for both practitioners and scholars. The work challenges IR prevailing ontological imaginaries rooted upon Newtonian physics and argues that non-substantialist ontological positions nurture a political ethos that privileges ‘modest’ engagements of practical solidarity and weights political choices with regard to the consequences and distributive effects they may produce in the context where they are made rather than based upon their universal normative aspirations. While the book is firmly rooted in metatheory, Zanotti also highlights the easiness with which political failures are dismissed as unintended consequences and argues that the current crisis in Syria, and genocides in Srebrenica and Rwanda have shown that advocating abstract ethical principles, be they the Responsibility to Protect, impartiality, or following rules can lead to disaster and can foster violent and exclusionary practices. She also exemplifies how an alternative ethos can be practiced through the example of an international NGO in Haiti.
Highlighting the need for critically re-thinking the way we conceptualize political agency and validate ethics, this work will be of interest to scholars of International Relations theory, ethics and critical security studies.
... View all notes. Foucault explored mechanisms and modalities of rule that supplanted sovereign... more ... View all notes. Foucault explored mechanisms and modalities of rule that supplanted sovereignty and ... in Valerio Marchetti and Antonella Salomoni (eds), Abnormal: Lectures at the Collége de ... states that do not have transparent, codified and comprehensive internal law and/or ...
The January 2010 earthquake in Haiti was a catastrophe not only for the loss of life it caused, b... more The January 2010 earthquake in Haiti was a catastrophe not only for the loss of life it caused, but also because it destroyed the very thin layer of state administrative capacity that was in place in the country. This article argues that the fragility of the Haitian state institutions was exacerbated by international strategies that promoted NGOs as substitutes for the state. These strategies have generated a vicious circle that, while solving immediate logistical problems, ended up weakening Haiti's institutions. However, the article does not call for an overarching condemnation of NGOs. Instead, it explores two cases of community-based NGOs, Partners In Health and Fonkoze, that have contributed to creating durable social capital, generated employment and provided functioning services to the communities where they operated. The article shows that organisations that are financially independent and internationally connected, embrace a needs-based approach to their activities and share a long-term commitment to the communities within which they operate can contribute to bringing about substantial improvement for people living in situations of extreme poverty. It concludes that in the aftermath of a crisis of the dimension of the January earthquake it is crucial to channel support towards organisations that show this type of commitment.
Disastri naturali: strategie d'azione internazionale tra gestione del rischio e risposta uma... more Disastri naturali: strategie d'azione internazionale tra gestione del rischio e risposta umanitaria. ...
Page 1. Implementing the Liberal Peace in Post-conflict Scenarios: The Case of Women in Black-Ser... more Page 1. Implementing the Liberal Peace in Post-conflict Scenarios: The Case of Women in Black-Serbia Max Stephenson Jr Virginia Tech Institute for Policy and Governance Laura Zanotti Department of Political Science, Virginia Tech ...
VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations, 2015
This case study of Rural Haitian University highlights the complexities and consequences that may... more This case study of Rural Haitian University highlights the complexities and consequences that may arise from a combination of unpredictable streams of international funding, financial vulnerability of communities, and the strategies that civic leaders employ to mobilize resources. We argue that the encounter sketched here of local vulnerability following protracted social conflict and a major natural disaster with the international aid machinery has fostered a cycle of dependence/survival strategies in the higher education institution we examine and undermined its ability to achieve its core mission. More generally, we contend that in situations of extreme poverty and heavy international donor influence, “local ownership” may become synonymous with “local survival” unless predicated on the availability of local capacities and site-specific distribution of international resources. We propose one modest initiative to reduce the university’s dependence on international funding through the development of a sustainable tourism enterprise as a way to nurture local ownership and social capital.
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There is increased awareness of the limits of abstract principles as ways of adjudicating real life political and ethical choices regarding International Intervention and international development for both practitioners and scholars. The work challenges IR prevailing ontological imaginaries rooted upon Newtonian physics and argues that non-substantialist ontological positions nurture a political ethos that privileges ‘modest’ engagements of practical solidarity and weights political choices with regard to the consequences and distributive effects they may produce in the context where they are made rather than based upon their universal normative aspirations. While the book is firmly rooted in metatheory,The book also highlights the easiness with which political failures are dismissed as unintended consequences and argues that the current crisis in Syria, and genocides in Srebrenica and Rwanda have shown that advocating abstract ethical principles, be they the Responsibility to Protect, impartiality, or following rules can lead to disaster and can foster violent and exclusionary practices. It also exemplifies how an alternative ethos can be practiced through the example of an international NGO in Haiti.
There is increased awareness of the limits of abstract principles as ways of adjudicating real life political and ethical choices regarding International Intervention and international development for both practitioners and scholars. The work challenges IR prevailing ontological imaginaries rooted upon Newtonian physics and argues that non-substantialist ontological positions nurture a political ethos that privileges ‘modest’ engagements of practical solidarity and weights political choices with regard to the consequences and distributive effects they may produce in the context where they are made rather than based upon their universal normative aspirations. While the book is firmly rooted in metatheory,The book also highlights the easiness with which political failures are dismissed as unintended consequences and argues that the current crisis in Syria, and genocides in Srebrenica and Rwanda have shown that advocating abstract ethical principles, be they the Responsibility to Protect, impartiality, or following rules can lead to disaster and can foster violent and exclusionary practices. It also exemplifies how an alternative ethos can be practiced through the example of an international NGO in Haiti.
The authors draw on case studies from Haiti, Serbia, and Northern Ireland to highlight the range of ways that NGOs are involved in postconflict reconstruction efforts. In the process, they not only explore the outcomes and effects of various past strategies, but also caution strongly against one-size-fits-all approaches to peacebuilding and offer food for thought about the complexities facing NGOs and international donors as they engage in postconflict situations.
There is increased awareness of the limits of abstract principles as ways of adjudicating real life political and ethical choices regarding International Intervention and international development for both practitioners and scholars. The work challenges IR prevailing ontological imaginaries rooted upon Newtonian physics and argues that non-substantialist ontological positions nurture a political ethos that privileges ‘modest’ engagements of practical solidarity and weights political choices with regard to the consequences and distributive effects they may produce in the context where they are made rather than based upon their universal normative aspirations. While the book is firmly rooted in metatheory, Zanotti also highlights the easiness with which political failures are dismissed as unintended consequences and argues that the current crisis in Syria, and genocides in Srebrenica and Rwanda have shown that advocating abstract ethical principles, be they the Responsibility to Protect, impartiality, or following rules can lead to disaster and can foster violent and exclusionary practices. She also exemplifies how an alternative ethos can be practiced through the example of an international NGO in Haiti.
Highlighting the need for critically re-thinking the way we conceptualize political agency and validate ethics, this work will be of interest to scholars of International Relations theory, ethics and critical security studies.