What decolonizing political science means in practice?

Political science curricula have long treated concepts such as "freedom, equality, democracy, and the citizen" as universal markers of progress, often detached from their cultural and historical contexts. Decolonizing the curriculum entails not merely expanding reading lists but critically interrogating the assumptions embedded in canonical theories. Historically, the discipline has been framed through a narrow lineage of Western thinkers – Aristotle, Hobbes, Locke, and Kant – whose works are seldom contextualized within colonial and imperial histories. Shilliam underscores that political science owes much of its conceptual framework to colonial structures, noting, for instance, that Aristotle’s categories of slavery, citizenship, and empire were formulated within societies structured by conquest. Similarly, Kant’s philosophy, when examined in its imperial context, reveals racial biases often ignored in mainstream curricula.

Beyond reframing canonical thinkers, curriculum reform requires the meaningful inclusion of diverse perspectives. Laakso and Hallberg Adu observe that syllabi, especially in the Global North, remain dominated by white Western authors, with African, Asian, and Indigenous voices largely absent. A decolonized syllabus foregrounds scholars such as Sylvia Wynter, Gayatri Spivak, Amílcar Cabral, Thomas Sankara, and Frantz Fanon, situating their insights alongside Western thought to critically examine the exclusions embedded in supposedly universal concepts. For example, modules on universality might juxtapose Kant’s writings on race with Wynter’s critiques of Western epistemology, fostering critical engagement with historical biases.

Decolonization operates on both official and unofficial levels. While formal curriculum changes matter, much transformation occurs through classroom practices, where lecturers challenge Eurocentric assumptions in discussions of democracy, statehood, and governance. This "hidden curriculum" plays a pivotal role in mediating knowledge and exposing the colonial legacies of political concepts.

In practice, activist interventions, such as the Rhodes Must Fall movement, have further inspired institutions to require decolonial teaching statements and include Africana and Indigenous content. Ultimately, decolonizing curricula is not about diluting the discipline but about broadening its intellectual horizons. It creates a pluriversal political science that recognizes diverse voices, historicizes canonical theories, and challenges Eurocentric assumptions, reshaping the “culture” of the discipline while maintaining rigorous scholarship.

Funding and publication patterns are disciplinary priorities in political science mostly driven by the interests of the Global North. This convention raises the issue of the ethnocentricity of research agendas of the discipline. Generalizations based on topics, including democratic consolidation, security studies, and governance, tend to reflect the interests of Western states and donors by sidelining other issues that bring in the Global South, such as postcolonial state-building, informal economies, or indigenous governance practices.

This difference in power reproduces what Connell (2007) refers to as the global knowledge economy, where the South is mainly a source of data but not of theorizing. "Academic extractivism" is a phenomenon that further promotes this imbalance, as Western researchers are followed by research assistants or other collaborators in the Global South who do not share the publication and credit (Pailey, 2020).

The process of decolonizing research agendas demands questioning existing hierarchies through a consideration of priorities and epistemologies of scholars in the Global South. The demands of Acharya to have a Global IR, which is pluralistic, avoids cultural essentialism, and is devoid of the privileging of concepts that have local histories, are helpful in this regard: the discipline can only globalize, and it must globalize through the resisting of any global hegemony. As an example, the contributions of the African continent to the international relations field, including Ubuntu diplomacy or Pan-Africanism, offer the benefit of re-examination of the global order outside the realist or liberal approach. Buen Vivir and Latin American dependency theory are also schools of critical thinking that act as alternatives to neoliberal development. Choudhary et al. (2025) argue that engaging with non-Western traditions such as Samkhya and Yoga helps decolonise political theory by challenging Eurocentric ethics and expanding debates on war and just war theory beyond the conventional canon.

Methodology is also important in the decolonization of political science. Dominant paradigms, particularly quantitative approaches based on positivism, tend to universalize categories without paying attention to local settings. Although quantitative methods have produced some fruitful knowledge, their prevalence has at some point limited the chances of capturing lived experiences, historical specificities, and non-Western epistemologies.

Decolonial scholars emphasize the importance of methodological pluralism, which validates narrative, interpretive, and participatory approaches alongside positivist ones. Linda Tuhiwai Smith’s work (2012) on Decolonizing Methodologies states how research itself has been a tool of colonial domination, extracting knowledge from indigenous communities without recognizing their agency. Decolonizing methodologies entail foregrounding reflexivity, ethics, and reciprocity in research relationships.

For instance, discourse analysis, ethnography, and oral histories allow for capturing voices traditionally marginalized in mainstream political science. Feminist methodologies, particularly those of Black feminist thought, emphasize standpoint epistemology as a means of generating situated knowledge that challenges universalist claims. Similarly, Islamic perspectives on knowledge production foreground relationality and divine justice as epistemic anchors, providing alternative frameworks for inquiry. By pluralizing methodologies, political science can embrace diverse epistemologies and produce richer, more inclusive analyses.

The decolonization of political science cannot be achieved without addressing institutional structures that reproduce epistemic inequalities. Western universities dominate global rankings, attract disproportionate funding, and set publishing standards, often dictating what counts as legitimate scholarship. Journals based in the Global North privilege English-language publications and methodological orientations that align with dominant paradigms, marginalizing voices from non-Western contexts.

Besides, institutional gatekeeping is reflected in hiring patterns, immigration policy, and the inability to access academic networks. The tip of the iceberg is that epistemic privilege of the North reinforces ‘cognitive injustice’ and demands that Global South scholars reckon with unequal power relations to obtain recognition.

To decolonize institutional structures, active attempts must be made to redistribute epistemic power. The increase in knowledge that is available through open access, as well as South-South collaborations and regional journal platforms, provides great opportunities to give voice to the unheard. Of equal importance is democratizing research funds, such that Global South institutions are able to decide research priorities, and not just or only implement funding agencies-driven research. Finally, structural change should work to break the monopoly of Western institutions to determine the criteria of academic excellence.

It is not a question of what we teach but also how we teach in decolonization. Teaching practices are very important in determining how students approach political science, how they navigate epistemological hierarchies in political science, and how they envisage change. The traditional pedagogies tend to mimic subordinate teacher-student relationships, favouring rote work and standardized texts.

Decolonial pedagogy, in contrast, concentrates on dialogue, reflexivity, and critical thinking. [‘Pedagogy of the Oppressed’ by Paulo Freire](https://files.libcom.org/files/Paulo Freire, Myra Bergman Ramos, Donaldo Macedo - Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 30th Anniversary Edition (2000, Bloomsbury Academic).pdf) set the tone in this respect by arguing in favor of an education that enables students to collaborate as those who construct knowledge. In political science, this would involve having the students challenge assumptions, make connections between theory and real lives, as well as critically considering various epistemologies. For instance, case-based learning that draws parallels between established Western theories and indigenous practices can offer comparative insights.

Practices in the classroom, such as collaborative projects, critical dialogues, and work with local communities, allow students to understand political science as a dynamic field of study, not just a set of facts. By doing so, decolonial pedagogy deconstructs the classroom as a zone of epistemic justice, cultivating scholars who are critically aware and situated as people.

Although the endeavor to decolonize political science has received a boost, it is not without challenges. The danger is often cited by critics in the form of cultural relativism, whereby the uptake of plural epistemologies subverts the prospect of agreed normative guidelines. However, others warn that decolonization can turn into a buzzword with symbolic gestures consisting of a diversification of syllabuses while not making serious changes in terms of structure (Bhambra, 2018).

Further, the poor allocation of resources complicates the bid at decolonization. Global South institutions are riddled with infrastructural shortages, which severely restrict their chances to affect the hegemony of Western academia. Of course, there is a dilemma of universality; can political science become a global science and, at the same time, accommodate epistemic plurality? According to the vision of Global IR proposed by Acharya, the universality of Global IR could be based on the dialogues of various traditions without presupposing their homogeneity.

Decolonizing political science is a long-term, multi-faceted process of resisting and countering Eurocentrism of curriculum, research, methodology, institutions, and pedagogy and the dismantling of those structures to allow diverse knowledge and opinions. It is not confined to adding a few non-Western authors; it runs deeper and involves underlying assumptions about what counts as politically relevant and which methods are treated as the default or superior. Some implicit biases are inherent because of the dominance of that method.

Thinkers such as Gandhi, Lorde, Said, and Bhambra focus on the fact that knowledge is practical and political, highlighting the need to criticize the colonial origins of the discipline. Earlier efforts, such as student activism around Rhodes Must Fall or faculty networks, or modified syllabi (like that published by Shilliam), illustrate meaningful pathways. (Laakso & Hallberg Adu, 2023; APSA, 2020). In a similar vein, academic platforms such as the Political Science Conclave organised by Rekha Saxena in New Delhi have created important spaces for engaging with the practical and conceptual intricacies of decolonising the discipline.

Nevertheless, some challenges must be considered. For example, efforts at decolonization can sometimes result in tokenism or be co-opted by nationalist agendas. Moving forward, South-South networks, Indigenous think tanks, and digital mediums can be used to integrate the voices of the marginalized. Decolonizing political science is therefore about plurality and justice, a reconstruction of what we teach, research, and empower, which finally means serving a genuinely global community in a truly 'Global' way.