Décript in dialogue : "Whose Peace? Warmongers, peace fictions, and the narratives of imperial order"
When: 22.10.2026 20:00
Where: 48.850289, 2.326965
Organizer: Admin
FMSH and the DECRIPT program
continue their cycle of meetings dedicated to the great voices of the
international research. This second session will
Historian Lauren Benton around her work They Called It Peace: Worlds of Imperial Violence, as well as journalist Eleanor Beardsley.
In this book, Lauren Benton shows how European empires
build their power by making violence an instrument
ordinary government, legitimized in the name of peace and order.
Through five centuries of history, from Asia to the Americas, it
traces how this violence has blurred the boundaries between
war and peace, until a state of quasi-permanent conflict
the heart of the contemporary international order.
The meeting will be held in English.
About the book
In They Called It Peace. Worlds of Imperial Violence (Princeton)
University Press, 2024), Lauren Benton traces five centuries of violence
Imperial, from Asia to the Americas. It shows how empires
Europeans have shaped a perpetual war regime, hidden
behind the language of peace and order: raids, massacres,
extermination campaigns were referred to as "small wars"
as humanitarian interventions, rather than
like acts of war.
This master book reveals how this legacy continues to structure
contemporary international order — and how imperial violence
remains at the heart of the world we live in.
; Credits: © Princeton University Press
About the speakers
Lauren Benton studied economics at
Harvard University before obtaining a PhD in 1987
anthropology and history at Johns Hopkins University. Its first
work on workers in the informal economy
a book on poverty workshops in Spain and a study
on the destruction of Afro-Uruguayian neighbourhoods
Montevideo. Since 2001, she has been one of the leading
specialists in global legal history. Author or co-editor of
seven books on European empires, including
working on issues of sovereignty, conquest, slavery and
abolition, war and peace, as well as the history of order
international. Winner of the Toynbee Prize in 2019, which distinguishes contributions
Lauren Benton taught at MIT, at the
New York University (NYU) and Vanderbilt University. She
also chaired the American Society for Legal History. It is
today Barton Chair holder Mr. Biggs and Professor
history and law at Yale University.
Eleanor Beardsley, born in South Carolina, is
holder of a licence in European history and in French,
honorary doctorate in humanities awarded by the university
Furman from Greenville, South Carolina, and a master's degree in
International trade at the University of South Carolina. It is
Paris correspondent for the National Public Radio, where it covers
various aspects of society, politics, the economy,
French culture and gastronomy. Eleanor Beardsley participated in
the coverage by the National Public Radio of events which
Europe over the last decade. The
terrorist attacks on the migration crisis, including
the arrival of Syrian refugees in Hungary, Austria, Germany,
Sweden and France.
About the DECRIPT Program
From the "initiative for a global civilization" put forward by China to the "civilization of civilizations" promoted by Russia, through the appeal of the United States State Department to the "search for civilizational allies in Europe", the reference to the notion of civilization structure of many political discourses and permeates collective imaginations. What representations of the world underlie the civilizational narratives conveyed by an increasing number of international actors? Who articulates them, and what mechanisms govern their production, dissemination or contestation? How do they intertwine with conflict dynamics and reconfigure both the analysis of global issues, the models of their governance and, more broadly, the concept of universal standards?
The DECRIPT (Device for the Study of Civilizational Crises and Recitations through Pluridisciplinarity and Land),
led by Inalco with a consortium of fifteen partners and supported
by France 2030, aims to illuminate these issues by crossing studies
and global studies. Engaging the humanities,
social sciences and data analysis,
original and empirically rooted research. It aims at enlightening
and to disseminate widely its results in order to
contribute to a critical understanding of the interactions between narratives
and contemporary crises.
Tags: imperial, history, peace, lecture
Source: https://www.paris.fr/evenements/presentation-de-l-ouvrage-les-refus-de-la-maternite-117274
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