The Canonical Conundrum of 2065

• Author: Joseph L. Jones
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00905917221128892
• Published date: 01 February 2023
• Date: 01 February 2023
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/00905917221128892

Political Theory

2023, Vol. 51(1) 126 –133

© The Author(s) 2022

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DOI: 10.1177/00905917221128892

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Article

The Canonical

Conundrum of 2065

Joseph L. Jones1

Abstract

This essay is part of a special issue celebrating 50 years of Political Theory. The

ambition of the editors was to mark this half-century not with a retrospective

but with a confabulation of futures. Contributors were asked: What will

political theory look and sound like in the next century and beyond? What

claims might political theorists or their descendants be making in ten, twenty-

five, fifty, a hundred years’ time? How might they vindicate those claims in

their future contexts? How will the consistent concerns of political theorists

evolve into questions critical for people decades or centuries from now?

What new problems will engage the political theorists (or their rough

equivalents) of the future? What forms might those take? What follows is

one of the many confabulations published in response to these queries.

Today I want to provide my insight as an elder Black political scientist by

describing this moment in political theory as the canonical conundrum. It

may not seem obvious to many of you that the field is in a conundrum

because, like most students, you experience the world as it is and not as it

once was. Today you are saturated with a diverse set of readings covering the

entire globe. There are hundreds of theorists to learn from—Middle Eastern,

Asian, African, American, Latin American, and European. Nevertheless, in

2065, there is no consensus on what constitutes the canon of political theory.

What exists is nothing more than ideological factions based on geography,

race, religion, and gender.

1Department of Political Science, Clark-Atlanta University, Atlanta, USA

Corresponding Author:

Joseph L. Jones, Department of Political Science, Clark-Atlanta University, 175 Harold Drive,

Atlanta, GA 30253, USA.

Email: jjones2@cau.edu

1128892PTXXXX10.1177/00905917221128892Political TheoryJones

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