Contexts of International Politics

Through different theoretical references and concrete studies, Goertz illustrates the fruitfulness of the contextual approach to international politics.

Gary Goertz (Author)

9780521469722, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 24 November 1994

310 pages, 27 b/w illus. 17 tables
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.8 cm, 0.46 kg

In this book Gary Goertz examines how states interact with their environment and contexts, which are important in understanding international politics. He presents a philosophical, methodological and empirical discussion of three important contexts which affect decision makers: history, system structure, and international norms. The effects of these contexts are explored by viewing context in turn as cause, as changing meaning, and as a barrier. The book engages with the literature on structural realism and international regimes, and uses rational actor and diffusion models as theoretical references. A number of concrete studies are provided using these contextual tools, including oil nationalisation, USSR-East European relations, enduring rivalries, and decolonisation. These empirical examples illustrate the fruitfulness of the contextual approach to international politics.

1. Introduction
2. Modes of context
3. Context as changing meaning
4. Contextual indicators
5. Rational actor and diffusion models
6. Barrier models of context
7. Oil nationalization, 1918–80
8. Eastern Europe, 1945–89
9. Historical contexts
10. Enduring rivalries
11. The context of international norms
12. The norm of decolonization
13. Postface: interacting contexts and explaining contexts.

Subject Areas: International relations [JPS]