Hermeneutical Ignorance and ‘Strong Objectivity’ in Knowledge Production about the Russo-Ukrainian War

This collective essay adapts the concept of hermeneutical ignorance to make sense of the paradoxical epistemic situation when apparently available knowledge cannot be productively used for timely and contextual expertise. Hermeneutical ignorance refers to a form of knowledge stratification wherein frameworks developed through non-hegemonic experience are discarded by hegemonic knowers who have little motivation to put them into use, even at the cost of distorted epistemic judgements. The essay develops its discussion through the case of knowledge production in the aftermath of the Russo-Ukrainian war and by examining two instances of ignorance and silencing: the marginalization of contextual frameworks and the absence of security sensibility in the literature on International Political Economy. Both instances demonstrate epistemic imposition and disavowal of the experiential and situated character of knowledge production.