![]() |
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
|
Your cart is empty |
||
|
Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > International relations > Diplomacy
Diplomacy is a neglected aspect of Hellenistic history, despite the fact that war and peace were the major preoccupations of the rulers of the kingdoms of the time. It becomes clear that it is possible to discern a set of accepted practices which were generally followed by the kings from the time of Alexander to the approach of Rome. The republican states were less bound by such practices, and this applies above all to Rome and Carthage. By concentrating on diplomatic institutions and processes, therefore, it is possible to gain a new insight into the relations between the kingdoms. This study investigates the making and duration of peace treaties, the purpose of so-called 'marriage alliances', the absence of summit meetings, and looks in detail at the relations between states from a diplomatic point of view, rather than only in terms of the wars they fought. The system which had emerged as a result of the personal relationships between Alexander's successors, continued in operation for at least two centuries. The intervention of Rome brought in a new great power which had no similar tradition, and the Hellenistic system crumbled therefore under Roman pressure.
Deng Xiaoping is widely acknowledged as the principal architect of China's economic reforms, but how far was he also responsible for shaping China's foreign policy which emphasized "peace and development"? This book explores Deng's foreign policy and shows how he established basic principles for China to have a foreign policy which supported economic development, which stressed "harmony" in the world rather than "hegemony", and which avoided conflict and nurtured a peaceful approach. The book outlines how Deng worked to normalize relations with both the United States and the Soviet Union, how he was disappointed by the lack of reciprocation by the United States, where relations are still portrayed in terms of "the China threat", and how the principles established by Deng continue to be adhered to.
Examining the role of envoys from the establishment of the first "barbarian kingdoms" in the West, to the eve of Justinian's wars of reconquest, this study reveals how Roman imperial administration influenced new patterns of political interaction in the earliest medieval states. Close analysis of sources with special interest in embassies offers insight into a variety of genres: chronicles, panegyrics, hagiographies, letters, and epitaphs. The study will make a significant contribution to the developing field of ancient and medieval communication.
U.S. national security policy is at a critically important crossroads. The Bush Doctrine of unilateralism, pre-emptive war, and the imposition of democracy by force has proven disastrous. The United States now finds itself vilified abroad, weakened at home, and bogged down in a seemingly endless and unwinnable war. In To Lead the World, Melvyn P. Leffler and Jeffrey W. Legro bring together eleven of America's most esteemed writers and thinkers to offer concrete, historically grounded suggestions for how America can regain its standing in the world and use its power more wisely than it has during the Bush years. Best-selling authors such as David Kennedy, Niall Ferguson, Robert Kagan, Francis Fukuyama, and Samantha Power address such issues as how the U.S. can regain its respect in the world, respond to the biggest threats now facing the country, identify reasonable foreign policy goals, manage the growing debt burden, achieve greater national security, and successfully engage a host of other problems left unsolved and in many cases exacerbated by the Bush Doctrine. Representing a wide range of perspectives, the writers gathered here place the current foreign-policy predicament firmly in the larger context of American and world history and draw upon realistic appraisals of both the strengths and the limits of American power. They argue persuasively that the kind of leadership that made the United States a great-and greatly admired-nation in the past can be revitalized to meet the challenges of the 21st century. Written by prize-winning authors and filled with level-headed, far-sighted, and achievable recommendations, To Lead the World will serve as a primary source of political wisdom in the post-Bush era and will add immeasurably to the policy debates surrounding the 2008 presidential election.
For most of the twentieth century, the most critical concerns of
national security have been balance-of-power politics and the
global arms race. The religious conflicts of this era and the
motives behind them, however, demand a radical break with this
tradition. If the United States is to prevail in its long-term
contest with extremist Islam, it will need to re-examine old
assumptions, expand the scope of its thinking to include religion
and other "irrational" factors, and be willing to depart from past
practice. A purely military response in reaction to such attacks
will simply not suffice. What will be required is a long-term
strategy of cultural engagement, backed by a deeper understanding
of how others view the world and what is important to them.
The Genoa Conference of April-May 1922 saw the first serious and sustained attempt to negotiate a modus vivendi between the newly established Soviet government in Moscow and the western capitalist countries that surrounded it. Drawing upon a wide range of archival and other sources, many of them unfamiliar or previously unexplored for this purpose, this study traces the evolution of Soviet-Western relations from the Revolution up to the autumn of 1921, when the proposal for a conference first began to emerge, and then considers in more detail the course of preconference diplomacy and the proceedings of the conference itself, up to the early summer of 1922. In his final chapter Dr White argues that the failure to resolve East-West differences at Genoa was attributable to a variety of circumstances, but above all to a failure of political will.
In this book, Dr. Christopher Hill breaks new ground by presenting a detailed case study of the British government and foreign policy. He takes the dramatic period from the Munich conference of 1938 to the German invasion of the Soviet Union three years later and analyzes the patterns of argument and influence within the British Cabinet. By using extensive archival material, he examines how far the strong personalities of Neville Chamberlain and Winston Churchill were able to dominate their Cabinets in an area where prime ministers have traditionally been supposed to exercise considerable freedom.
Threats to peace and stability are real and will likely continue into the foreseeable future. Likewise, globalization and its proliferation has made it increasingly difficult in knowing whether one is a friend or foe. This is particularly true when turning to the relationship of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC); the relationships are not as clear as was the case two decades ago. Intelligence professionals the world over would be remiss in their assessments if they fail to take into account the position of each in the context of contemporary issues. Countries can be aligned on one issue and yet diametrically opposed on others. This research looks to enhance what Ernest Boyer refers to as scholarship of integration and uses the Federal Qualitative Secondary Data Case Study Triangulation Model and a variation of a model referred to as the York Intelligence Red Team Model-Modified (YIRTM-M) to conduct the analysis. More pointedly, this book looks at issues from the U.S. perspective to see how the YIRTM-M can be applied to advance its own interests on the world stage and to better understand when each can be seen as a friend or foe.
International negotiations have become an increasingly widespread feature of international affairs. Cecilia Albin argues that negotiators do not simply pursue their narrow interests or those of their countries, but regularly take principles of justice and fairness into account. Her analysis is based on cases in four important areas: the environment, international trade, ethnic conflict, and arms control. Drawing on a mass of empirical data, including a large number of interviews, she relates the abstract debate over international norms and ethics to the realities of international relations.
International negotiations have become an increasingly widespread feature of international affairs. Cecilia Albin argues that negotiators do not simply pursue their narrow interests or those of their countries, but regularly take principles of justice and fairness into account. Her analysis is based on cases in four important areas: the environment, international trade, ethnic conflict, and arms control. Drawing on a mass of empirical data, including a large number of interviews, she relates the abstract debate over international norms and ethics to the realities of international relations.
The book examines diplomatic immunity and provides a historical analysis of the granting of diplomatic immunity to non-diplomats, based on the perspectives of several states. Featuring contributions in which experts from four continents and from academia and practice present their views and perspectives; it is an insightful resource for diplomats, academics and legal professionals, while at the same time it is useful and understandable for students, junior staff and anyone just starting their venture into the diplomatic immunity issues and general international law.
The hilariously and candid memoirs of an (un)diplomatic wife Cherry Denman offers her witty take on 25 years trailing husband Charlie, a UK diplomat, around some of the most farflung outposts of the world. Describing herself as a reluctant traveler, she shares adventurous tales of cultural collision, sparing herself no embarrassment. From wearing a gold lame Mao suit at a diplomatic ball in China to catching her husband Charlie trying to escape out the bathroom window at a party, she relates one riotous, globetrotting escapade after another. Illustrated by Cherry's own wonderfully funny cartoons of diplomatic life, this is a collection of clever and very funny tales of global misunderstanding.
A Vanishing West in the Middle East covers the history of Western cooperation in the Middle East and North Africa since the end of the Cold War. Based on more than fifty interviews with diplomats and experts as well as consultations of the academic literature, it describes the operational and political frameworks through which the United States and European countries have intervened in the Arab world, and how their relations with the region have changed. Practitioner testimonies and detailed case studies illuminate U.S. successes and failures in enlisting allies for campaigns in Iraq, Syria, and Libya. This analysis goes to the heart of the American debate on “endless wars†but also questions the very concept of Western intervention in a region where the Arab Spring and subsequent uprisings have profoundly changed the geopolitical landscape. Today, whereas the United States wishes to pull back from the region, Europe understands it must become more involved. Whatever their particular motivations, both must adapt to an increasingly fragmented Middle East, influenced specifically by more assertive Chinese, Russian, Iranian, Emirati, and Turkish foreign policies.
Although modern life grows increasingly casual, in many sectors, protocol still reigns supreme. An Expert's Guide to International Protocol offers an overview of its associated practices, including those found within the context of diplomatic relations and the business world. Focusing on a wide range of countries and cultures, the book covers topics like precedence, seating arrangements, flags, ceremonies, invitations, dress codes, gifts and honours, and the roles of the protocol officer, guest and host. Throughout, influential diplomatic, business, and cultural figures share their own experiences with protocols around the world, also throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.
A splendidly illuminating book. Like it or not, George W. Bush has launched a revolution in American foreign policy. He has redefined how America engages the world, shedding the constraints that friends, allies, and international institutions once imposed on its freedom of action. In "America Unbound, " Ivo Daalder and James Lindsay caution that the Bush revolution comes with serious risks-and, at some point, we may find that America's friends and allies will refuse to follow his lead, leaving the U.S. unable to achieve its goals. This edition has been extensively revised and updated to include major policy changes and developments since the book's original publication.
A mixture of poignant biography and marvellously entertaining social history, 'Daughters of Britannia' is the story of diplomatic life as it has never been told before, seen through the eyes of some of its least-known participants: the wives, daughters and sisters who accompanied their men to the far corners of the globe. "This is a lovely book: affectionate, celebratory and as conscious of the glory as the hardship. These women lived; they saw dolphins in the Bosphorus at dawn, took tea with empresses, watched eclipses in Turkistan. And they were so lonely they wrote it all down." "Absorbing, moving and wonderfully gossipy … all of it laced with a good helping of eccentrics and the undeniable glamour of pomp and tradition in far-flung places." "This is a delightful and exceptionally well-written book, funny, lively and warm-hearted." "Part history, part anecdotal anthology, it makes unputdownable reading as famous names in diplomatic spouse lore like Emma Hamilton and Vita Sackville-West are upstaged by ordinary women faced with extraordinary situations." "Enormously enjoyable, anecdotal and scholarly."
This book by a leading scholar of international relations examines the origins of the new world disorder - the resurgence of Russia, the rise of populism in the West, deep tensions in the Atlantic alliance, and the new strategic partnership between China and Russia - and asks why so many assumptions about how the world might look after the Cold War - liberal, democratic and increasingly global - have proven to be so wrong. To explain this, Michael Cox goes back to the moment of disintegration and examines what the Cold War was about, why the Cold War ended, why the experts failed to predict it, and how different writers and policy-makers (and not just western ones) have viewed the tumultuous period between 1989 when the liberal order seemed on top of the world through to the current period when confidence in the western project seems to have disappeared almost completely.
"Diplomatic Interventions" argues that war is a social
construction. In so doing, it unsettles the definition of
intervention, as a coercive interference by one state in the
affairs of another, to examine the range of communicative or
'diplomatic' practices which through their presence modify the
experience of war. The tension between claims that war is pervasive
and that war is a social construct is analysed in relation to a
range of moral, legal, military, economic, cultural, and
therapeutic interventions. The concluding chapter highlights how
the book itself is a critical intervention that requires us look at
again from a new angle at international practice.
Taking insights and controversies from feminist political theory, Lu looks to illuminate alternative images of 'sovereignty as privacy' and 'sovereignty as responsibility', and to identify new challenges arising from the increased agency of private global civil society, and their relationship with the world of states.
Introduction to Global Politics, Fourth Edition, is an accessible, comprehensive, and well-written introductory textbook which emphasizes the evolution of major global issues from the past to the present. By integrating theory and political practice at individual, state, and global levels, students are introduced to key developments in global politics, helping them make sense of major trends that are shaping our world.
The exact legacies of the two Hague Peace Conferences remain unclear. On the one hand, diplomatic and military historians, who cast their gaze to 1914, traditionally dismiss the events of 1899 and 1907 as insignificant footnotes on the path to the First World War. On the other, experts in international law posit that The Hague's foremost legacy lies in the manner in which the conferences progressed the law of war and the concept and application of international justice. This volume brings together some of the latest scholarship on the legacies of the Hague Peace Conferences in a comprehensive volume, drawing together an international team of contributors.
This fully revised and expanded sixth edition of Diplomacy, written by an internationally respected researcher and teacher of the subject, is richly illustrated with examples from the worlds of health and commerce as well as high politics. The instances included are mostly contemporary, but considerable historical background to the diplomatic methods themselves is always provided. Among other features, new to this edition is a list of topics for seminar discussion or essays, as well as annotated further reading at the end of each chapter. Following a chapter on the foreign ministry, Part I of this book deals with the art of negotiation (prenegotiations, around-the-table negotiations, diplomatic momentum, packaging agreements, and following up); Part II covers conventional modes of diplomacy (embassies, telecommunications, consulates, secret intelligence by 'legals', conferences, summits, and public diplomacy); and Part III examines diplomacy in hostile circumstances (embassy substitutes such as representative offices and interests sections, special missions, and mediation). Students and educators of diplomacy will find much of value in the latest edition of this highly regarded and much-cited textbook.
This book demonstrates that during the early twentieth century, the Monroe Doctrine served the role of a national security framework that justified new directions in United States foreign relations when the nation emerged as one of the world's leading imperial powers. As the United States' overseas empire expanded in the wake of the Spanish-American War, the nation's decision-makers engaged in a protracted debate over the meaning and application of the doctrine, aligning it to two antithetical core values simultaneously: regional hegemony in the Western Hemisphere on the one hand, and Pan-Americanism on the other. The doctrine's fractured meaning reflected the divisions that existed among domestic perceptions of the nation's new role on the world stage and directed the nation's approach to key historical events such as the acquisition of the Philippines, the Mexican Revolution, the construction of the Panama Canal, the First World War, and the debate over the League of Nations.
Since its establishment after World War II, the State of Israel has sought alliances with non-Arab and non-Muslim countries and minorities in the Middle East, as well as Arab states geographically distant from the Arab-Israel conflict. The text presents and explains this regional orientation and its continuing implications for war and peace. It examines Israel's strategy of outflanking, both geographically and politically, the hostile Sunni Arab Middle East core that surrounded it in the early decades of its sovereign history, a strategy that became a pillar of the Israeli foreign and defense policy. This "periphery doctrine" was a grand strategy, meant to attain the major political-security goal of countering Arab hostility through relations with alternative regional powers and potential allies. It was quietly abandoned when the Sadat initiative and the emerging coexistence between Israel and Jordan reflected a readiness on the part of the Sunni Arab core to deal with Israel politically rather than militarily. For a brief interval following the 1991 Madrid conference and the 1993 Oslo accords, Israel seemed to be accepted by all its neighbors, prompting then Foreign Minister Shimon Peres to muse that it could even consider joining the Arab League. Yet this periphery strategy had been internalized to some extent in Israel's strategic thinking and it began to reappear after 2010, following a new era of Arab revolution. The rise of political Islam in Egypt, Turkey, Gaza, southern Lebanon and possibly Syria, coupled with the Islamic regime in Iran, has generated concern in Israel that it is again being surrounded by a ring of hostile states-in this case, Islamists rather than Arab nationalists. The book analyzes Israel's strategic thinking about the Middle East region, evaluating its success or failure in maintaining both Israel's security and the viability of Israeli-American strategic cooperation. It looks at the importance of the periphery strategy for Israeli, moderate Arab, and American, and European efforts to advance the Arab-Israel peace process, and its potential role as the Arab Spring brings about greater Islamization of the Arab Middle East. Already, Israeli strategic planners are talking of "spheres of containment" and "crescents" wherein countries like Cyprus, Greece, Azerbaijan, and Ethiopia constitute a kind of new periphery. By looking at Israel's search for Middle East allies then and now, the book explores a key component of Israel's strategic behavior. Written in an accessible manner for all students, it provides a better understanding of Israel's role in the Middle East region and its Middle East identity. |
You may like...
Foreign Policy Breakthroughs - Cases in…
Robert Hutchings, Jeremi Suri
Hardcover
R3,574
Discovery Miles 35 740
|