Erik Ringmar

Erik Ringmar
Born	(1960-12-10)December 10, 1960 Luleå, Sweden
Citizenship	Swedish
Alma mater	Yale University Uppsala University
Scientific career
Fields	International Relations International History Political Science

Erik Ringmar is a retired professor of political science and international relation.

Background

Ringmar graduated with a PhD from the Department of Political Science, Yale University, in 1993. Between 1995 and 2007 he was senior lecturer in the Department of Government at the London School of Economics, United Kingdom, and between 2007 and 2013 he worked as a professor of political science in China, the last two years as Zhi Yuan Chair Professor of International Relations at Shanghai Jiaotong University, Shanghai, PRC. Between 2013 and 2019 he worked in the department of political science at Lund University, Sweden, and between 2019 and 2024 he was a professor at Ibn Haldun University in Istanbul, Turkey.

Research

Ringmar's writings cover international relations theory, history, and cultural and economic sociology. His first book, Identity, Interest and Action, focused on the concept of recognition and discusses the Swedish intervention in the Thirty Years' War as a matter of the creation of a Swedish identity. The Mechanics of Modernity discussed the origin of modern societies as a consequence of the interaction between institutions that allow reflection, entrepreneurship and the resolution of conflicts, and compares the development of Europe and East Asia. Surviving Capitalism, addresses the pathologies of capitalist development and the need for protection of social relationships and values. His most recent book, Liberal Barbarism, concerns European imperialism in China in the 19th century and the destruction of Yuanmingyuan, the Old Summer Palace of the Chinese emperor. In addition, Ringmar has published articles on metaphor, the problems of historiography, international law, social theory and phenomenology. His coming book, to be published by Cambridge University Press, is a phenomenological study of movement and international politics.

In the summer of 2019 he gave a TEDx talk entitled, "What Is a Non-Western IR Theory?"

Bibliography

• Ringmar, Erik (2019). History of International Relations: A Non-European Perspective (Open Access). Cambridge: Open Book Publishers. doi:10.11647/OBP.0074. ISBN 978-1-78374-022-2.
• Ringmar, Erik (2013). Liberal Barbarism: The European Destruction of the Palace of the Emperor of China. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Ringmar, Erik (2008) [1996]. Identity, Interest and Action: A Cultural Explanation of Sweden's Intervention in the Thirty Years War. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

• Ringmar, Erik (2009) [2005]. The Mechanics of Modernity in Europe and East Asia: Institutional Origins of Social Change and Stagnation. London: Routledge.
• Ringmar, Erik (2005). Surviving Capitalism: How We Learned to Live with the Market and Remained Almost Human. London: Anthem Press.