This article employs newly declassified documents from the National Archives in Washington and London to re-examine foreign policymaking of the Nixon Administration during the Cienfuegos crisis of 1970. The article seeks to answer two fundamental questions with regard to policy decision-making during the crisis: why did the Administration pursue a public policy of ‘business as usual’ while cloaking the crisis in extreme secrecy, and how was this achieved? Answers to these questions can be found in the unique situation the Administration found itself during the ‘Autumn of Crises’, and in Kissinger’s manipulation of NSC mechanisms and procedures, respectively.

There are two central theses to this article, the first is that a special kind of governance authority is needed for principles of distributive social justice (‘social justice’ from now on) to be applicable to any sphere of human action. The second is that international law does not and cannot represent that kind of governance authority. It is not ‘social justice-apt’, in my terminology. This is due to the limits inherent in the statist character of international law, a character that underlies the point and purpose of international law in the first place. Putting these together, one can conclude that international law cannot be used to govern the global order according to those principles of social justice that liberal theorists typically defend in the domestic context. This shows that if the cosmopolitan project of extending social justice to the global arena does not find an alternative form of governance for the international order (the problem of ‘cosmopolitan coordination’) it ceases to be a viable project.

In spite of its initial rejection of the international system, the USSR became increasingly involved in diplomatic relations with the other—largely capitalist—powers. The intensity of diplomatic activity increased from the Khrushchev years, not only in relation to other states but also to international bodies and conventions. There was a comparable change, in the later wartime years and under Khrushchev, in the proportion of foreign states with which the USSR sustained relations; by the end of the Soviet period, in 1991, there were diplomatic relations with 85 per cent of the members of the international community. This evidence supports the thesis that outcast states will tend to become ‘socialised’ into a more cooperative relationship with their counterparts; it also suggests that the USSR had become a largely ‘normal’ participant in the international system before the end of communist rule.

Near the end of his career, Raymond Aron explained that he had never ceased to ‘think or dream or hope – in the light of the idea of Reason – for a humanized society’, a hope that extended to the conduct of international affairs as well. The purpose of this essay is to examine how Aron’s liberalism manifested itself in his theorising about international relations and in some of his less abstract diplomatic recommendations. In tracing the effects of Aron’s fundamental theoretical commitments on his more concrete policy analyses, we examine how Aron’s liberalism affected his approach to two of the most contentious issues in French foreign policy, namely, the decolonisation of Algeria and the creation of the force de frappe, France’s nuclear weapons programme. We argue that the tensions and contradictions in Aron’s foreign policy prescriptions have their origins in his ambivalence over the source and character of human reason.

In his lively essay on Hans Morgenthau Peter Gellman points out that the school of realism was essentially ‘an association based upon a common repudiation of unfounded hopes for a new world’. But he cautions that ‘beyond this shared purpose, the diversity of theoretical priorities among “Realists” … limits the utility of realism as a word that can either describe or enlighten’. Certainly, on the nature of power, the ends of politics, the role of morality, the national interest, the meaning of theory itself Morgenthau had his own views. On many of these matters Gellman sets us right. We have here, I believe, a fair account of Morgenthau's views and a profound analysis of his theoretical approach.

Surprisingly little systematic research has been completed on evaluating the impact of intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) at a time when participation in their activities has come under close scrutiny. Both theoretical weaknesses and methodological inadequacies plague researchers who are interested in the effects of outcomes on affected parties, be they intergovernmental organizations, governments or, ultimately, individuals. In this paper, we examine the problems confronting this type of research and assess the strategies so far employed to overcome some of these shortcomings. We shall also examine some approaches appropriate to generating hypotheses concerning IGO impact and propose a comprehensive framework suitable for further research.

This article makes theoretical and empirical contributions to the recent literature on the socialisation and punishment of state and non-state actors. First, it argues that the English School can add significantly to our understanding of the socialisation and punishment processes because of the theory's emphasis on great powers as ‘custodians’ of the society of states. Second, it analyses the policies of the United Kingdom, France, and, to a lesser degree, a number of other powers toward the Bolsheviks and the Whites during the Civil War and beyond (1917–1924). The basic argument is that London, Paris, and other capitals acted like ‘guardians’ of the society of states in their attempt to punish and socialise the participants in the Civil War.

The relationship between the United States and Great Britain is a subject of apparently endless fascination. It has given rise to innumerable books, theses, articles, essays and speculations. It is, however, riven with misunderstandings, inconsistencies and stereotypes. For all that the relationship has been written about, investigated, discussed and analysed, the topic is ripe, even yet, for further discussion.

Determinist views are prevalent in human thinking. King Solomon's reflection that ‘What has been is what will be done and what has been done is what will be done and there is nothing new under the sun’ seems as valid today as it was three thousand years, ago. The international arena, overrun by scenes of bloody, wars, acute crises and protracted conflicts is a constant reminder of the truthfulness of this pessimistic view.

It is not surprising that international crises have become a subject of intensive study in the nuclear age. The example of Sarajevo stands as an awesome warning of the repercussions which can flow from an apparently minor incident. The Cuban missile crisis seemed for a time to suggest guidelines by which crises could be successfully 'managed', but the dangers of generalizing from an optimistic reading of that unique case have come to be widely appreciated.

In a recent issue of the Review John Baylis discussed wartime thinking in Great Britain about a post-war European security group. Baylis's contribution is of great importance to the historiography of wartime and post-war British foreign and security policy, filling a void in our knowledge of these crucial years. However, we would like to make some critical comments on his treatment of the Post-Hostilities Planning Staff report ‘Security in Western Europe and the North Atlantic’, which is such a central feature in his contribution. According to Baylis this particular study by the PHPS (an interdepartmental study group created by the British War Cabinet) laid down ‘a reasonably coherent set of attitudes’ regarding post-war European co-operation. The PHPS, collecting together much of the current thinking in both Foreign Office and military circles, advocated the formation of a Western European-Group as a kind of insurance against a rearmed Germany ors if the world organization failed to materialize, against a potentially hostile USSR. The report marked the formation of a ‘consensus’ among Foreign Office and military officials involved in post-war planning.

To scholars researching the connections between international relations and globalisation, such as those in the five books reviewed here, ‘foreign policy’ is becoming functionally and descriptively rivalled in a globalising context. Foreign policy, once the theoretically exclusive prerogative of the nation-state, is violated daily by new developments in non-state actorness arising from transnational technical and welfare issues such as trade, finance, labour standards and environmentalism. These books under review introduce the displacement lexicon of transnational politics, global civil society, non-state resistance and complexity into policymaking consciousness; in short, the post-international era. The conclusion proposes to tease out the preliminary outlines of the post-international challenge to foreign policy on the basis of ‘plus non-state’ actor-interest considerations.

The two global norms that are most widely recognized in our world are human rights and the principle of national self-determination. Sometimes these norms are presented as complementary, sometimes as rivals. Of the two, national self-determination seems to have secured more widespread acceptance. No doubt the uncertain meaning of national self-determination has aided its widespread popularity. Quite what sort of entity (or ‘self’) does the adjective ‘national’ describe? What sort of arrangements does ‘self-determination’ demand? Those who apparently share a common commitment to the principle of national self-determination can nevertheless give markedly different answers to these questions. Moreover, whatever meaning we give to national self-determination, its reality has long been questioned and is increasingly challenged by the forces of globalization.

The mainstream literature on the UN has been underlain by a methodological individualist philosophy, according to which all social phenomena, and particularly the functioning of all social institutions, should always be seen as resulting from the decisions of individual actors, as if the whole (organisation) was never more than the sum of its parts (members of an organisation). Such a fallacy has been denounced by social constructivist approaches which account for the existence of certain emergent properties of the UN, such as collective identity, which cannot be reduced to its constituent units, namely, states. These accounts, however, have offered a partial picture of the holistic understanding of the UN, as they have failed to comprehend, or perhaps simply ignored the causal powers of such emergent properties. This article enhances constructivist approaches by dint of the critical realist models of Synchronic Emergent Powers Materialism and Transformational Model of Social Activity. The value added of these two models in comprehending the powers associated with the UN Security Council lies in their ability to function as instructive metaphors; they allow for the independent and irreducible existence of certain mechanisms by which the Council controls international conflicts but nevertheless recognises that these can only emerge from the mutual interaction between agents (states) and structure (UN institutions).

What, this essay asks, is the relation between contemporary IR scholarship and the existentialist intellectual and cultural tradition? How is our discipline informed and animated by existentialist thinking? Is existentialism a heritage to be recovered, claimed, and embraced by IR scholars, or a shadow to be escaped? And what resources does it furnish us for thinking through the kind of issues that IR scholars are called upon to grapple with today? These questions are not purely theoretical. There are practical and political reasons, not only for considering them, but for considering them now. Living through what has been termed an unfolding ‘Age of Anxiety’, we find ourselves confronted by existential questions and existentialist ideas at almost every turn. It is, however, unclear how substantive or meaningful this apparently existentialist moment truly is. Does existentialism have something to say to contemporary IR, or does it flatter to deceive? We think the time is ripe to take stock of existentialism as it relates to IR and global politics. This is the purpose of this article and of the collection of essays it introduces.

International Relations theory has recently turned its attention to the study of comparative regionalism in economics and security. As part of this new research agenda, this article explores what we might learn from the Southern Cone's experience with denuclearization that might be applicable to the Middle East. The two regions differ with respect to security dilemmas, military capabilities and doctrines, and the prior availability of a cooperative regional institutional infrastructure. Yet two aspects of the Southern Cone process seem potentially relevant to other regions. The first relates to improving our understanding of the appropriate domestic political conditions that underpin denuclearization. In particular, the nature of domestic coalitions and of their respective approaches to the global economy and political institutions deserve far more serious consideration than they have gained thus far. The second relates to the nature of the regional denuclearization regime initially fashioned in the Southern Cone, which set an international precedent. A regionally-based system of mutual inspections could help remove some of the most intractable barriers to a future Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction.

Over the past quarter-century, Fred Halliday has distinguished himself as a prolific and insightful scholar of international affairs. He has imbibed a generous dose of Marxist theory without being intoxicated by it, and one might say the same for his consumption of other types of theory as well. Not content to be an armchair academic, Halliday is personally acquainted with a number of revolutionary movements and his writings combine an obvious sympathy for their aspirations with a clear-eyed sense of their shortcomings. The result is a combination of intellectual range and personal experience that is nearly unique among contemporary scholars of world politics.

Traditional approaches to questions about nomos in IR typically focus upon either its establishment and the formal structures that emerge through interaction within a clearly delineated spatial area, or an exploration of US hegemony in the post-2003 world. In this article I posit a different approach, building on the ideas of Giorgio Agamben, which grounds nomos as a spatialisation of the exception within conditions of neoliberal modernity. I suggest that within the global nomos are more localised nomoi. These localised nomoi are a consequence of the spatialisation of the exception and a fundamental tension between localisation and ordering. I argue that while sovereign power has been a source of contemporary scholarship, such explorations have paid scant attention to the regulatory power of normative values and their capacity to create order within space. Such norms allow for a greater awareness of how sovereign power can be mobilised in and of itself as a form of contestation. Locating such debates in the Middle East, I explore the concept of nomos to understand how struggle over the localisation and ordering of space helps us to better understand contemporary political life.