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The United States and the entry of the Baltic states into international society: insights from the case of Estonia
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In terms of population, the Republic of Estonia was the smallest country to gain independence after the First World War. While according to President Woodrow Wilsonâs policies, the United States was considered a supporter of small countries, gaining de jure recognition for Estonia from America was a complicated issue. This article analyses Estoniaâs struggle for recognition through the triangle of American-Bolshevik-Estonian relations during the years 1918â1921. In achieving recognition, economic rather than political or ideological arguments became decisive.
This article introduces the special issue 'Exploring the Link between Historical Memory and Foreign Policy'. It sets the scene for the individual case studies by illustrating how memory and foreign policy are linked in a complex and reciprocal way. Several mechanisms of (ab)using historical memory in foreign policy discourses are identified, including the application of historical analogies, the construction of historical narratives, the creation of memory sites, the marginalisation and forgetting of the past and the securitisation of historical memory. The contributions to the special issue are introduced according to this conceptual frame. The article highlights how these mechanisms are deployed in different national and political contexts, as well as how a state's politics of memory influences its foreign policy and relations with other states.
This article asks why Denmark and Estonia have eagerly attempted to ‘punch above their weight’ in the transatlantic relationship since the end of the Cold War and shows how they differ in their strategies to do so. Using neoclassical realism as a theoretical point of departure, the article explains how a combination of changing constraints in the strategic environment and elite interpretations of how these changes affected national security resulted in ‘super atlanticist’ alliance policies in the two countries. Following this analysis, we discuss the future of super atlanticism.
In a world of regions, inside/outside dynamics—the identity politics of international society—are effectively reinstated. Accounting for these dynamics from an English School (ES) perspective requires, first, prior clarification of the place and role of the concept of identity in ES theory. Constitutive of society in both inter-state and inter-human domain, of international and world society, respectively, identity arguably is key to social structural ES theorising. This is visible in, second, the (in-)congruence of identities across domains, constellations of international and world society, instilling a state with the desire for belonging. Induced in this way is the ‘movement’ of a state in international society, triggering the identity politics of (regional) international society. This is illustrated, third, by the patterns of inclusion and exclusion currently on display at the Eastern boundary of the contemporary European society of states that transpire as the result of ‘neighbourhood’ states aspiring to join ‘Europe’.
Recognition plays a multifaceted role in international theory. In rarely communicating literatures, the term is invoked to explain creation of new states and international structures; policy choices by state and non-state actors; and normative justifiability, or lack thereof, of foreign and international politics. The purpose of this symposium is to open new possibilities for imagining and studying recognition in international politics by drawing together different strands of research in this area. More specifically, the forum brings new attention to controversies on the creation of states, which has traditionally been a preserve for discussion in International Law, by invoking social theories of recognition that have developed as part of International Relations more recently. It is suggested that broadening imagination across legal and social approaches to recognition provides the resources needed for theories with this object to be of maximal relevance to political practice.
Since 9/11, Washington has viewed the new Europe as a protégé of the United States, whose role is to repair the political bridge across the Atlantic. Whereas the lure of the United States has started to weaken in Central European countries, the Baltic states have remained the most trustful new Europeans from Washington's point of view. Nonetheless, the Balts have not felt comfortable with the new European label. They have seemingly begun to define themselves as something special and have aspired to a voice of their own. Instead of being merely protégés of the United States, the Balts are transforming themselves into intermediaries between Brussels and Washington.
This is an edited text of the fifth John Vincent Memorial Lecture delivered at the University of Keele on 9 May 1997 in which Jack Donnelly attacks the still common scepticism about international human rights - although from an unorthodox angle.
What is the English School of International Relations and why is there increasing interest in it? Linklater and Suganami provide a comprehensive account of this distinctive approach to the study of world politics which highlights coexistence and cooperation, as well as conflict, in the relations between sovereign states. In the first book-length volume of its kind, the authors present a comprehensive discussion of the rise and development of the English School, its principal research agenda, and its epistemological and methodological foundations. The authors further consider the English School's position on progress in world politics, its relationship with Kantian thought, its conception of a sociology of states-systems and its approach to good international citizenship as a means of reducing harm in world politics. Lucidly written and unprecedented in its coverage, this book is essential reading for anyone interested in international relations and politics worldwide.
Bringing together some of the most innovative scholars in both the English School of international relations and East Asian studies, this volume investigates whether or not significant and distinct international social structures exist at the regional level represented by 'East Asia', and what this can tell us about international society both regionally and globally. The book's main finding is that the regional dispute over how its states and peoples should relate to the Western-dominated global international society makes the existence of East Asian international society essentially contested. While this regional-global social dynamic is present in many regions, it is particularly strong in East Asia. This book will appeal to audiences interested in developing English School theory, the study of East Asian international relations and comparative regionalism.
Edward Keene argues that the conventional idea of an 'anarchical society' of equal and independent sovereign states is an inadequate description of order in modern world politics. International political and legal order has always been dedicated to two distinct goals: to try to promote the toleration of different ways of life, while advocating the adoption of one specific way, that it labels 'civilization'. The nineteenth-century solution to this contradiction was to restrict the promotion of civilization to the world beyond Europe. That discriminatory way of thinking has now broken down, with the result that a single, global order is supposed to apply to everyone, but opinion is still very much divided as to what the ultimate purpose of this global order should be, and how its political and legal structure should be organised.
What is meant by international society? On what principles is the notion of international society based? How has the notion of nationalism influenced its evolution? In this book James Mayall addresses these questions and sheds important new light upon the issues of nation and international society by bringing together subjects which have hitherto been examined separately. Mayall locates his study within a theoretical discussion of the relationship between the ideas of nationalism and international society, maintaining that it is one of challenge and accommodation. He then explores three central issues. First, the manner in which nationalism has created new states and pushed the boundaries of international society outwards. Second, how the confrontation between nationalist and liberal ideas about international economic relations has impelled state activity downward into the lives of ordinary people and outward into the international political economy. And third, the way Third World nationalism has reacted against the postwar international economic order but has been unable to alter it in its favour. Nationalism and international society will be of interest to specialists and students of international relations with special reference to nationalism and sovereignty, and to modern historians of world order, decolonisation and economic nationalism.
This study examines the impact of revolutionary states upon international society. These states have always posed major problems for the achievement of world order: revolution is often accompanied by international as well as civil conflict, while revolutionary doctrines have proven to be highly disruptive of the existing structure of international politics. Conversely, the prevailing international order presents fundamental difficulties for some revolutionary states. The belief system on which its revolution was founded and which legitimized the assumption of state power by the revolutionary elite is certain to run counter to the prevailing political doctrines of many other states. David Armstrong asks whether revolutionary states are ‘socialized’ into adopting acceptable patterns of international behaviour, or whether it is the international society that is forced to change when these new states appear. He looks in detail at the French, American, and Russian revolutions and at several post‐1945 revolutionary states. He also examines the relationship between revolutionary states and the principal ordering devices of an international society: international law, diplomacy, and the balance of power. His book is a significant contribution to the ‘English School’ literature, whose central concept is that of an international society. It shows how the interaction between revolutionary states and the established norms, rules, and institutions of international society works to produce change in both the revolutionary state and international society itself. As such it elucidates the dynamic aspects of international society.
Many analysts claim that international politics has recently entered a new era, following the end of the Cold War and then the events of September 11th. In this book, Kalevi Holsti asks what we mean by 'change' in international politics. How do we identify it? How do we distinguish between significant and unimportant changes? Do we really live in a new era or do we see more continuity than transformation in the texture of international politics? Combining theoretical and empirical argument, Holsti investigates eight major international institutions including the state, sovereignty, territoriality, international law, diplomacy, trade and war. Having identified the types of change these institutions have undergone during the last three centuries, Holsti analyses the sources of those changes and speculates on their consequences. This is a major book, likely to have lasting influence in the study of international politics.
Cambridge Core - International Relations and International Organisations - Global International Society - by Barry Buzan
What is the role of memories for the expansion of international society? By drawing on the English School approach to International Relations this edited volume argues that the memories of empire and suzerainty are key to understanding sociological aspects of the expansion of anarchical society. The expert contributors adopt a socio-historic conceptualization of entry into international society, aiming to move beyond the legalist analysis, and also explore the impact of identity-constructions and collective memories on the expansion of international society. Empirically, the volume investigates the entry into international society of Belarus, Bulgaria, Greece, Poland, Serbia, Slovakia and Romania and studies memories that they activated along the way. While these memoires of bygone polities were used by state builders to make sense of international society and legitimise claims of the new entrants, they inadvertently also generated tensions and anxieties, which in many ways persist until this day. Both the theoretical angle and the empirical material presented in this volume are novel additions to the growing body of knowledge in historical International Relations. Exploring how memories and experiences of the past still complicate the entrants’ positions in international society and to what degree ensuing tensions remain today, this volume will be of interest to students and scholars of European International Relations, particularly those with a focus on Eastern Europe.
The following paper deals with US policy toward the Baltic states at two different time periods (1918–20 and 1989–91) and by two very different presidents (Woodrow F. Wilson and George H. W. Bush). The first period represented the time that saw the emergence of the United States on the world stage. Woodrow Wilson seemingly advocated self-determination as was understood by a number of his advisers at the Peace Conference, but eventually decided to support the unity of Russia as part of an anti-Bolshevik policy. During the second period, George H. W. Bush negotiated a settlement to end another conflict, the Cold War. While self-determination of the Baltic states (on the basis of the US non-recognition policy) was not of prime importance for the US, it nevertheless was brought up at very summit meeting with Mikhail Gorbachev and came to be linked to the resolution of economic issues between the two major powers. Ultimately the restoration of independence was decided by developments in the Soviet Union, but US policy made the Baltic question an international issue and helped resolve it peacefully.
In his book The Baltic Revolution, Anatole Lieven noted, ‘dealing with Lithuanian nationalist politicians during the second independence struggle, I was repeatedly made aware that they operate just partly in the present’ (Lieven, 1994, p. 16). As pointed out by Kasekamp, the Baltic states’ claim to independence from Russia during the Cold War was mainly based on historical arguments, while their original struggle for freedom from Russia after the First World War was mainly couched in terms of the right of self-determination (Kasekamp, 2010). History has indeed become a salient issue in relations between Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania on the one hand and Russia on the other. When asked what the main issue in the Latvia–Russia relationship was, a senior diplomat from the Latvian prime minister’s office declared in an interview that ‘of course, the first one is the historical question’. One striking example is the annual parade of the veterans of the SS Latvian Legion in Riga, which is systematically used by the Russian government and media as an argument to accuse Latvia of Fascism. On the Latvian side, it is described as a private commemoration of the fight for independence. This example shows to what extent history, or at least historical arguments, are used in modern diplomacy in the Baltic context.
This outstanding book is the first comprehensive introduction to the English School of International Relations. Written by leading ES scholar Barry Buzan, it expertly guides readers through the English School’s formative ideas, intellectual and historical roots, current controversies and future avenues of development.
Part One sets out the English School’s origins and development, explaining its central concepts and methodological tools, and placing it within the broader canon of IR theory. Part Two offers a detailed account of the historical, regional and social structural strands of the English School, explaining the important link between the school’s historical projects and its interest in a societal approach to international relations. Part Three explores the School’s responses to the enduring problems of order and justice, and highlights the changing balance between pluralist and solidarist institutions in the evolution of international society over the past five centuries. The book concludes with a discussion of the English School’s ongoing controversies and debates, and identifies opportunities for further research.
For students new to the topic this book will provide an accessible and balanced overview, whilst those already familiar with the ES will be prompted to look afresh at their own understanding of its significance and potentiality.
This book weaves together perspectives drawn from critical international relations, anthropology and social theory in order to understand the Polish and Baltic post-Cold War politics of becoming European. Approaching the study of Europe's eastern enlargement through a post-colonial critique, author Maria Mälksoo makes a convincing case for a rethinking of European identity. Drawing on the theorist Edward Said, she contends that studies of the European Union are marked by a prevailing Orientalism, rarely asking who has traditionally been able to define European identity, and whether this identity should be presented as an historical process rather than a static category. The central argument of this book is that the historical experience of being framed as simultaneously in Europe - and yet not quite in Europe - informs the current self-understandings and security imaginaries of Poland and the Baltic States. Exploring this existential condition of 'liminal Europeaness' among foreign and security policy-making elites, the book considers its effects on key security policy issues, including relations with Western Europe, Russia and the United States. Supported by solid empirical analyses, this book provides an innovative and interdisciplinary approach to the post-Cold War predicament of Poland and the Baltic States. It will be of interest to students and scholars of International Relations, European Studies, Social and Political Theory, and Anthropology.
The concept of civilization has played a central role in the work of the English School. Yet, most English School scholars concern themselves with the role of civilization in defining the relations between the members of international society. The Standard of Civilization stands as a case in point, for most English School scholars have examined this legal principle with reference to its role in defining membership in the society of states. This paper sets out to help us understand the role of the Standard of Civilization in defining relations between state and nonstate societies at the beginning of the twentieth century. It analyzes the Standard of Civilization and its role in defining Indigenous-state relations and presents a case study analysis of Chief Levi General's diplomatic mission to the League of Nations on behalf of the Six Nations. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of its analysis for the theory and practice of IR, as well as the English School and its analytics.
This book examines recognition of new states, the practice historically employed to regulate membership in international society. The last twenty years have witnessed new or lingering demands for statehood in different areas of the world. The claims of some, like those of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Eritrea, Croatia, Georgia, and East Timor, have achieved general recognition; those of others, like Kosovo, Tamil Eelam, South Ossetia, Abkhazia, and Somaliland, have not. However, even as most of these claims gave rise to major conflicts and international controversies, the criteria for acknowledgment of new states have elicited little systematic scholarship. Drawing upon writings of English School theorists, this study charts the practice from the late eighteenth century until the present. Its central argument is that for the past 200 years state recognition has been tied to the idea of self-determination of peoples. Two versions of the idea have underpinned the practice throughout most of this period - self-determination as a negative and a positive right. The negative idea, dominant from 1815 to 1950, took state recognition to be acknowledgment of an achievement of de facto statehood by a people desiring independence. Self-determination was expressed through, and externally gauged by, self-attainment. The positive idea, prevalent since the 1950s, took state recognition to be acknowledgment of an entitlement to independence in international law. The development of self-determination as a positive international right, however, has not led to a disappearance of claims of statehood that stand outside of its confines. Groups that are deeply dissatisfied with the countries in which they presently find themselves continue to make demands for independence even though they may have no positive entitlement to it. The book concludes by expressing doubt that contemporary international society can find a sustainable basis for recognizing new states other than the original standard of de facto statehood.
This article uses the so-called English School of International Relations (ES) as a lens through which to examine Indonesia's trajectory as a regional power and a would-be world power. The ES approach has always emphasized the social dimensions of great-power status, which factor in, alongside material components, a mutual recognition of special rights and duties. But its scholars have not yet paid much attention to the issue of self-conceptualization as an element in that status. By examining the case of Indonesia, this article begins to fill that gap. It draws on a range of material to highlight a variety of internal narratives on Indonesia's power, which are often paradoxical, and often at odds with the external discourse. A region-theory 'dialog' on this topic therefore offers an alternative perspective on Indonesia's constraints and opportunities, while also refining ES perspectives on the topic of power and powers. © The author [2013]. Published by Oxford University Press in association with the Japan Association of International Relations; All rights reserved.
In this paper, I outline and assess the international society perspective on world politics, and identify the distinctive common ground of the leading English School writers in terms of the three dimensions of their main subject?matter ? structural, functional and historical. I focus on the major works of Manning, Bull, Wight, Watson, Wheeler, and Buzan and Little, paying special attention to the structure of each writer's argument and the interconnections of these writers' ideas. I conclude by listing a number of themes that the English School writers offer. These provide us with significant points of departure from where we may build on or transcend their collective and individual achievements.
The international system of civilized states that came to develop in Europe in the course of the nineteenth century was formed through practices of recognition, which created and affirmed similarities between all European states, but also through practices of non-recognition, which created and affirmed differences between Europeans and non-Europeans. Practices of non-recognition are generally ignored in liberal accounts of the origins of international society. A theory of recognition allows us to retrieve this alternative history and make it explicit.
The 'standard of civilisation' has its roots in the culturally widespread trope of 'civilised' versus 'barbarian'. It took its specific modern form in the 19th century, primarily as a European legal term. No specific set of criteria for the 'standard of civilisation' was ever codified, but the general practice was to define the standard by the contemporary forms of government prevailing in Europe. Its political role was to gate-keep membership of international society, and to justify colonialism. The term collapsed after 1945 when the right of self-determination opened membership to nearly all peoples. In the English School literature, the 'standard of civilisation' has been used to tell a variety of historical encounter stories, and to critique the School's neglect of colonialism. Its contemporary relevance in the literature concerns debates about whether human rights, democracy, capitalism and possibly environmentalism are being used to construct a new 'standard of civilisation' operationalised through conditionality and other discriminatory practices. Another important link is between the colonial obligation to raise 'less advanced' peoples to the standard and the post-1945 obligation to provide aid and development to the 'less developed'. The English School concept of the 'standard of civilisation' is thus both refreshingly frank politically and of durable relevance for thinking about international relations.
In this article I engage with the theoretical opening provided by Barry Buzan’s From International to World Society? I present an argument for five functional categories, which should be able to encompass all the institutions identified by English School scholars throughout history. Their introduction should point the way towards a sounder analytical framework for the study of what Buzan believes should be the new subject of the discipline of International Relations (IR). This subject is defined as second-order societies, meaning societies ‘where the members are not individual human beings, but durable collectivities of humans possessed of identities and actor qualities that are more than the sum of their parts’, and where the content of these societies, and the key object of analysis, is primary institutions. The purpose of the five functional categories is to break down this ‘social whole’ and provide a set of lenses through which to potentially analyse international societies throughout history.
The point of departure for this article is the realisation that the regional dimensions of international society have not been conceptualised adequately by International Relations scholars. One consequence of this, I argue, is that what could have been understood as regionally led change has been framed as revolutionary exceptions or imperialist drives for power aggregation. I attempt to develop this point by demonstrating how, for example, the EU and international fascism (in this article mainly associated with Germany, Italy and Japan during World War II) might instead be considered as cases of regional differentiation within international society. Two things are accomplished via this analysis. First, the cases are ‘normalised’, making a more accurate historical description of their respective developments possible. Second, by taking these regionally led developments seriously, the potential for fundamental change to the core institutions of international society becomes a distinct possibility and thus unsettles our whole Westphalian imagination.
The European Union is often compared to other political systems in order to better understand its basic features and how they structure politics. This article argues that this focus on comparative politics instils a domestic bias into the study of the EU, which also ignores the impact of enlargement. To remedy this, a comparison is suggested between the order of the EU as a regional international society and the order of the traditional, global international society as analysed by the English School of International Relations, and in particular by Hedley Bull. It is argued that the primary goal of the international order of the society of states, the preservation of states as its fundamental units, has been replaced by the goal of the preservation of peace in Europe. Consequently, the five core institutions of international order identified by Bull (balance of power, international law, diplomacy, war and great powers) have been modified or replaced. The new institutions of the European order are identified as the pooling of sovereignty, the acquis communautaire, multi-managerialism, pacific democracy, member state coalitions and multiperspectivity. These sustain and enlarge a regional international society that not only combines international and domestic elements, but transforms politics to such an extent that it should better be called a multiperspectival society, confounding Bull's expectation that the European integration will either lead to a European state or falter. This has potential ramifications for the organisation of international society at large, although whether the transformative potential of the EU can be realised remains to be seen, and will be decided above all in the EU's treatment of its own borders.
This article addresses how entry into international society has been conceptualised, suggests a reconceptualisation that will make the concept more relational, and illustrates with a case study. Part one attempts a summary of relevant debates without the English School, and directs attention to the importance of how entrants draw on memories of its subject position in the suzerain system that it left as it entered international society. Part two discuses the experiences of Russia's predecessor polities, with the focus being on the place of Russian principalities within the suzerain system of the Golden Horde (ca. 1240–1500). I argue that Russia's basic stance towards European polities in the 16th and early 17th centuries is readily understandable in terms of a key memory, namely the one of being dominated by this polity, which was itself an outgrowth of the Mongol empire. Part three demonstrates how the resulting understanding of politics was confirmed by Russian experiences in the 16th and 17th centuries. I suggest that Russia never really let go of its memories of being part of a suzerain system, and that it is therefore still suspended somewhere in the outer tier of international society.
We live today in the world's first universal, multicultural, and multiregional system of sovereign states. Five centuries ago, emergent sovereign states were confined to Europe and contained within the bounds of Latin Christendom. Through five great waves of expansion this nascent European system globalized. The Westphalian settlement, the independence of Latin America, the Versailles settlement, post-1945 decolonization, and the collapse of the Soviet Union each brought a host of new states into the system. How can we explain these great waves of expansion, each of which saw imperial systems of rule displaced by the now universal form of the sovereign state? After detailing the limits of existing explanations, this article presents a new account of the principal waves of systemic expansion that stresses the importance of subject peoples' struggles for the recognition of individual rights. Empires are hierarchies, the legitimacy of which has been sustained historically by traditional regimes of unequal entitlements—institutional frameworks that allocate individuals of different social status different social powers and entitlements. In the Westphalian, Latin American, and post-1945 waves of expansion, which together produced most of today's sovereign states and gave the system its principal regions, subject peoples embraced local interpretations of new, distinctly modern ideas about individual rights and challenged the traditional distribution of entitlements that undergirded imperial hierarchy. Each wave differed, not the least because different rights were at work: liberty of religious conscience, the right to equal political representation, and after 1945, a compendium of civil and political rights. But in each case a “tipping point” was reached when the imperial system in question proved incapable of accommodating the new rights claims and subject peoples turned from “voice” to “exit,” and each time the sovereign state was seen as the institutional alternative to empire.
Fifteen years after the Baltic SSRs' independence declarations, this article sheds new light on the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian struggle to regain statehood in the context of international relations between 1988 and 1991. Based on declassified archival sources from Western and Eastern archives, memoirs and official histories, it reveals the nature of 'Western' Baltic policies and analyses how (far) they impacted on the Soviet Union's demise. Second, the role universal normative values played in Western, Soviet and Baltic politics will be discussed in historical perspective; with the article concluding by offering some reflections on the general relationship between political rhetoric and foreign policy.
USA ja Balti küsimus külma saja lõpus
- U Bergmane
- Bergmane U.
- Dunne T.
Wilsonianism ilma Wilsonita: Ameerika Ühendriigid ja Eesti, 1918-1922
- O Arens
- Arens O.
The Emergence of a Universal International Society
- H Bull
- Bull H.
The Standard of ‘Civilization’ in International Society
- G W Gong
- Gong G. W.
Külalisena maailmapoliitikas: Eesti ja Rahvasteliit 1919-1946
- V Made
- Made V.
Enesemääramine, Wilson ja Eesti
- E Medijainen
- Medijainen E.
Vene mõjusfäärist NATO kandidaadiks: Eesti julgeolekupoliitilised püüdlused G.H. Bushi ja W. Clintoni ajal.” InAmeerika sajand
- K Piirimäe
- H H Varbla
- Piirimäe K.
The United States and Decolonization: Power and Freedom
- D Ryan
- V Pungong
- Ryan D.
The USA, Soviet Russia and the Baltic States: From Recognition to the Cold War
- E Medijainen
- Medijainen E.