¹ “The Comparison of Subordinate Systems,” paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, Chicago, Illinois, 1974, p. 5.

² This regional subsystem definition is discussed at greater length in William, R. Thompson. “The Regional Subsystem: A Conceptual Explication and A Propositional Inventory,” International Studies Quarterly, 17 (03 1973), 89–117.Google Scholar

³ See, for example, Bruce, M. Russett, International Regions and tile International System (Chicago, 1967)Google Scholar and “Delineating International Regions,” in David Singer, J., ed., Quantitative International Politics (New York, 1968), pp. 317–352;Google ScholarHayward, Alker and Donald, Puchala. “Trends in Economic Partnership: The North Atlantic Area, 1928–1963,” in Singer, Quantitative International Politics, pp. 287–316;Google ScholarRobert, A. Bernstein and Peter, D. Weldon, “A Structural Approach to the Analysis of International Politions,” Journal of Conflict Resolution, 12 (01 1969), 159–181;Google ScholarSteven, J. Brams, “The Structure of Influence Relationships in the International System,” in James, N. Rosenau, ed., International Politics and Foreign Policy (Rev ed., New York, 1969), pp. 589–599;Google ScholarWilliam, C. Lamb and Bruce, M. Russett, “Politics in the Emerging Regions,” Peace Research Society(International) Papers. 12 (1969), 1–31Google ScholarBruce, M. Russett and William, C. Lamb, “Global Patterns of Diplomatic Exchange, 1963–64,” Journal of Peace Research, 6 (1969) 37–56;Google ScholarJeffrey, Hart, “Structures of Influence and Cooperation-Conflict.” International Interactions, 1 (07 1974), 141–162;Google ScholarMichael, D. Wallace. “Clusters of Nations in the Global System, 1865–1964: Some Preliminary Evidence,” International Studies Quarterly, 19 (03 1975), 67–110;Google ScholarCharles, W. Kegley Jr and Eugene, R. Wittkopf, “Structural Characteristics of International Influence Relationships,” International Studies Quarterly, 20 (01 1976), 261–299;Google ScholarJon, A. Christopherson, “Structural Analysis of Transaction Systems: Vertical Fusion or Network Complexity?” Journal of Conflict Resolution, 20 (12 1976), 637–662.Google Scholar

⁴ For example, see Roderic, H. Davison, “Where Is the Middle East?” in Richard, H. Nolte, ed.,The Modern Middle East (New York, 1963), pp. 13–29, or almost any introductory chapter to a survey of Middle Eastern history, politics, geography, economics, or art.Google Scholar

⁵ The six include Leonard, Binder, “The Middle East as a Subordinate International System,” World Politics, 10 (04 1958), 403–429;Google ScholarMichael, Brecher, “The Middle East Subordinate System and Its Impact on Israel's Foreign Policy,” International Studies Quarterly, 13 (06 1969), 117–139;Google ScholarFrederic, Pearson, “Interaction in an International Political Subsystem: The ‘Middle East’, 1963–1964,” Peace Research Society (International) Papers, 15 (1970), 73–99;Google ScholarLouis, J.Canton and Steven, L. Spiegel, The International Politics of Regions: A Comparative Approach (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1970);Google ScholarYair, Evron, The Middle East: Nations, Superpowers and Wars (New York, 1975);Google Scholar and Michael, C.Hudson, “The Middle East” in James, N. Rosenau, Kenneth, W. Thompson, and Gavin, Boyd, eds., World Politics (New York, 1976), PP. 466–500.Google Scholar

⁶ See as well John Waterbury's subregional delineation on the basis of perceived economic logic in Waterbury and Ragaei, El Mallakh, The Middle East in the Coming Decade: From Wellhead to Well-Being? (New York, 1978), pp. 53–55. Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Jordan, and Kuwait are assigned to the “Fertile Crescent.” A “Nile” subregion consists of Egypt, Sudan, and Libya. Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya make up the “Maghreb.” An “Arabian Peninsula” grouping encompasses Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Yemen, Yemen (PDR), Bahrain, Qatar, the U.A.E., and Oman. Iran is described as attempting to achieve economic and military dominance in the “Northern Tier,” “Fertile Crecent,” and “Arabian Peninsula” subregions.Google Scholar

⁷ “The Middle East as Subordinate International System,” pp. 403–429.

⁸ “The Middle East Subordinate System and Its Impact on Israel's Foreign Policy,” pp. 117–139.

⁹ “Interaction in an International Political Subsystem: the ‘Middle East,’ 1963–64,” pp. 73–99.

¹⁰ Binder, , “The Middle East as a Subordinate International System,” pp. 403–429.Google Scholar

¹¹ Brecher, , “The Middle East Subordinate System and Its Impact on Israel's Foreign Policy,” pp. 117–139,Google Scholar and Evron, , The Middle East: Nations, Superpowers and Wars, 192–207.Google Scholar

¹² The International Politics of Regions: A Comparative Approach, pp. 20–22.Google Scholar

¹³ Pearson, , “Interaction in an International Political Subsystem: The ‘Middle East’, 1963–64,” pp. 73–99. It is customary for regional subsystem analysts to treat nonlocal actors as “intrusive” actors by definition.Google Scholar

¹⁴ “The Middle East,” Pp. 468–479 and 483. Only the second list is included in table I since the relative capability differentiation is not fully comparable to the other regional delineations. It should be noted that Turkey, Iran, Israel and Cyprus are included in Hudson's first list but are excluded from the second list which he describes as the Arab subsystem.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Cantori, and Spiegel, , The International Politics of Regions: A Comparative Approach, p.9.Google Scholar

¹⁶ “Western Europe,” in Rosenau, , Thompson, , and Boyd, , eds., World Politics, pp. 415–443.Google Scholar

¹⁷ “South Asia,” in ibid., pp. 501–527.

¹⁸ I. William Zartman, “Africa,” in ibid., pp. 569–594.

¹⁹ Example of earlier treatments of the visits indicator may be found in George, Modelski, “Communism and the Globalization of Politics,” International Studies Quarterly, 12 (12, 1968), 380–393;Google ScholarBrams, , “The Structure of Influence Relationships in the International System,” pp. 583–599;Google ScholarBarry, Hughes and Thomas, Volgy, “Distance in Foreign Policy Behavior: A Comparative Study of Eastern Europe,” Midwestern Journal of Political Science. 14 (08 1970), 459–492;Google ScholarWilliam, R. Thompson, “The Arab Subsystem and the Feudal Pattern of Interaction Hypothesis: 1965” Journal of Peace Research. 7 (1970) 151–167:Google ScholarCharles, W. Kegley Jnr, and Llewellyn, D. Howell, “The Dimensionality of Regional Integration: Construct Validation in the Southeast Asian Context”, International Organization, 29 (Autumn 1975), 997–1020;Google ScholarKegley, and Wittkopf, , “Structural Characteristics of International Influence Relationships,” pp. 261–299;Google ScholarChristopherson, , “Structural Analysis of Transaction Systems,” pp. 637–662;Google Scholar and William, R.Thompson and George, Modelski, “Global Conflict Intensity and Great Power Summitry Behavior,” Journal of Conflict Resolution, 21 (01 1977), 339–376.Google Scholar

²⁰ Visits involving travel to foreign countries but no actual or publicly acknowledged intergovernmental meeting were excluded from the data set. Similarily, no effort was made to verify rumors of secret meetings.

²¹ “The Comparison of Subordinate Systems,” p. 5.

²² William Zartman, I., “Military Elements in Regional Unrest,” in Hurewitz, J. C., ed., Soviet- American Rivalry in the Middle East (New York, 1969), p. 75.Google Scholar

²³ The argument for regarding visits as an indicator of cooperation is advanced in Kegley and Howell, “The Dimensionality of Regional Integration,” p. 1014. In the Middle East, however, it is not unknown for relatively active visit dyads (e.g., Egypt and Libya or Algeria and Morocco) to engage in military hostilities with each other.

²⁴ The type of analyses conducted in or made available by Pearson, “Interaction in an International Political Subsystem: the ‘Middle East,” 1963–64”; Charles A. McClelland and Anne A. Gilbar, “An Interaction Survey of the Middle East,” in Willard, A. Beling, ed., The Middle East in the 19705: Quest for an American Policy (Albany, N.Y., 1973), pp. 549–168;Google Scholar and Edward, E. Azar and Thomas, J. Sloan, Dimensions of Interaction (Pittsburgh, Pa., 1975), represent possible models. To date, however, these types of studies have tended to restrict the number of countries or years examined. This may be expected to change in the near future.Google Scholar

²⁵ The visits data were collected and prepared for analysis at a rather incremental rate between 1974 and 1978 with the assistane of Patrick Cole, Mary Grace Tavel, David Rapkin, and Mima Nedelcovych.

²⁶ Mansoor's, Political and Diplomatic History of the Arab World (Washington, D.C., 1972–1977) claims dependence upon some seventy-five sources while the Middle East Journal's (Washington, D.C.) chronology section has noted, for various intervals, reliance upon some thirty sources. The main problem is that while the Mansoor source improves (in terms of the number of visits reported) overtime, the Middle East Journal appears to have become increasingly selective about which visits it chooses to report. Of the three, the Arab Report and Record, (London) which acknowledges its sources after each news item, is the best single source for visits.Google Scholar

²⁷ The Political and Diplomatic History of the Arab World and the Arab Report and Record are explicitly biased in favor of reporting Arab events. This means that data on exclusively non-Arab visits must come largely from the Middle East Journal, which, as noted, has declined as a data source over the 1946–1975 period. For similar reasons, it was also decided to avoid any attempt to capture nonstate actor visits (e.g., the United Nations, the Palestinian Liberation Organization).

²⁸ All United Arab Republic visits for the period of time (1958–1961) during which Egypt and Syria were joined as one state are considered to be Egyptian visits.

²⁹ State representatives occasionally meet one another in states other than their own. In such cases, the visitor versus visited distinction is not relevant but such visits are included in the dyadic visit counts as long as they were bilateralin form.

³⁰ Official visitors are usually but not always met by officials of the same rank. Regardless of the rank equivalence of the meeting, visits were scored according to the status of the highest ranking member of a visiting delegation.

³¹ See Brams, “The Structure of Influence Relationships in the International System” and Kegley and Wittkopf, “Structural Characteristics of International Influence Relationships.”

³² This probably means only that bilateral visits are not as useful as subsystemic indicators in the less visit-prone late 1940S as they appear to be in the 1950S through the 1970S.

³³ See Bernstein and Weldon, “A Structural Approach to the Analysis of International Relations,” p. 174.

³⁴ “Regional Arab Politics and the Conflict with Israel,” in Paul, Y. Hammond and Alexander, S. S., eds., Political Dynamics in the Middle East (New York, 1972), p. 61.Google Scholar Suggestive, in this context, are the more general arguments of socio-anthropologists who discuss the relationship between the tightness of networks (as in a regional subsystem) and tendencies toward reaching normative consensus and the aggregate capability to exert informal pressures for obtaining conformance to network norms. See Elizabeth, E. Bott, Family and Social Network (London, 1971),Google Scholar and Mitchell, J. C., “The Concept and Use of Social Networks,” in Mitchell, J. C., ed., Social Networks in Urban Situations (Manchester, 1969), pp. 1–50.Google Scholar

³⁵ Still, this does not preclude concerted efforts on the part of fringe or peripheral actors to expand or enhance their subsystemic status as in the case of Iran. Nor does it preclude increased subsystemic interest in fringe or peripheral actors as in the case of Mauritania and Somalia.

³⁶ Evron, The Middle East: Nations, Superpowers and Wars and Hudson, “The Middle East.”

³⁷ “Mice That Do Not Roar: Some Aspects of International Politics in the World's Peripheries” International Organization. 25 (Spring 1971), 175–208.Google Scholar

³⁸ Visit patterns, of course, represent only one of several ways to make operational boundary and centrality questions. While it is possible to argue that regional subsystems represent primarily political phenomenon, indicators tapping economic and cultural interaction should also be examined for comparative purposes.