International Relations as an academic field will reach its 100th year in 2019 and ever since its birth, government officials, academics, and civil societies have contributed to the development of International Relations.[1] The long path of the development of International Relations in the Western World, however, does not necessarily reflect the development of the study and practice of International Relations in Asia. Acharya and Buzan note that the Western theories of International Relations are often unfit to the political condition of countries in Asia which contributes to the marginalization of both scholars and studies of Asian countries.[2] Moreover, historically, Asian countries tend to develop alternative responses in facing the great power politics as shown in the formulation of Dasasila Bandung, an output of the Asia Africa Conference in 1955, which was the stepping-stone toward Non-Aligned Movement that aim to challenge the bipolar system during the Cold War.
In 2018, to celebrate 99 years of International Relations and 63 years of the Spirit of Bandung, it is timely to conduct an academic event that aim to foster discourses about the relevance of Asia in the Global International Relations and Politics. With this objective, Parahyangan Center for International Studies (PACIS) as part of Department of International Relations, Parahyangan Catholic University together with The Asian Political and International Studies Association (APISA) will hold The 2nd Biennial International Conference on International Relations (ICON-IR) and The 12th Annual Congress of APISA on the topic of “Revisiting Bandung: Cultivating Asia’s Insights on Global International Relations and Political Science.”
[1] David M. McCourt, “The Inquiry and the Birth of International Relations 1917-19,” Australian Journal of Politics and History: Volume 63, Number 3, 2017, p. 395.
[2] Amitav Acharya and Barry Buzan, “On the possibility of a non-Western international relations theory,” in Non-Western International Relations Theory: Perspectives on and beyond Asia, ed. Amitav Acharya and
Barry Buzan (New York: Routledge, 2010), 222.