Decolonial IR, Indo identity, and epistemic marginalisation in International Relations

Recently, a major concern of International Relations (IR) has been the need to ‘decolonise’ the discipline as a remedy for ‘Eurocentrism.’ This article argues that Decolonial IR is at risk of developing and perpetuating notable blind spots and making mistakes similar to those that it rightly berates Eurocentric IR for. First, while pointing at problematic binaries that undergird Eurocentric IR, Decolonial IR fails to escape the use of identity-based binaries of its own when justifying its project. Second, the use of these binaries allows Decolonial IR to decouple its task from the actual historical events of decolonisation, allowing for the marginalisation of communities that are not easily categorised. This decoupling enables exclusion and exposes Decolonial IR to the criticisms that it levels at Eurocentric IR. The article supports this argument through a discussion of Decolonial IR’s rationale, objectives, and strategies that are inflected with binary thinking. It then presents the Indo community as an example of marginalisation that follows from this thinking, highlighting the many contributions that attention to communities like the Indos can bring to the discipline. Finally, the article suggests a four-step approach through which Decolonial IR can improve and avoid the pitfalls that the article observes.