Alternatives explores the possibilities of new forms of political practice and identity under increasingly global conditions. Specifically, the editors focus on the changing relationships between local political practices and identities and emerging forms of global economy, culture and polity.

Alternatives was established in 1975 by scholars who were concerned with the more obvious dangers of Cold War but also with the need for less imperious and more sustainable forms of development. In both contexts, it focused on the implications of what was then just coming to be called globalization, and published many prescient analyses that now pass as conventional wisdom. It has long sought to promote a wide range of critical, normative and interdisciplinary approaches to political, social, cultural and ecological developments, and to encourage more creative and imaginative ways of thinking and acting in a rapidly transforming world. It has especially tried to encourage more sophisticated theoretical engagements with processes that seem to be reshaping relations between global and local, or universality and particularity, in ways that challenge prevailing assumptions about political life within and between states. To this end, we encourage submission of articles that engage contemporary political problems in a way that speaks to the circumstances of people living in many different parts of the world while maintaining theoretical rigour, empirical precision and a culturally sensitive imagination.