INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

GENERAL INTRODUCTION
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I. DEFINITIONS

International relations can be approached nowadays through three different perspectives:

- Historical approach
- Conceptual approach
- Legal approach

From a legal point of view, international relations allow to:

- Analyse States behaviour by referring to social mechanism and public law rules.
- Study the content of those rules and the effective modalities of their application.

How are international relations defined ?

International relations are of such a complexity, that they can be apprehended through multiple
manners which open up to many controversial definitions:

From the expression “ International Relations” we can understand Intercourses involving subjects of
international law within the International society. These subjects are essentially:

o The States
o The International Organisations
→ International public law determines their rules and their application modalities.

We may care to show all of its complexity by giving the following definition:
“All the relationships and the cross-border flows, material or immaterial, which can exist between two
or several people groups or authorities.”

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 II. TRADITIONAL APPROACHES

A. THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN CONFLICTUAL AND PEACEFUL

RELATIONSHIPS

1. Conflictual relationships

- 19th century and beginning of the 20th century, considered War, as a licit problem regulating
procedure.

Nowadays, and since the Charter of the United Nations 1, the use of force is forbidden.

A conflictual situation will be generating a crisis, ought to be solved before it degenerates.

International law provides different ways to defuse a crisis:

- Countermeasures
- Dispute resolutions mechanisms

2. Peaceful relations

Peaceful relations are are complex relations recovering a complete range of human activities.
Traditionally and for a long time, the first aspect of International Relations has been the political
aspect. Since then, many other aspects have been added like cultural, economic, social and
technological ones.

B. THE DIFFERENT SYSTEMS OF INTERACTIONS ON THE INTERNATIONAL SCENE

A second distinction affects different techniques of international relations.

- The relational system: it refers to traditional diplomatic relations.

- The institutional system: this system consists in creating legal structures to satisfy a
particular general or regional need.

The institutionalisation of international relations, force a specific approach, nor exclusively or

principally legal. The realities of the international life, are social and political. Legal formulas we
encounter are always the resultants of past historical political, diplomatic, economical, technical,
geographical, cultural and religious circumstances.

III. THE OVERRUN OF THE TRADITIONAL CONCEPTION OF INTERNATIONAL

RELATIONS

1 Charter of the United Nations or Charte of San-Francisco, 26 juin 1945

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States can be dominated by certain actors of international relations life who are no subjects of the
international relations (such as transnational companies)2. Interests groups and lobbies can represent a
real opposition against States (environmental movements3).

As a consequence the legal frame is often inadequate to approach international relations.

In a traditional perspective, international relations relate to the states external activities: study of
diplomatic relations and legal relations between governments, study of international activity structure.

International relations can be summed up to a few essential topics such as :

- Peace and international justice
- War and disarmament
- Development and cooperation

2 Importance of oil companies in Nigeria

3 Japan wales, Green Peace, Sea Sheperd case,

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 CHAPTER 1: MAIN NOTIONS

I. THE INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS PURPOSE

Circumstances which justified the need of thinking international relations like an autonomous
discipline belong to the Post World War era. Mutations of the World since this period explain
nowadays necessity of redefining their object and need to enhances their analytical tools.

Political science is a 20th century invention, but international relations are quite recent. The first
specialised chair appeared in 1919 in Wales University before being adopted by all anglo-saxon
universities. This field of study was certainly explored by the past. Some consider that Jean-Jacques
Rousseau4 is the first author of the discipline. Others, consider that Hobbes5, Machiavel 6or
Thucydides7 were the pioneers concerning the researches on the “international” (a word invented in
1789 by Jeremy Bentham). Others refer to Philippe-le-Bel8 legal team which elaborated the concept of
“sovereignty”, or refered to the 17th and 18th century legal advisers which associated the two concepts
of “natural law” and “people right”.

However, international relations became an autonomous field of research thanks to the combined
effect of three factors:
- The First World War
- The transformation of 19th century European stability mechanism
- The American refusal to fulfil the role assigned to them after their determining
intervention in the 1917's, build up a general reflection on the role of power and the
finalities of diplomatic objectives.

These three factors contributed to a double distinction:

- International relations were discussed through a new approach with distinctive methods of
diplomatic history and international law which descriptive or normative vision did not permit
to apprehend all of the international life's factors.
- The new discipline was dissociated from states domestic politics, and was dedicated to the
study of the international anarchical relations.

4 1750
5 1500
6 1500
7 408 BC
8 1300

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 II. THE CAUSES OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS EVOLUTION

A. GLOBALIZATION
The political sphere used to take precedence over economic, cultural and ideological spheres. The
intensification of economic and financial relations, the amplification of information and
communication networks, the improving of international transports shows that cross-borders relations
are beyond the control of states.

Apart from transnational relations, a new type of international relations developed beyond the
control of states. This development resulted in 2 consequences:

Stanley Hoffman made a clear distinction between two competing logics:

- High politics
- Low politics

Traditional international relations theory assumes that all conflict can be resolved politically, which
brought in a uniform thinking frame. This political primacy is contested by secondary actors, currently
capable of imposing their own functional logic or to reject State intervention.
Currently, a much more complex pattern takes the place of this unitarian tension resolution pattern. In
fact, in this pattern, the political demands enter in a conflictual state with other demands, for instance
economic ones.
Some authors consider that the states have totally lost their control over new non-state actors.

Less arbitrarly, it is possible to consider that, difficulties encountered in this field of international
relations can be explained by the shock of concurrent logics: States must take note of evasive
strategies and avoid other actors on the international scene, which explains the protest over their
hegemonic position in the international life.

B. The 1989 SHOCK AND THE FAILING of ANTICIPATING

1. Internal order and outside disorder

Despite the Cold War military escalation, USSR didn’t collapse due to a direct military confrontation.
USSR’s collapse wasn’t the result of external factors, but caused by the consequence of internal
movements leading to an implosion. However, Emmanuel Todd anticipations of USSR's end, were
based on demographical data and statistics.

E. TODD, La Chute finale, 1976

In this publication Emmanuel Todd forecast the soviet system collapse based on the falsity of official
statistics. He points out a manipulation of statistics to legitimate the political system.
- High suicide rate ( because of a deep suffering of the population)
- High child mortality rate (making the whole technological and industrial strucuture go down)
- Delivery of Shoe cargoes originating from USSR (Disruption of the planned economy)

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 - Fall of the Eastern Communist block under the pressure of the european homeland elites of
USSR.

In addition, we may think that cross-border exchanges development (trade, finance, communication…)
created interdependence between states which could have influenced the two blocs in order to avoid
the use of violence.

This change in perspective leads us to consider that internal order was more fragile than previously
envisaged, while international anarchy was less disorganised than formerly supposed.

2. Reconsider the concept of State

The term “State” has been used indistinctly to qualify a sovereign political authority.

Two phenomena contributed to change this old paradigm:

- The deepening of European integration
- In the same time, studies on decisional process pointed out the diversity of operational logics
within a single State.

This State was previously considered as an autonomous and neutral entity. State and government were
merged and governmental authorities had the monopoly of diplomatic representation.

The international relations in the 20th century can be divided into four periods :
- The first period extends until the First World War
- The second period extends from the Versailles treaty to the Second World War
- The third period corresponds to the Cold War
- The 4th, represents the contemporary post Cold War period

This outcut is at the same time arbitrary and crucial.

This is justified for two reasons:

- Each period corresponds to a specific balance of power:

o 1900-1945: multipolar
o 1945-1989: bipolar
o 1990 – today: unipolar but…

We can notice that each of these period can be characterised by the recurrence of the subject of the
“end of globalization”. Moreover, each period can be regarded as an evolution of diplomatic system.
Between both World-Wars, Paul Valéry thought to experience the beginning of the “ending World”.

The four periods studied in this Chapter correspond to different modalities of the functioning of “
diplomatic system”. Selection criteria are thus, essentially political and grant a dominating place to the
analysis of diplomatic relation and to the war. The State is thus, placed in the centre of international
life but, his freedom of action is confined by the constraints put by every type of configuration.

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A part of the diplomatic system, this environment constitutes what Marcel Merle the “Arrangements
System” (systheme de force) determined by different factors, which nust me strongly considered by
political actors in each of their decisions processes.

Consequently, the international system under each of these 4 periods is framed by the combination of
two main situations:
- A particular diplomatic situation
- A particular arrangement system

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 CHAPTER 2: THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY

I. INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY MEMBERS

Contemporary international society is made of different actors:

- the States
- International Organisations
- Emerging actors, which cannot dictate the course of international action even if there are quite
important: individuals, peoples, non-governmental organisations, transnational firms…

II. RELATIONSHIPS WITHIN THE INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY

A. DOCTRINAL APPROACHES

There are as many theories of international relations as researchers.

2 major schools of thought : each of them subdivided but completing each other

- Realists: they agree on 4 main ideas

o The predominance of a political environment characterised by a confrontation
between states relationships and transnational flows
o The anarchy resulting from an international society, which is regulatable.
o The presence of a structure framing the freedom of action of every international entity
composing the international system
o The favour expressed for a general theory of international relations

- Transnationalists: they agree on 4 main ideas

o The permanent and non achieved clash between state order and transnational non
State controlled flows.
o A globalisation trend leading to localisation reactions
o Development of networks organising outside of the state’s territorial logic
o The promotion of the international relations sociology

1. Realistic approaches
These approaches used to be the most popular of international relations discipline:
- They focus on conflicts
- They develop analysis based on State power
- They tend to suggest that international society is stable only if the arrangement system is
balanced.

a. The study of conflict

There are different ways to approach conflicts:

- Marxist approaches: they focus on economic factors in order to explain international
relationships organisation and explain conflicts by domination and exploitation phenomenas.

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 - Geopolitical approaches: they focus on several physical, economical and human
geographical analysis of conflicts.

b. Power relationships

International relations are power relationships. Power is a complex notion which must be distinguished
from the notion of force.

Some authors promoted this realistic approach of international relations: Hobbes, Machiavel,
Morgenthau, Aron highlighted the role of the State, the confrontational nature of relations and
minimising or even cloaking cooperation phenomena and international law's body of standards which
rules the international society..

On 1993, Samuel Huntington (American professor) went further in this theory, believing that
forthcoming conflicts will be the result of cultural oppositions, civilisation oppositions 9. He identified
height civilisations:
- Occidental
- Slavic and orthodoxe
- Islamic
- Hindu
- Confucian
- Japanese
- Latin American
- African

Six arguments underline his theory:

- Differences between civilisation are the consequence centuries-old process are essential

9 S. HUNTINGTON, The clash of civilizations, 1996

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 - Interactions between people of different civilisations are multiplying and enhance
paradoxically, the feeling of difference;
- The economic modernisation reduce the influence of ancient local identities. It weakens the
State identity role.
- The Western World is perceived as being as attractive and repulsive at the same time.
Attachment from elites to the Western is decreasing breaking ideological bonds.
- The sense of belonging to a civilisation is very difficult to change
- The progressive regionalisation of the global economy reinforces the sense of belonging to a
civilisation because the regional integration process is the consequence of the rooting in a
common local civilization.

Moreover, Huntington identifies different source of conflict such as the frontier of Islamic
civilisation. He concludes that Occident threatened by an Islamic and Confucian anti-western axis.

2. “Transnationalist” or “solidarist” approaches

2 different schools promote this way of thinking:

- Federalists:
Georges Scelle systematized a federalist conception which consider that international law express
the will-force and solidarity between individuals.

- Functionalists: (D. MITRANY & M. VIRALLY)

These authors consider that technical international organisations have the function to transform,
formulate and gather member-states interests.

In other words, the organisation monitors a socialisation process.

III. INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY OR INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY?

In ordinary language, the expressions “society” and “community” or “ international system”, are
indifferently used. However, these expressions do not have the same meaning.
At the end of 19th century, a German, sociologist, Ferdinand Tönnies introduced a distinction (that will
be taken up by Max Weber thereafter):
- The term “society” designates a link that gathers members, bond or opposed by their interests.
- The term “community” designates a link that gathers members bound by close and harmonious
relationships

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 IV. THE TRAITS OF INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY

A. AN AMBIVALENT SOCIETY

The international society is almost defined by contradictions. It is organized into institutions, governed
by specific rules framing the States behaviour. However states do not always respect those rules. This
society goes from regulation to anarchy, from order to disorder.

B. INTERSTATE SOCIETY VS. TTRANSNATIONAL SOCIETY

The State remains the main component of the a Society of coexistent between sovereign States, so still
an interstate society.

However, today’s reality of international relations reveals the presence of a transnational society
which actors are developing their activities “Through boundaries overwhelmed by unstoppable
humans, capital, licit and illicit goods movements, terrorists and traffickers movements.”

C. GLOBALIZED OR FRAGMENTED SOCIETY ?

1. Globalisation

In 1919 Paul VALERY spoke in “The era of the end of the world is beginning” about the new
globalisation phenomenon of the beginning of the XIXth century.

a. Economic globalisation

The phenomenon is particularly important in the fields of economy and finance. Many economists
consider that the globalisation of economy is the culmination of the “ western modernity ”, a process
which began with the rise of capitalism.

The establishment of a new multilateral frame for trading is materialized by institutionalisation of

free-market rules (General Agreements on Tariffs and Trade, World Trade Organisation) and by the
will of monetary rule’s stability.

However, the globalisation phenomenon is not achieved yet. The world multilateral reorganisation
with new integrated regional areas is accelerating. In Europe, unification is the result of a double
process of deepening and widening of, for instance, the European Union. A new form of supranational
political organisation will be emerging from this process in a few decades.

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 b. Cultural globalisation

Liberal principle aims to achieve universality. It intrinsically rejects cultural diversity. Globalisation
means cultural hegemony.

2. A deeply fragmented society

a. The rise of nationalisms and fundamentalisms

Nationalism generates exclusions and inclusions:

- The collapse of official ideologies accelerated its expression giving nationalism the possibility
to become both a mobilisation and legitimation instrument.
- Also, the decay of the State model increased (Africa: Liberia, Sierra-Leone, Somalia, Congo,
Côte d’Ivoire, Rhodesia)
- Claims emanated from smaller and smaller communities. (Nationalist fever in de Balkans led
to a return to the past, perceived then as a virtual future.)

b. The ills of under-development

Under-development or poverty, is a major challenge, an essential key issue for international relations
on de 21st century.

Almost 3/5 of the 5 billion developing countries’ inhabitants are living without the most basic food
hygiene. Almost 1/3 lacks access to clean water and ¼ lacks adequate housing. 1/5 lacks access to
modern healthcare and 1/5 of children doesn’t achieve primary school.

Inequalities between rich northern countries and poor southern countries are rising, especially
concerning access to healthcare. (e.g. HIV). This virus progressively cripples the economy in many
states due to a lack of skilled labours.

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 CHAPTER 3: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS CONSTITUTIV FACTORS

I. MATERIAL FACTORS

A. GEOGRAPHICAL FACTOR
Some authors pointed out the influence of climate, soil type, relief and vegetation on states. Others
explained and justified states’ foreign policies according to natural factors.
The vastness of the state territory is an important data.
Localisation is another very important point.

However, “new geography”, which developed in the last decades of the 20 th century, set out to be
strictly anti-determinist, instead treating geography as one essential part of the context of possibilities
and constraints that face foreign policy decision makers. Pioneers in this approach were the
international relation scholars, Harold and Margaret Sprout, who characterised environmental
determinism as follows:

“In practice, strict environmental determinism has generally referred to the thesis that some of set of
environmental factors, less than the total milieu, is sufficient to account for… both the psychological
behaviour of human beings and the empirical outcomes of their undertakings. Applied rigorously, this
philosophical posture envisages man as a sort of chip in the stream of history. He is borne along by a
current which he is incapable of resisting, within a channel from which he cannot escape. “

B. THE DEMOGRAPHICAL FACTOR

- First statement: the global population double every 30 years and currently reaches 7,5 billion
people.
- Second statement: the population is unevenly spread across the world and the population
growth is faster in the south than in the north.

Several factors should be taken into account in the analysis of the demographical impact: age pyramid,
educational level, medical condition, migratory flows.

C. ECONOMIC, FINANCIAL AND MONETARY FACTORS

There are three main views :

- Liberal view: the political relations autonomy from economic relations
- Marxist view: interdependence between political relations and economic relations
- Realist view: interaction between political relations and economic relations.

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 D. TECHNOLOGICAL AND SCIENTIFIC FACTORS

Scientific discoveries and technological advancement have noticeable effects on international

relations. Authors like Marcel Merle, consider this factor as being determining. Implications are
various, positive on one side and negative on the other side. Progress has erased all distances between
the States thanks to, the creation of new instant communication tools and the ever growing usage of
new information technologies. Progress profoundly changed the worlds strategic perception by the
developing of sophisticated military technologies and transformed diplomatic practices.

E. MILITARY FACTOR

The arms race is timeless, general and multi-form. It concerns all regions of the world and all types of
conventional or nuclear weapon systems.
Militarisation implies the implementation of considerable human, material, financial, scientific and
commercial meanings. The presence of disproportioned military arsenals, including Third World
countries, in our present-day realities, represents surely a patent danger for the maintain of peace and
stability through the World.

II. INTELECTUAL FACTORS

A. IDEOLOGICAL FACTOR
Holders of a small portion of authority, are those diffusing a message aimed to nationals and to the
world, sometimes counterbalanced by counter ideologies. May they be global or limited to interstate
relations (Marcel Merle). functional or dysfunctional (P-F Gonidec), ideologies are as much a source
of affirmation as of concealment. Therefore, nationalist or religious influences on the global scene,
since 1990, are difficult to contest.

B. INFLUENCE OF MEDIAS
Main media impact (TV, newspapers) on international relations is undeniable.
International public opinion is a reality shifting through time and space, with the capacity to operate
through various forms and originating from States, transnational movements or individuals of different
nationalities, united in the pursuit of a common goal. Confronting the international system, public
opinion performs a double function resulting in its regulatory and destabilizing role.

C. POLITICAL LEADERS PERSONAL DIPLOMACY IMPACT

Numerous examples illustrate major actions taken by a government , modifying the course of
international relations thanks charismatic influences or political actions.

D. LEGAL FACTOR

The production of written or customary international norms, has an important impact on international
relations, even if the formulated legal norms are not effectively applied by the addressed states.

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 CHAPTER 4: THE STATE

- Essential elements also called, “primary elements”: States

- Secondary elements created by States: the International Organisations

These two categories of elements are subjected to international law.

DEFINITION: “A subject of law is the one who is vested with legal rights and which is meant to
respect given obligations”.

In this perspective of an international role-play, states are organized around three main fundamental
and inseparable preoccupations:
- State’s survival
- Wish of power
- Affirmation of its national identity

I. THE CONCERN OF SURVIVAL

Survival. Is an obsession for every Nation or State. At all times kings tried to extend their realm to
assert their legitimacy.

We attended 3 main evolutions:

- A victory even if total, never deletes conquered people, nor eradicates nations (Germany,
Italy, Japan).
- The triumph of the anglo-saxon liberal model, imposed the idea of the major importance of a
common interest and a smooth working international economy.
- The advent of nuclear weapon raises the issue of human species survival.

II. THE DESIRE OF POWER

The haunting idea of the disappearance and the desire of power get all mixed up. Power is then felt as
a necessity for survival.

States have assets such as such as territory, population, raw materials, economic and financial
resources, foreign presence (trade, investments, reputation, language…) are only resources to foment
power.
All equilibrium is only the temporary result of a heterogeneous and evolutionary force configuration.
Once acquired, Power reveals to be quite binding, evanescent, misleading. Every Empire knows that
its power and its survival have a price :
- the price of distribution of economic wealth
- the price of the recognition of cultural, religious and national differences.

Finally, every power decreases because it originate from:

- The tiredness or the confusion of so much responsibilities
- Heavy weighting commitments

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 - Budgetary, financial or military arbitrations becoming more delicate on State level
- A feeling of incomprehension
- Certain fixations on Symbols

All those arguments do not mean that power is only an illusion, International relations are only the
results of power relations and finally, power balances.

Power is nor a data, nor a quality but a sub-product of a phenomena or a calculation which has led a
State or several States to the Center of international relations game at a given instant.

III. AFFIRMATION OF THE NATIONAL IDENTITY

A. WHAT’S IDENTITY?

Any man of power is governed by what he is or by what he believes he is, like:

- A higher power depository
- An essential mediator between past and future
- A guardian of the national identity

The quest for identity can be:

- An ultimate manifestation of the right of people to self determination
- A search of a cultural independence
- A contestation of westernisation
- A search of news points of reference: religious, national, regionals

B. IDENTITY, WHAT FOR?

To demonstrate its differences and positions.

In Europe identity quest takes on particular importance.

Copenhagen declaration adopted by 9 European states on 197310, provides the beginning of an answer
: “The Nine European States might have been pushed towards disunity by their history and by selfishly

10 December 14th, 1973, Declaration on European Identity

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defending misjudged interests. But they have overcome their past enmities and have decided that unity
is a basic European necessity to ensure the survival of the civilization which they have in common.

The Nine wish to ensure that the cherished values of their legal, political and moral order are
respected, and to preserve the rich variety of their national cultures. Sharing as they do the same
attitudes to life, based on a determination to build a society which measures up to the needs of the
individual, they are determined to defend the principles of representative democracy, of the rule of
law, of social justice — which is the ultimate goal of economic progress — and of respect for human
rights. All of these are fundamental elements of the European Identity. »

IV. STATE AND NATION

In everyday language these too terms are often used interchangeably.

The Nation, as a more political than legal concept, holds an emotional dimension.

DEFINITION (nation): “A human grouping characterized by awareness of its unity and a community
of traditions, culture, expectations, reflected in a will to live together.”

DEFINITION (State): “grouping of individuals within a given territory under the sole and exclusive
authority of a government”.

The State can be defined as:

- A human community: a population
- standing on a defined space: a territory
- having a legal system of government
+
- With international legal personality
- Depositary of sovereignty

A. A HUMAN COMMUNITY: A POPULATION

There is no State without population.

1. The concept of nationality

Nationality is the legal bond between an individual and a particular State. This concerns all subjects of
law: private persons, legal persons, boats and aircrafts.

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In the Nottebohm case 11 from 1955, the International Court of justice stipulated that each State is
sovereign when it comes to determine the conditions for obtaining or losing their nationality. As a
result, certain people have no nationality (stateless) and others get several nationalities (double or
triple nationality).

Conditions for obtaining nationality differs from a country to another:

- Filiation: jus sanguinis
- Birth or residence on the territory: jus solis
- A combination of both these criteria (e.g. Israel confers nationality to every Jew people living
on its territory).

11 ICJ, 6 avril 1955, Nottebohm Case (Lichtenstein vs. Guatemala)

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 2. Nationality’s prerogatives

a. From the internal scope

i. Nationals
Nationals usually enjoys the rights of their state:
- Right to vote, eligibility, access to civil service posts
- Free access to the national territory
- Right of residence, public freedoms
- There are also subject to the obligations of the national law (fiscal obligations, military
service)

ii. Foreigners
Foreigners are subject to a less favourable regime:
- No right to vote, ineligibility, no access to civil service posts
- Strict conditions of admissions and presence on the national territory

b. From the international point of view

The nationality bond enables the nationals asking the national authorities for diplomatic protection
when they suffer damages due to an infringement of international law.

In the Nottebohm case the ICJ stated that “by taking up the case of one of its subjects and by resorting
to diplomatic action or international judicial proceedings on his behalf, a State is in reality asserting
its own right-its right to ensure, in the person of its subjects, respect for the rules of international
law.”12.
In this same case the ICJ specified the nationality bond concept: “According to the practice of States,
to arbitral and judicial decisions and to the opinions of writers, nationality is a legal bond having as
its basis a social fact of attachment, a genuine connection of existence, interests and sentiments,
together with the existence of reciprocal rights and duties”.

12 P.C.I.J., Series A, No.2, p.12, and Series A/B, Nos. 20-2I, p.17

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The increasing of international migratory flows raised new challenges about:
- International protection
- Legal status
- Labour legislation an social protection

B. THE TERRITORY
Internationalism’s fundamental purpose is: “No State without territory”. So territory is a key issue for
the States.

1. Land space
The land space is the apparent area on the earth’s surface.

For the contiguous waters separating two states, this is harder to determine the exact limit of state’s
territorial sovereignty.
The most ancient theory adopted by Roman Law, was to determine the centre line. Each State has the
ownership of the waters until the geometric centre of the watercourses’ usual level. (This practice has
been used for the Rhine limit and for numerous treaties).

Another theory and practice, dating back to the Middle Ages is to draw a border line on each state’s
bank: “Rhenus ex una ripa galliae, ex altera germaniae lines”. The river part between the two States
is considered a neutral area.

A third practice is to make use the “ Talweg line”. It represents the ideal line traced into the deepest
part of the waterbed, where waters are the fastest and profoundest. For navigable rivers this is the line
used by boats to paddle down the watercourse.

2. Maritime space

Various spaces can be distinguished.

a. Inland waters
They are designated by ports, bays, harbours, fjords, and the part of the sea between the low-water
mark and the shoreline.

Inland waters are an integral part of the state’s territory.

b. Territorial waters
According to a customary rule, the Geneva Convention of April 29th 195813, taking place on the
territorial sea and the contiguous Zone specified that State’s sovereignty extends beyond the land
borders and inland waters, based on a customary rule. The State also has a sovereign control on the
territorial sea: the area of the sea adjacent to the national coasts.

13 April 29th 1958, Geneva Convention on the territorial sea and the contiguous Zone

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In the fisheries case in 195114 the International Court of Justice (ICJ) specified: “It is the land which
confers upon the coastal State a right to the waters off its coasts.”.

The jurisdiction of the State also concerned the soil, the sub-soil and the airspace under and over the
territorial sea.

The territorial sea width has been questioned but:

Montego Bay convention on the law of the sea 15 specified that the territorial sea cannot extend beyond
12 nautical miles (= 13.8 miles = 22.2 km = 22 224 meters).

c. The exclusive economic zone (EEZ)

Coastal states get an EEZ equal to 200 nautical miles (230 miles = 370km) from the baselines of the
territorial sea. (the EEZ includes the territorial sea).

Within the EEZ the coastal state enjoys two prerogatives:

- he has sovereign and exclusive property on living and minerals water resources, soil and
subsoil.
- He has rights to prevent and contain pollution, and to regulate scientific activities.

However, the ship traffic is free, just like on the high seas.

d. The high seas

Beyond the EEA (Exclusive Economic Area) we find the high seas. The highs seas are unlikely to be
appropriated.

3. The airspace

The airspace legal status appeared with the Paris Convention on 1919 16:
- Each state has complete and exclusive sovereignty on the atmospheric space over its land
space, its inland waters, and its territorial sea.
- This principle has been confirmed by the Chicago Convention in 1944 17 and the Geneva
Convention in 195818.

Other consequence of the agreement evoked, led to the creation of:

- The International Commission on Air Navigation in 1919
- The International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) in 1944

4. Outer space

The outer space is the space beyond atmospheric space.

14 ICJ,December 18th 1951, Fisheries case, (United Kingdom vs. Norway)

15 Montego Bay convention on the law of the sea, December 10th, 1982.
16 Paris convention on air navigation, October 13th, 1919
17 Chicago convention on International civil aviation, December 7th 1944
18 Geneva convention on the high seas, April 29th, 1958

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Under the initiative of the UNO’s General Assembly, a treaty has been adopted in 1967 and included
two main provisions:
- The outer space and celestial bodies are unlikely to be appropriated by States.
- The outer space and celestial bodies are available to the States as long as they are exploited in
a peaceful purpose.

C. A GOVERNANCE SYSTEM

A government can be defined as a set of political and legal structures of each state (executive,
legislative, judiciary, domestic security, external security, police, army, economic organisation).

Moreover, the government should be effective.

D. INTERNATIONAL LEGAL PERSONALITY

This legal person quality leads to important consequences in the sense that:
- It implicates a State continuity throughout time
- It helps understanding acts of Government’s actions are no more their responsibility but the
responsibility of the State.
- It activates the international responsibility mechanism.

E. THE COMPETENCE OF THE STATE

1. Territorial sovereignty
Sovereignty is the most important characteristic of the state.

The concept of sovereignty was firstly theorised by Jean Bodin and enshrined by the Westphalia
Treaty in 1648.

a. A negative content: What sovereignty isn’t ?

Sovereignty is the absence of any kind of subordination

b. A positive content: What sovereignty is?

Sovereignty is the set of State’s competences and prerogatives

2. The exclusivity of competence

The principle of exclusivity gives the State the right to oppose other states interferences on the
national territory.

22
 3. The full jurisdiction

Generally spoken, the State is competent in exercising its power against all moral or physical
person living on its territory.

4. A full autonomy of competence

The qualified authorities of a State get the full and complete freedom of decision. Autonomy is the fact
to obey to norms of our own.
To forward the idea that a State is autonomous, means that it is only bond by rules of formation from
which it has participated or for which it has agreed to.

23
 CHAPTER 5: RECOGNITION

I. RECOGNITION OF A STATE

A. NATURE AND SCOPE OF THE RECOGNITION

Two conceptions traditionally oppose:

- Attributive or constitutive conception:
- Declarative conception:

The recognition of a State is not only declarative, because its purposes is to notice the existence of
this new State without conferring any legal quality it already possesses. This declaration doesn’t assert
nor the State, nor its Sovereignty.

This approach is shared by:

- The Institute for International Law, in its Resolution of 1936 Resolution, during the Brussel's
session.
- Bogota Charter or Organisation of American States (OAS) Charter, April 30 th 1948, Article 13
“The political existence of the State is independent of recognition by other States. Even before
being recognized, the State has the right to defend its integrity and independence, to provide
for its preservation and prosperity, and consequently to organize itself as it sees fit, to
legislate concerning its interests, to administer its services, and to determine the jurisdiction
and competence of its courts. The exercise of these rights is limited only by the exercise of the
rights of other States in accordance with international law. »
- the decision of the German-Polish Mixed Arbitral Tribunal of 1919 concerning Poland.

However, recognition is not a legal useless mere formality.

This explains that the first preoccupation of a State is to be officially recognised (by its peers). A new
State's legal situation is to the same before and after its recognition.
- A new State doesn’t need recognition to factually exist as a State.
- By contrast, a non-recognised new State cannot coerce other States to consider it as an equal.

Only recognition formally enshrines at all levels, the relations between this new State and those
recognizing it.

24
 B. HOW TO RECOGNISE?

State recognition is a free and discretionary legal act.

1. Stimson doctrine
The Stimson Doctrine is a policy of the United States federal government19, acting as a non-
recognition of japanese territorial conquest in Mandchuria. The doctrine was an application of the
principle of ex injuria jus non oritur.

1931, Japan occupies Mandchuria and makes it a State satellite, named Manzhouguo. Named after
Henry L. Stimson, United States Hoover Administration (1929–33), refused to caution this conquest,
by stating that changement in the international order brought by armed or lethal force (and in
contradiction with the Birand- Kellogg Pact of 1928) could not be diplomatically recognized without
acceptance of the Society of Nations. This consequences had as an origin the implication of the USA,
wanting to maintain the Versailles system.

After the second World-War, the existence of a duty of non recognition of a New State or every
situtation coming from the usage of illicit force, has been confirmed by solemn texts, even if it seems
prematured to affirm that this notion could've been adopted by Positive Law.

2. De jure and de facto recognition

“De jure” recognition is a definitive, full, irrevocable and complete that produces the complete effects
of recognition.

The “ de facto” gratitude is a temporary, revocable gratitude and which produce only limited effects.
She understands in a concern to help a group which establishes in State or in the concern of a State to
protect and save its interests.

19 Stated in a note of January 7, 1932, to the Empire of Japan and the Republic of China.

25
 “De facto” recognition should not be confused with the implicit recognition which is a modality of
“de jure” recognition.

C. FORMS OF RECOGNITION

1. Individual recognition and collective recognition

In nearly all cases, each state individually recognises the new state.

2. Express recognition and implicit recognition

Express recognition, as the most prevalent form, supposes the adoption of a legal act more or less
solemn, clearly expressing the States will it recognizes.

Tacit or implicit recognition are deducted of certain fact or acts usually saved for inter-state
relationships.

II. RECOGNITION OF GOVERNMENT

The question of the recognition of a government in a pre-existing State is crucial. A government being
replaced by another one, does not catch the interest of other States. A position-taking can be even
considered as an interference in domestic policy.

By such type of recognition, a State admits the effectiveness of a new Government, arising from
confusing political circumstances.

A. THE RECOGNITION OF GOVERNMENT LEGAL SCOPE

There is a complete analogy between State and Government. This is a legal declarative act based on
the effectiveness of new governmental authorities.

The only significant differences being:

- The recognition of the Government is revocable
- The validity of the acts taken by the previous Government cannot be contested when
recognition takes place in the context of a State succession.

B. THE RECOGNITION OF GOVERNMENT IN PRACTICE?

The recognition of government is within the discretionary power of each States.

It is a frequent situation and always of current events, stemming from the fact that no armed faction
manages to take a decisive advantage.

26
 III. OTHER KINDS OF RECOGNITION

A. RECOGNITION OF INSURGENT AND BELLIGERENT ORGANISATIONS

Internal insurgency questions national unity and government effectiveness. It affects peoples security
and goods. Therefore, it forces States to take position to protect their own interests.

Rising from customary practice insurgency and belligerent’s recognition leads to inflect traditional
international mechanisms before the reality of troubles with a doubtful issue, represented by a mix of
national and international conflicts. (Angola, Eritrea, Mozambique, Chad, Cambodia, Lebanon,
Afghanistan).

Today, international practice insist on the humanitarian reach of insurgents recognition (rights of
fighter as individuals, protocol II of Geneva 1977).

The set up of legal order is opposable to the subject of International law. In the conduct of the
conflict, the insurgents have to respect the rules of the Law of war.

B. RECOGNITION AS A NATION AND RECOGNITION OF NATIONAL LIBERATION

MOVEMENT

1. Recognition as a nation

During the Second World War, the allies have recognised the Czechoslovakian and the Polish nation,
even though, this surprising initiative, did not permit these nations to be actually recognised as formal
subjects of international law.

2. The recognition of National liberation movements

It is the only form of recognition that has been used in situations of contemporary decolonisation
processes. This kind of recognition has merely the same scope and effects than belligerents’
recognition.

27
 CHAPTER 6: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

I. INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS TRADITIONAL INSTRUMENTS

A. NATIONAL BODIES

The Ministry organises within Governments, a particular hierarchy defining at each level very precise
competences. The primacy of the Ministry of External Affairs, or of its representative in the conduct
of diplomatic relations, is recognized by article 41§2 of the Vienna Convention of April 18 th 1961,
article 41§2 stipulating : “All official business with the receiving State entrusted to the mission by the
sending State shall be conducted with or through the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the receiving
State or such other ministry as may be agreed.”

The Ministry is entitled to the privileges and immunities based on custom law and international
comity. It is also competent to ensure the enforcement of international conventional law into the
domestic legal order.

B. DIPLOMATIC BODIES

Until 1815, diplomatic rules were customary law. In 1815, during the Vienna Congress, European
monarchies tried to formalise these rules in writing. However, they only agreed on a text about
diplomates hierarchy.

November 21st 1818, the protocol of Aix-la-Chappelle completes the Vienna settlement.
In 1927, the states failed again to formalise the customary law. The Cold War incidents forced the
UNO to ask the International Law Commission for a written proposition. (December 5 th 1952)

On April 18th 1961 the Vienna Convention formalized the existing customary rules and introduced
new solutions without threatening the general regime structure rising from the costum. This treaty took
states’ aspirations and technical progress into account (Telecoms).

The convention enters into force on April 21st 1964. On December 8th 1969 it was supplemented by
the Vienna Convention on Special Missions. Since 1977, the International Law Commissions works
on the status of diplomatic mails.

28
 II. DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS

A. ESTABLISHMENT AND BREAKING OF DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS

Article 2 of the Vienna Convention of 1961, stipulates: “The establishment of diplomatic relations
between States, and of permanent diplomatic missions, takes place by mutual consent.”

However, “Whereas, while no State is under any obligation to maintain diplomatic or consular
relations with another, yet it cannot fail to recognize the imperative obligations inherent therein, now
codified in the Vienna Conventions of 1961 and 1963, to which both Iran and the United States are
parties”20

The breaking of diplomatic relations is also a discretionary power and unilateral decision of the State,
as well as the establishment period of those relations.

B. THE DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS MODALITIES

1. Permanent diplomatic mission

a. Accreditation

Because of diplomatic personnel lack and budgetary savings several States do multiple accreditations.
The Vienna Convention of 1961, article 5 stipulates: “The sending State may, after it has given due
notification to the receiving States concerned, accredit a head of mission or assign any member of the
diplomatic staff, as the case may be, to more than one State, unless there is express objection by any of
the receiving States.”

Some States use common representation. Several states can accredit the same head of mission in the
same host state (cost-effective, states solidarity). Vienna convention, article 6: “Two or more States
may accredit the same person as head of mission to another State, unless objection is offered by the
receiving State.”

20 ICJ, December 15th 1979, Case concerning United States Diplomatic and Consular Staff in
Tehran.

29
 b. Diplomatic mission organisation

According to the Vienna convention, mission’s members are:

- the Head of mission or head of diplomatic post
- other staff members:
o Diplomatic staff members: diplomats
o Administrative and technical members
o Staff service members

c. The role of diplomatic mission

- Represent the sending State on the receiving State territory
- Protect sending State interests and its nationals interests
- Negotiate with the receiving State government
- Investigate about events evolutions in the receiving State and to communicate information to
the sending State government
- Promote friendly relationships and develop economic, cultural and scientific relations.

d. Special missions

This special regime was subsequently fixed by the Convention on special mission on December 8th
1969.
1st Article: “A “special mission” is a temporary mission, representing the State, which is sent
by one State to another State with the consent of the latter for the purpose of dealing with it on
specific questions or of performing in relation to it a specific task.”

C. DIPLOMATIC PRIVILEGES AND IMMUNITIES

Diplomatic agents were attributed exceptional guarantees to make their task easier. These diplomatic
guarantees are called “privileges and immunities”.

1. Privileges and immunities of the diplomatic missions

a. Liberty of official communication

Vienna Convention of 1961, Article 27: “The receiving State shall permit and protect free
communication on the part of the mission for all official purposes. In communicating with the
Government and the other missions and consulates of the sending State, wherever situated, the mission
may employ all appropriate means, including diplomatic couriers and messages in code or cipher.
However, the mission may install and use a wireless transmitter only with the consent of the receiving
State.”

b. Inviolability
This rule bounds the receiving State (certifying State), that shouldn’t violate diplomatic premises and
properties.

30
Moreover, it must make all necessary arrangements to ensure their protection and thus, prevent all
damages that could be occasioned by uncontrolled elements21.

2. Privileges and immunities of diplomatic agents

a. The inviolability of human person

It means that the receiving State must guarantee his absolute security. The Vienna convention from
1961, specified that receiving State cannot apprehend or hold diplomatic agents.

b. Jurisdictional immunity
The diplomatic agent enjoys immunity for criminal jurisdiction.

However, there is no jurisdictional immunity amongst problems concerning:

- An agent’s property on the receiving state territory
- Inheritance
- Independent and commercial job practiced by the agent in addition to its official functions

c. Tax exemption and customs taxes exemption

Article 34 of the Vienna convention, stipulates tax immunity excepting for:
- Property taxes on private property

d. Privileges and immunity of agent’s family members

Vienna convention article 37 stipulates that family members get the same privileges than agents
themselves as long as they are not nationals of the receiving state.

e. Privileges and immunities of other mission’s members and private servants. (art. 37)

21
ICJ, December 15th 1979, Case concerning United States Diplomatic and Consular Staff in
Tehran

31
 III. CONSULAR RELATIONS

A. ESTABLISHMENT AND BREAKING OF CONSULAR RELATIONS

The establishment is subject to the rule of mutual consent 22.

Consular relations are mostly administrative.

B. CONSULAR RELATIONS MODALITIES

1. Exequatur
Each head of consular post is provided a letter of entitlement by his sending State.
A State can also appoint a foreign citizen to such a position.

2. Consular functions
They fulfill administrative functions.
This administrative function dates back to the 12th century. Traditionally, Italian republics appointed
consuls in Levant’s ports to control maritime traffic and protect their expatriated nationals.

Article 5 of the Vienna Convention of 1963, stipulates that consuls are charges with:
- Protecting sending States interests and nationals (private persons and legal persons)
- Developing commercial, economic, cultural and scientific relationships
- Fulfilling administrative functions: civil status, legal assistance, passports, visas, boats control,
aircraft control and crew control.

3. Consular privileges and immunities

These privileges and immunities are conceived to be purely functional

22 Vienna Convention on consular relations, April 24th 1963, article 2 and

article 4

32
 CHAPTER 7: INTERNATIONAL ORGANISATIONS

First initiatives driven by Emmanuel Kant, Jeremy Bentham only improved traditional cooperation
proceedings. Saint-Simon books title foretold this evolution “De la réorganisation de la Société
européenne ou de la nécessité et des moyens de rassembler les peuples de l’Europe en un seul corps
politique en conservant à chacun son indépendance »23 (On European society reorganisation or on the
necessity to gather European peoples as a single political body while maintaining their national
independence.)

Some attempts of evolution in time: international public services, international river commissions
(Rhine, Danube), attempts of unions mostly of administrative nature (Pan-American Union in 1910).

The First World War impact provoked a real revolution. The League of Nations was created by the
Versailles Treaty on April 28th 1919 for the scope of maintaining peace and solidarity between
democratic peoples and to prevent a new international conflict.

In the aftermath of the Second World War, States were convinced that the search for peace could only
be achieved by a reinforced international organization.

In the same time geographical and ideological local solidarities developed:

- Between Western States: European Community, Atlantic alliance, OECD, IEA
- Between communists States: COMECON, Warsaw Pact
- Between the Third World States: OAU, OPEC

23 Claude-Henri de Rouvroy de Saint-Simon, De la réorganisation de la Société européenne ou

de la nécessité et des moyens de rassembler les peuples de l’Europe en un seul corps politique en
conservant à chacun son indépendance, 1814

33
 I. INTERNATIONAL ORGANISATIONS MAIN CHARATERISTICS

A. CREATION AND COMPOSITION

1. The constituent act

The International organization only exists through a multilateral treaty, nearly a “birth certificate”
coming from an external initiative.
States express their will and consent through the constituent act to the appearance of a legal person
which functioning will impact the content or exercise of its own competences (sovereignty). Each
State should demonstrate its desire to enter the organization.

2. The entrance into organizations

The Vienna convention on the 23 May 1969's law of Treaties 24, describes international organizations
as intergovernmental organizations:
Article 2 1. i.: “International organization means an intergovernmental organization.”

a. The right to enter international organizations

Without any exception, international organizations constituent acts are open to the States. IT cannot
be otherwise because those treaties emanate from States.

However, nothing prevents non-States authorities, entering an international organization such as:
- Non-sovereign territories
- Temporary political authorities
- International organizations

24 Vienna Convention on the law of treaties (with annex), Concluded at Vienna on 23 May 1969

34
 b. International organization entry practices
The problem doesn't settle for the native States, those responsible for the creation of the international
organization. We consider that they participated in the conference of elaboration of its essential
Charter and that they signed her at the end of the conference. The native States co-opted mutually at
the same time of the initiative and it is their consent which generated the international organization.
Native States co-opted mutually at the time of the initiative and its their consent that generated the
international organization.

c. Admission criteria
- Organization’s objectives:
o Solidarity
o Geographic criteria
o Economic and social criteria
o Ideological criteria
o Procedural criteria for the international organizations which belong to a family of
international institution

d. Control procedures
The constituent act always provides for application’s control procedures. This is a major impediment.

3. The withdrawal from international organization

a. Voluntary withdrawal
The withdrawal of a State is similar to the denunciation of the constituent act of the organization.

Vienna Convention on the law of treaties, 1969, art. 54: “The termination of a treaty or the
withdrawal of a party may take place: In conformity with the provisions of the treaty; or At
any time by consent of all the parties after consultation with the other contracting States.”
Vienna Convention on the law of treaties, 1969, art. 56: “1. A treaty which contains no
provision regarding its termination and which does not provide for denunciation or
withdrawal is not subject to denunciation or withdrawal unless:
o It is established that the parties intended to admit the possibility of denunciation or
withdrawal; or A right of denunciation or withdrawal may be implied by the nature of
the treaty.
o 2. A party shall give not less than twelve months' notice of its intention to denounce or
withdraw from a treaty under paragraph 1.”

But for the European Community (EU) there was no procedure until 2009.

If the constituent act does not provide a clear-cut answer, is it possible to refuse a withdrawal?
- The withdrawal may be stopped if it put the organization in a difficult financial situation.
- The withdrawal may be stopped if it led to a lack of member-States

35
 - The withdrawal may be stopped if other States can prove the intuit personae aspect of the
constituent act

b. Forced withdrawal
Eviction, expulsion or exclusion from an organization must respect the international law of treaties.

Sometimes the constituent act provides for less radical sanctions:

- Suspension of the member’s rights and privileges
- Suspension of the right to vote

UNO Charter:
- Article 5: “A Member of the United Nations against which preventive or enforcement action
has been taken by the Security Council may be suspended from the exercise of the rights and
privileges of membership by the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security
Council. The exercise of these rights and privileges may be restored by the Security Council.”
- Article 19: “A Member of the United Nations which is in arrears in the payment of its
financial contributions to the Organization shall have no vote in the General Assembly if the
amount of its arrears equals or exceeds the amount of the contributions due from it for the
preceding two full years. The General Assembly may, nevertheless, permit such a Member to
vote if it is satisfied that the failure to pay is due to conditions beyond the control of the
Member.”

II. INTERNATIONAL ORGANISATIONS TYPOLOGY

A. ORGANISATIONS WITH UNIVERSAL or WORLDWIDE MISSION

AND REGIONAL ORGANISATIONS

two coexistent tendencies:

- Universalism
- Regionalism

Universalism is pointed out as the ideal which can’t be totally achieved because of:
- Political motivations
- Geographical solidarities motivations

B. COOPERATION ORGANISATIONS AND DECISION-MAKING

ORGANISATION

There is a noticeable difference between simple cooperation organizations States keeping their total
sovereignty amongst their Member States and international organizations which enjoy an autonomous
decision making power, giving them a supra national character.

The first category get an overwhelming majority on the international scene.

The second category is mainly represented within European construction.

36
 CHAPTER 8: THE NEW ACTORS IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

I. NON GOVERNMEENTAL ORGANISATION (NGO)

A. DEFINITION and EXTEND OF THE PHENOMENON

UNO charter, article 71: “The Economic and Social Council may make suitable arrangements for
consultation with non-governmental organizations which are concerned with matters within its
competence. Such arrangements may be made with international organizations and, where
appropriate, with national organizations after consultation with the Member of the United Nations
concerned.”

The phenomenon amplified all along he 20th century. There are thousands of NGO over all continents.

NGO intervene in varied domains but mainly in four categories:

- Corporative organizations
- Technical organizations
- Social and humanitarian organizations
- Organization dedicated to research

1. NGO

NGO and IGO organize meetings to complement international UNO conferences on major problem of
today’s society (environment, demography, social development, transnational criminality, women’s
issues). NGO are part of normative processes, sometimes they participates implicitly to rules
elaborations, implicitly or explicitly (e.g. ICRC on humanitarian laws).

NGOs are differently appreciated by several authors, getting attributed as having “a significant role
in international policy” (J. LAROCHE). Other consider they get “a modest role” (D. COLLARD)
supporting the preeminent role of interstate relations on the international scene.

2. Transnational firms

a. Definition

Transnational firms raise numerous practical difficulties.

As a corporation, a transnational firm is based in a State which exercise production or distribution

activities in several States via foreign branches, with a parent company which define the global
strategy.

There are approximatively 60 000 transnational firms overs the worlds, 500 000 foreign branches,
employing more than 90 millions workers. They represent 25% of the global production. In 1998,

37
foreign branches made a 11 000 millions dollars turnover. (UNCTAD, 2010 Report, “Foreign Direct
investment and development’).

b. Transnational firms’ strategies

Transnational firms initially appeared in Europe first, then in the USA and Japan.

This internationalisation process is manifested by repurchases, merges with other companies or

investments in equity in order to control production, research and selling processes.

However, it can be noticed that during the last fifteen years, transnational firms’ strategies have
evolved. They no more provide all capital and technological contributions but they only federate local
actors. This strategy limits their own investment and ensures competition between States to obtain
industrial implantation or important contracts.

c. Relations between transnational firms and developing States

This problem has been historically approached through two different perspectives:
- On a first hand, until the mid 1980s: States considered transnational firms as a danger.
- On a second hand, ince the 1990s: States favoured FDI through subsidiaries, by liberalising
their investment codes and the granting of numerous opportunities amplified by the
phenomenon of deterritorialisation of economic activities and deregulating stock markets.

The success of the ones, conditions that of the others However, the international competition that
North America, Europe and Japan are engaged, is partially made by the intervention of the STN, “real
engines of the integrated system of world production.”

This concentration and this “size critical” race, are the consequence of the phenomenon of
globalization which characterizes the end of the Millenium and always arouses questionning and
concerns.

3. Individuals
In 1972, Professor Jean-René Dupuy asserted that : “Man is a private person in exile in the society of
States. The dialogue between man and the State took place within the same borders: democracy was
instituted to the extent of the State. It is to him that man entrusted his preservation, and his
participation in international life was only mediate.”25

25
R-J DUPUY, Le droit international, Ed. PUF, Coll. Que sais-je, 1972

38
 CHAPTER 9: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS HISTORY

I. THE END OF EUROPEAN CONCERT (1900-1918)

International relations studies consider that 20th century began on March 1890, as Bismarck had been
forced to quit his positions of Chancellor. This departure marked the end of the Bismarckian model26.
which ensured since 1870 the prevalence of Germany in Europe, isolating France diplomatically.

A. THE WESTERNISATION OF THE WORLD

Beginning of this century, international relations were mainly ruled by diplomatic considerations.
Events considered as being important were political ones and major actors of international life were
Governments, diplomats and soldiers.

However, the latters were led to consider new economic constraints. (1) On the same time, the
European intellectual climate and diplomatic orientations were mainly dominated by the
universalisation of western model. (2) Finally, domestic political requirements progressively impacted
foreign policies by the extension of democracy which favours the emancipation of civil society (3).

1. Globalisation and imperialism

26 Domination cycle, not German model domination.

39
As it was measured in relation to it's economic opening rate, Europe was more open in 1900 than one
century later, in 2000. (P. Bairoch et R. Kozul-Wright).

According to John Maynard Keynes, globalisation became a reality beginning with the end of 19th
century. A double dynamic led to an opening of societies and economies to the outside world: an
unprecedented wave of immigration and mobility of the Capital.

European population doubled over the 19th century, increasing from 260 million inhabitants to 450
million inhabitants. This demographical growth, combined with massive underemployment and
restrictive wage policies (Jacques Adda), caused 34 million departures from Europe between 1871 and
1914. This emigration wave was mainly from Britain to Commonwealth dominions (South Africa,
Canada, Australia, New-Zealand).

It expanded then to Germany and Scandinavian States. The third emigration wave was formed by
Mediterranean and Slavs. The USA became the favourite host country with 29 million newcomers
between 1861 and 1920. However, Latin American and Oceanian virgin territories were a highly-
coveted destination too.

Extreme mobility of the Capital was the second globalisation driver. This movement of capital
balanced commercial restriction out, due a generalisation of European protectionism beginning in
1870. The total amount of the investments placed abroad raised from 40 billions gold-franc in 1870 to
120 gold-franc billions in 1900, up to 210 gold-franc billions in 1913 (René Girault).

The return to protectionism provoked a massive financial globalisation, even stronger than in the
economic sector. Raw material finding was of secondary importance in the decolonisation process
because the major industries prioritised European extracted minerals transformation (iron, copper,
zinc…). Colonial population were too poor to buy European products.

Three phenomenon explain such an essentially financial dimension of this globalization:

- Absence of exchange rate control public mechanism
- A stable monetary system based on national currencies convertibility into gold
- Industrial and financial activities combination within the same structures, for instance,
holdings

These holdings had large amounts of capital thanks to economies of scale and low wages and searched
abroad for more attractive placements than those mainly offered by national markets. In the case of
France, foreign investments became higher than domestic investments since 1877.

Imperialist theories explained colonization by the creation of big Monopolies, fusing industrial capital
and banking capital to give birth to big financial groups and aiming at exporting their capital on a
world-wide scale.
If financial circles often joined the “colonial party”, they acted in their own name and interest which
rarely encountered diplomacies nationalist preoccupations .
The fall of Bismarck, caused partially by his refusal to take part at the colonial adventure, marked the
end of the German primacy in Europe.
It's also possible to notice that colonies absorbed very unevenly European capital. On a basis of 45
Billion francs, place abroad by France in 1913n only 3 Billion were invested in the Empire against 13
billion in Russian loans.

40
On the contrary, Great Britan invested 8 times more than France in its colonies. The imperialism, thus
presented itself as the demonstration of the emancipation of economic actors. The latter showed
themselves in measure tu escape the political control, while being capable of influencing big
diplomatic orientations.

2. Resistances to the universalization of occidental values

Beginning of the XXth century, International relations second characteristic was mirrored by the
acceleration of the westernisation of the World which, by reaction, unleashed radical oppositions.

Beyond those economic aspects, colonisation was lead by a triumphant Europe in the name of
civilization values.
In the United-Kingdom, R.Kipling was the representative of the “ jingoîsm” movement, a form of
nationalism assigning the British, the mission of educating colonial populations (commonly seen as “
the burden of the white man”).

In France, Jules Ferry mentioned in 1885, rights et responsibilities of superior races towards “inferior
races”, in order to justify its colonial politic.
This state of mind found its intellectual origins in Auguste Comte's positivism doctrine, which
considered that industrial society was beneficial for the whole Humanity.

The industrial production had to let all peoples to go from the “ metaphysic age”, represented by the
pre-eminence of war, to the “ scientific age”, where exploitation of nature had to become humanity's
centre of occupation.
Rare were the authors, taking position with Max Weber against this deterministic universalization of
the western model.

It is hard to distinguish the respective influence of political or economic considerations of humanistic

preoccupations in the colonial expansion of Europe.

The fight against slavery was an excuse invoked by the United Kingdom in order to establish the
Anglo-Egyptian protectorate on Sudan.

During the same time, “ intervention for humanitarian causes” have multiplied and served often as an
alibi to political ambitions:
- British military intervention in Egypt during 1882.
- Threat of British landing in the Dardanelles following the massacre of the Armenian population by
the Kurds supported by the Kurds (1897), French operation in Fès in 1911…

Those interventions aroused reactions of identity rejection.

The resistance was then lead in the name of religious or cultural grounds ( the holy war in Mahdi and
Sudan from 1890 to 1898).

41
In the case of the rebellion of the Chinese boxers, the hostility to the European penetration was the
principle motive of secret societies which assassinated the German Minister (Ambassador) in Beijing
in 1900 and who organized the siege of legations.
This questioning of diplomatic rules seemed enough grave so that the European powers forget their
antagonisms and form a coalition in which participated the United States and Japan.

3. Civil Societies emancipation

The beginning of the XXth century, was finally marked by the increasing influence of public opinion
in favour of parliamentary democratic expansion , of the development of public instruction and of the
place taken by the press in political life.
In front of less and less popular colonial operations, European Governments had to take into account
the reactions of a Civil – society in the course of emancipation27.

The two waves of anarchy attacks which rattled France between 1892 and 1894 (assassination of
President Carnot) and during 1911-1912, have been the most radical manifests of this Trial of State.
The libertarian individualism which motivated them, recused all instrument of social constraint under
the double emblem of anti-militarism and anti-patriotism.

On another Mode, the resistance against the “ Kulturkampf ” lead by the German State against the
catholic Church, forced Bismarck to renounce to all cult controls in 1880.
Although, Germany, the State dominating Europe, could not achieve its purpose to bring to hell
syndicates and socialist movement.

This emergence of civil society took place essentially inside of the States. This civil society also had
international impacts. Those impacts came out as a development of a very active pacifist wave and by
the announcement of new problems:

27 At the beginning of a coordinated action between a political and media sphere with divergent interests
but, which finally complete each other.

42
The pursuit towards peace was sufficiently powerful to make the idea of general strike against war
grow and express itself.
The IL' international socialist, reunited in Stuttgart in 1907, did not achieve the purpose of making this
principle of general strike being accepted by the German labour movement.
This failure hid the success of the pacifist mobilisation in Sweden, forcing the government of
Stockholm to renounce at the project of forcing to respect the union treaty with Norway.
The dispute took on such an extent that the Swedish State had to renounce to its war-waging
intentions and accept independence of Norway by the treaty of Karlstad of 1905.

The weight of public opinion was also expressed by the enunciation of new problems: ecology and
humanitarian considerations.
The birth of ecology in 1866 pulled to the beginning of awareness on the necessity of acting
collectively in order to protect he environment. An arbitrary sentence from August 18 th 1893 tempted
to preserve seals of the Bering sea, by reducing the hunting season.
The failure of this device lead to the adoption of the 1911 Convention, forbidding hunting at sea.

The development of humanitarian preoccupations was the second manifestation of the role of civil
Society. Since 1863, this manifestation has given proofs of its capacities of autonomous organisation
with the creation of the International Committee of the Red Cross. The conference of La Haye, in
1899 and 1907, dedicated to the armed conflicts, have demonstrated the sensibility of diplomacies
regarding public opinion's preoccupations.

The School of legal pluralism incarnated this autonomous claim of civil society, by contesting the
States pretensions to detain the Law's monopoly. According to the precursor, of this doctrine, the
Austrian jurist Eugen Ehrlich, the Law is the product of social strengths (real sources), the State only
being their interpret ( formal sources ).

A spontaneous law thus exists, rising from Society. This Law is thus, anterior to its enunciation by
the States: each social group elaborates its own rules which are generating obligations and duties
without any necessity to resort to the State's constraint.
This distinction subsequently lead Harold Laski to negate the States sovereign unity, because of the
the diversity of individual's allegiances and of the fraction of their loyalism.

43
B. THE GLOBALISATION OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

Two parallel evolutions contributed , around the beginning of the XXth century, to the rise of a really
world-wide diplomatic system.

1. As Great Britain accelerated the process of independence at its dominions ( Australia in 1900, New-
Zealand in 1907 and the south-African Union in 1910), the United – States and Japan invested
respectively in Latin America and North-East Asia and claimed consequently the status of major
power. (A)
2. On the ancient Continent, the diplomatic system imperfectly multi-polar evolved towards a bipolar
configuration. Far from being a factor of stability, this confrontation between alliances (Triple alliance
or Triplice and Triple agreement) aggregated and amplified the tensions until the explosion of 1914
(B).

1. The end of the European primacy

In February 1885, the conference of Berlin had established the rules governing the taking of
possession of colonies in Africa. By forcing the obligation of formal notification to the other
occupation powers of a new territory, Europe had affirmed its will to behave as the only responsible
of the Worlds destiny. In 1914, the colonial empires represented a third of the land masses.
Nevertheless, this ambition came up against the emergence of the new extra-European poles of power,
the United States and Japan.

a. The United-States, strongest Nation of the World

Beginning 1890, the whole surface of America was occupied. The foundation myth of the border
became blurred and the United States began to open themselves up to the world by adopting European
practices, despite their anti-imperialistic tradition bond to the Independence -War.

According to the Monroe doctrine of 182328, the United-States to get involved into European Affairs,
this opening has been a privilege for the American continent.

28 Obama's Speech : « l’Amérique passe de 10 ans de guerre au renouvellement économique »

44
The United-States estimated themselves, being sufficiently powerful to confront Europeans. In 1895,
the government of Washington confronted the British about a Anglo-Venezualian dispute related to a
border delimitation of the Britain Guiana.

The american determination forced London to retreat. In 1898, the Congress took sides with cuban
pro-independence groups and forced the White House to declare War to Spain. Three months of
hostility were sufficient for the American marine to destroy two Spanish squadrons in the Caribbean
and Philippines. This victory gave the United – States the possibility of taking possession of the
Philippines and Porto-Rico, as well as annexing the Hawaiian islands and establish a protectorate on
Cuba. In 1903, the United – Kingdom has been exclude from the piercing operation of the Panama
Canal which were going to transform the west-Indian Sea into an “ American lake”.

This will asserted by power, allowed the United States to claim the right to be represented in big
international conferences. In 1899, they participated to the first conference of La Haye and the
president Theodore Roosevelt took the initiative to reunite a second conference in 1907 in order to
prepare the obligatory arbitration.
In 1905, the United States took position as a mediator of the russian-japanese conflit with ended then,
on the American territory by the signing of the Portsmouth treaty. At last, their real entry on the
diplomatic scene29 bzgan during the beginning of the Algésira conference (1906) which temporarily
settled the Moroccan question, about which French and German people were in conflict30.

In 1913, the United-States which had become the first industrial power in the World, exported for the
first time of their history more capital than they could receive. Staying at distance from the War, given
the importance of the German community, the United – States massively lending English and French
Governments and eventually dreaded a German victory.

The excessive submarine war engaged by Germany beginning of January 1917, has lead to their war
declaration in April 1917. The million men of the expeditionary force and the tanks of Pershing, made
the difference and placed the United – States in a position to promulgate new international rules (see
the 14 points of President Wilson from the 8th January 1918)31.

29 Rupture with the Monroe principles

30 Espagnol – Anglais
31 Announced league of Nations + ma y against the ideal but EUROPE did not adopt only 4 points from
the 14 = immense hope disappointed by liberation of colonies.

45
 Les 14 Points de Wilson

1. Free and open-space treaties: public peace negociation

2. Absolute freedom of navigation on seas
3. Retreat of all economic barriers, establishement of equality conditions of trade amongst all nations
desiring peace and joining in order to maintain it.
4. National armement reduced to compatible necessity with the interioir security.
5. Adjustment free of colonial territories
6. Evacuation of the whole russian territory and regulation of all questions concerning Russia, i order
to assure the most valuable and a free cooperation between World Nations.
7. Evacuation of Belgium
8. Evacuation of France and return to Alsace of Lorraine.
9. Réajustement des frontières de l'Italie et la limite des nationalités.
10. Dismembering of Austria and Hungary according to the people.
11. Evacuation of Serbia, Montenegro and Romania.
12. Regions of ottoman Europe (non turcs) before their autonomy + permament opening of the
Dardanelles strait.
13. Creation of an independent polish State + access to the sea.
14. Creation of general nations association.

b. Japan, regional power

In 1853, the mission of commodore Perry had forced the opening of japanese markets to american
products.
In 1865, the oriental powers imposed the Shogun/ Treaty of Shimoneski Constitution revision, which
consecrated the Japanese victory on China. This intervention created an institutionnal crisis putting an
end to the Shogun era (1867)32.

The SHIMONOSEKI TREATY

Also known under the treaty noun of « Maguan » in China, it has been signed at Shimonoseki the 17th
of April 1895 between the japanese Empire and the Qing Dynasty, putting an end to the chinese-
japanese war of 1894-1895.

Consequences : China had to give Formose and its islands to Japan, today Taïwan, the Pescadores,
the peninsula of Liaodong (acniently Liao-Toung) with Port Arthur and recognize Coreas
independence which, will get under japanese protectorate, subcribe a 740 Millions yuan war
compensation and open 7 ports to japanese traders.
The treaty will enter in revision by the triple russian, german and french intervention.

The Meiji era began in 1868 with the restauration of the ancient imperial monarchy, for the purpose of
modernising the country and giving it the opportunity to resist to western influence33.

32 Seigneury - military Feudalism = dress rehearsal

46
In less than 4 years, Japan transformed into an industrial power34. The need for raw materials,
combined to a european protectionism, led Japan to search for new opportunities Asie.

The clash with european interests and principaly russian ones, was inevitable.
The victory of Tokyo in the chinese-japanses conflict from 1895 was the first clue of an expansion
willingness. European pressures forced again the Japanese to give up to the advantage of a victory
and primarily, to give up their protectorate on Kora and Port Arthur.

However, Japans isolation has been quite short because in 1902, Great Britain contracted a defensive
alliance with Tokyo. This treaty gave Japan the power to defy the Russians, positionned at
Vladivostok. The War began in February 1904, by a surprise attack of the Russian squadron at Port
Arthur and endend in May 1905 with the russian fleet disaster in the Tsushima detroit.
This victory had considerable impacts, because it has been considered as the first defeat of the white
man.

Russian – Japanese War

Prefigures the 20th century wars :
- by its duration : 1,5 years
- by its engaged forces : 2 million men
- by its casualties : 160 000 dead, 250 000 injured, 30 000 prisoners
- by the exploitation of modern techniques : logistics, communications and
intelligence, combined ground + sea operations, preparation length.

The Portsmouth treaty (mediation of Rooselvet on September 5th 1905) allowed the Japanese to
stenghten their influence on the region. The annextion of Korea (1910) has favored the pentration in
the Southern Manchuri, where the Japanese had been attributed the concession of the zone of south
Mandchourian Railways.

33 The Constitution of 1989 is a « copy – stick » of the German consitution of the same time,
giving much power to the emperor. In practice, the generals managed the polycies outside of Japan.

34 In 1910

47
In 1908, the japanese influence in the Pacific was sufficiently strong to make the USA negociate with
Tokyo a status-quo in the region, Russia has no dominant rôle in Eastern Asia anymore.

2. Epilogue of the european concert

Bismark's Germany has dominated Europe thanks to an alliance system that had isolated France and
neutralized Great Britain (the sleeping partner of the Triplice interested in the Balkans).
The event of William II in 1888 and the desire of a new emperor to engage himself into new colonial
adventures, was rejected by Bismarck and ended the german pre-eminence.

Erros of its successors allowed France to rebuild its own alliance network.

The encounter of Triplice and Triple Alliance succeeded in managing the colonial disputes but, did not
resist the explosive situation of the Balkan.

a. The end of french isolation

German diplomatic errors lead essentially to the recomposition of France's alliance network, first with
Russian then with Great Britain.

If no existed between France and Russia, monarchic solidarity had nevetheless lead Moscow to
choose the gernam camp (Alliance of the 3 Emperors of 1872, treaty of counter insurance de 1881,
reinssurance treaty of 1887).

Tensions in the Balkans, where Austria's interests, ally of Germany, where conflicting with Mosco's
panslavic politics, lead Russia to get closer to Paris.

In opposition to the french-russian relations, relations between London and Paris remained tense
because of the colonial antagonisms. The Fachoda case threatened to degenerate into an open-war in
1898, when the French wished to open a liaison between Dakar and Djibouti, which cut of the british
road linking Cairo to the Cap. Again, Germany's attitude contributed to seal an alliance which seemed
impossible.
The german support to the anglo-netherlandish resistance in the Transvaal province (1898) and
particularly, William II's strong will to be equipped with a naval army fleet comparable to the Royal
Navy (1898) favored the french-british link.

48
 The Fachoda incident

The Fachoda incident is a serious diplomatic incident which brought into conflict France and
the United Kingdom in 1898, in the advanced military post of Fachoda in the Sudan (today,
South Sudan).

The colony of captain Marchand coming from the french Congo, tried to outstrip the British
expedition of Kitchener. France wanted to realize a junction between Dakar and Djibouti.
Great Britain wanted to realize a junction between Cairo and congo. In front of the
superiority, Great Britain evacuated Fachode and loss the whole pond of the Nile for the
benefit of the United Kingdom.

Four years hardly after Fachoda, the agreement 8th April 1904 checked the colonial disputes between
both countries and sealed the debuts of the cordial Agreement but the links between both countries
have been altered durably.

Le rôle of the french diplomacy was much more active during the improvement of french – italian
relations. Italy had joined to the Triplice in reaction to the protectorate forced by France on the bey of
Tunis in 1881.

This french-italian opposition in the Mediterranean sea caused a customs war, which started in 1887
on the initiative of Rome. The italian economy suffered from these measures which compromised the
politics of grandeur of the ministry Crispi, which fell in 1896.
The link with France began in September 1896 with the signature of an agreement which settled the
Tunisian dispute.

After having recognized their mutual rights on Morocco (for France) and the Tripolitania (for Italy),
both countries signed in June 1902 a secret agreement, by which, Italy made a commitment to remain
neutral in case of french-German war. The success for the French diplomacy was considerable,
beacause he allowed to weaken the Triple alliance, in which Italy always participated.

b. The confrontation of alliances

In 1905-1907, the diplomatic situation of Europe was simplified by the confrontation between two
alliances. The french system of alliances, weakened by the English -Russian rivalry, was strenghened
by the english-russian Treaty of august, 1907 which settled the dispute between these two countries
about Persia and in Central Asia (the Tibet and Afghanistan).

The Triple Alliance appeared then as an implicit mechanism of alliance gathering three countires
united by three different treaties. On the contrary, Triplice gathered Germany, Austria and Italy in the
same treaty signed in May, 1882 and seen out three times (on 1886, on 1891 and 1902). Triplice was
nevertheless affected by the French-Italian secret agreement of 1902 and by the obligation made in
Italy to give up both provinces of Trentin and Tirol and the region of Trieste, possessions of Austria.

49
Against all odds, this confrontation equilibrated all colonial claims. The moroccan question had nearly
missed to bursting out into an open war between France and Germany during the tanger crisis of
March 1905. This first crisis was first settled by the Algésiras conference; which reunited between
January and April 1906. The moroccan question came out in 1911, as french troops became active in
Fez. Germany reacted by sending its naval force to the Agadir Port. The british support to France
helped again finding a negociated solution.
The treaty concluded in November 1911, recognized to France the right to establish its protectorate on
Morocco, in exchange of french territorial concessions in Congo given to Germany.

Nevertheless, the european diplomacy was incapable of finding a durable solution to the provoked
tensions in the Balkan area originating from the weakeneing if the turkish Empire and by the will of
Austria to reduce the russian influence on slavic states of the region.

After the italian-turkish war of 1911, the region's states created the Balkanic League. The latter
declared immediately war to Turkey. The first balkanic war began in Mai 1912 and ended in
December 1912 by the turkish armisitce.

A conference organized in London, under the authority of the great powers, organized the session of
all turkish territoires of Europe, excepted the region of Constantinople. The austrian policy, which was
opposed to the serbian expansion by the creation of Albania and the incapacity to find a pacific
solution to the division of territories taken to the turks, have lead Bulgaria (supported by the Triplice)
to attack Serbia (supported by the Russians and the French).

This second Balkanic war began in June 1913 and ended by the victory of the Serbs in August1913, a
victory which exacerbated the austrian-serbian antagonism.

The assassination in Sarajevo in June 28 th 1914, of the heir of the austrian throne by a bosniak
activist sponsored by the Serbian Secret Services, demonstrated the incapacity of the european concert
to slow down the race for war and pushed Europe into the precipice of the first Worldwide conflict.

Albert Demangeaon (1872-1940) : student at the Ecole Normale supérieure, qualified teacher of
History and Geography, has an economic approach, he justifies in his book « Le Déclin de l'Europe »
(« The Fall of Europe ») ( 1 amongst 12, more than 100 articles written).

Oswald Spengler (1880 – 1936) : « Der Untergang des Abendlands » 1918, the hstory of Humanity
is perceived like the history of progress and developement. The theory of cycles : decline after the
ascencion of cultures.

50
II. THE INTERWAR PERIOD AND THE SECOND WORLD WAR (1919- 1945)

Europe will not stay up after the first world conflict. The 13 Million dead and the birth deficits broke
the rise of a civilization which became conscious of the inevitable caracter of it's own demise.

Symbol of this spirit of mind, the publication of « The Demise of Europe » by Albert Demangeon, has
been followed up two years later by the work of Spengler on « The Decline of the West ». To deal
with this announced decline, the interwar period was thus, a period of refoundation. This imperative
of reinvention of policies applied to the internal questions ( Bolshevik revolution, creation of the
Welfare State). It also concerned external relations, where the loss of credit of the mechanism of the
balance of power aroused the creation of League of Nations. The difficulties of implementation of
those new practices, explained the chronic instability of a period which was characterized by the
fragmentation of the World space (I) and by the absence of an international regulation mechanism (II).

A. THE WORLD SPACE FRAGMENTATION

The pre-war economic and financial globalization has been coupled with a political and cultural
globalization, through the emergence of extra-european powers and by the diffusion of western-values.
The inter-war period interrupted this double-movement . The impossibility to restore a mechanim of
stable exchange combined with the 1929 crisis effects to break the world market (A). The bolchevik
revolution broke besides, the diplomatic unity, which led to maintain an open dialogue between
opponents sharing the same code of conduct (B). Finally, the partition of the central Empires added a
last factor to the territorial crumbling, while the crisis of the State questionned the faith of the
LEAGUE OF NATIONS in the capacity of democracy to pacify nationalisms (C).

B. THE INTERRUPTED GLOBALIZATION

Globalization has not been affected by restrictions on triggered exchanges by the comeback to a form
of protectionism between 1870 and 1914. The monetary instability that prevailed in the interwar years
was combined with the establishment of an autarkic market in the Soviet Union in order to break the
unity of the world market observable before the war.

Outside of Great Britain, which succeeded in restoring the gold parity of the pound, no European
country succeeded in restoring the value of its currency in relation to the pre-war period. The inflation
which stroke the countries, particularly Germany and Central Europe as a whole, accentuated this
monetary instability (in January 1922, a gold mark was worth 46 paper marks, in October 1922 it was
worth 6 billion francs). Consequent devaluations thus contributed to split the world market, which was
divided into small rival entities by the considerable increase in customs tariffs.

51
In 1923 : the annual inflation rate reached 5000 %
In 1922 : 1 $ was equivalent to 200 german Marks
1st February 1923 : 1 $ was equivalent to 47 500 german Marks

After the « War communism » and the NEP, which authorized the recovery of a private sector between
1921 and 1927, the soviet Union went to a planified economy beginning 1928. By organizing the
socialization of all economic sectors, the first fie years plan fixed as a double objectif :
- to destroy the private property
- to extend the centralized prize setting system to the whole economy
Abbandoning all reference to the market, the USSR took the path of an autarkic developement. While
the globalization had previously been translated by the emancipation of the economic players, the
Stalinist voluntarism pursued the work of Lenin by asserting the absolute primacy of politics on the
economy.

The 1929 crisis achieved the world market disruption. Three concomittant effects participated to the
diffusion of the great depression :
- In order to face the industrial mass production, the american administration raised in 1930 its
costums tariffs ()Hawley-Smoot tarif), which had as an immediate effect the reduction of european
exportations.
- In spite of this return to protectionism, the continuing fall of interior prices in the United States
imposed on all the world producers to align itself with the americain prices.
- Finally, the repatriation of the american capital invested in Europe destabilized the whole European
banking system which was not able to face the bakruptcy of Austrian Kredit Anstalt and of the german
Danat Bank.

Because of the fact that the USA became the first economic world power, the stock market crach of
October 24 1929, echoed to the whole planet. The crisis pread has been the last manifest of the
globalization because, coontrarly of what happened during the pre-war period, the instability of the
monetary system did not allow for a return of protectionism.

SPARTAKISTS ( SOCIALIST MOVEMENT FOUNDED IN 1916)

Revolt at the origin of the first labor strike, organized by the KPD of which the spartakists where only
a ranche (division : K.Liebknecht wanted to overthrow the Government with force and Rosa
Luxemburg wanted more negociation.) The SPD chancelor Ebert, decided to repress the revolt with
« Freikorps » to avoid a mutiny amongst the stationed troups in Berlin.

C. THE IDEOLOGICAL RUPTURE

The russian revolution destroyed the unity of the diplomatic system which remained on a community
of shared values and a common language. The participation of state to the World, was based on the
recognition procedure through which States recognized that a newly created State respected the
principles in use and authorized to particiapte to the diplomatic life.

The french revolution had operated to the first rupture amongst this unified diplomatic field.

52
By spreading the ideas of 1789, the revolution had shattered the monarchic consensus and got
percieved as an unbearable intervention into european realms interior life. The Vienna Congress (from
the 1st November 1814 to June 9th 1815) restored the destroyed unity, by forcing France to restore
brutally the monarchic principle as a prize of its participation at the european Concert.
The 1917 Revolution broke again this diplomatic unity. Like in the french case, the bolsheviks made
the suspicion grow around their intention of integrating traditionnal frames, by opposing proletarian
States to wealthy Nations.
As the specter of an overall revolution spread in central Europe (spartakist revolution in Germany in
January 1919, Bela Kun taking power in Hungary in March of the same year), the Third International
created by Moscow in March 1919 published a manifesto announcing « a new revolutionnary era ».
Despite the recognition of swear to the new Soviet power introduced by the treaty of Rappalo between
Germany and future Soviet Union (in April, 1922), Moscow remained isolated by a double cordon,
economic and political sanitaire.

It was necessary to wait for the membership of the USSR in the Briand- Kellog Pact35 in 1929 and pf
the League of Nations in 1934 so that dissipates partially this climate of mistrust. Nevertheless, this
evolution was above all understandable by the internal difficulties of the USSR, which gave up
organizing a world revolution (theme given up during the congress of the peoples of East of Baku in
September, 1920). The consolidation of Stalin's power, combined with the growing dangers in Europe,
however made the antagonism reappear between these two opposite conceptions of international life.
The secret protocol of division of the Eastern Europe annexed to the German-Soviet pact of August
23rd, 1939 and the eviction of the U.S.S.R. of LEAGUE OF NATIONS on December 14th, 1939
following the invasion of Finland by the Red Army, dedicated this ideological break. This one had to
be at the origin of the destruction of " the unpredictable alliance " (J.-B. Duroselle), contracted by the
Soviet Union and the western democracies thanks to the Second World War.

Rapallo: Rompre l'isolement soviétique et allemand après la première guerre mondiale :

- Renouces the reciprocal war seperations
- Reestablishes diplomatic and commercial relations : clause of the most favoredd Nation (in internal
communication; this means that, on one merchandise, the importing country will not force its partner
to pay higher customs tariffs than those recieved on the production of other more favored countries.

35 After the defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte, determine borders, naval army, abolition of the slave trade
(unlike the slavery, the decree Schoelcher in April 27th, 1848), neutrality of Switzerland.

53
- A secret military collaboration will start in 1933 with parallely, secrete training camps in USSR :
the Combat Gaz School in saratov, the Flight School in Liptesk and the Combat Tank training centre
in Kazan.

D. THE STATE'S CRISIS

The State's Crisis was the third dominant trait of the inbetween wars. This crisis affected the modern
State's philosophy through the of :
- the Nation State
- the democracy

It has been amplified by the effects of the crack of 1929 which exposed the lacking organisation of the
public authorities.

Fiume: a buffer state created after the 1st world war between Croatians, Serbians and Slovenians e
For Wilson, it had to welcome the LEAGUE OF NATIONS.

Memel: the Former region of the kingdom of Prussia in East Prussia (German speaking). Creation of
the region of Memel by the treaty of Versailles of 1918, placed under administration of France by
LEAGUE OF NATIONS. It was annexed by Lithuania in 1923, by Germany in 1939 and by the
USSR. Since the dislocation of the latter in 1991, she(it) is a part of Lithuania.

1. The illusions of the Nation – State

The Pact of League of Nations dedicated the principle of the right of peoples to self-determination. To
the antipodes of the Realpolitik, LON intended to establish a lasting peace by the respect for two
conditions:

- The nationalities satisfied by the creation of nation states had to become peaceful;
- These nation states had authority to choose the democratic regime and to live in peace inside and
outside.

None of these two conditions was filled. The recently established States made a commitment very fast
in « force policies ». This aggressiveness has manifested inside towards minorities: refusal in 1919 of
Romania to give to LEAGUE OF NATIONS the possibility of assuring the protection of minorities
installed on his territory (Hungarians, Germans, Ukrainians ...), refusal of Poland to recognize the
plebiscite favorable to Germany in Haute-Silesia (1920), oppression of the Croats by the Serbs in the
Kingdom of Yugoslavia ... External relations were also disturbed by the multiplication of the
takeovers by force and the border incidents: Swedish contesting of the allocation of the islands of
Aaland in Finland (1921), annexation by the strength of Memel by Lithuania (on 1923 ) Annexation of
Fiume by the Italians (on 1923), Italian and Yugoslav interventions in the Albanian internal affairs, the
latent confliction of Greece with all his(her) neighbors... On the other hand, these new States gave fast
up, with the exception of the Czechoslovakia, taking the path of the democracy and were transformed
into authoritarian diets(regimes): ex: regency of admiral Horthy in Hungary, coup d'état of Pilsudski in
Poland (on 1926), coup d'état of Zveno in Bulgaria (on 1934)...

54
2. The antiparlamentarism

The crisis of the democratic regime reached its paroxysm in Italy beginning from 1922 where,
following the march to Rome, the fascist party obtained the full powers of the Chamber of deputies
and the Senate (in November, 1922). In Germany, Hitler also reached the power under the appearances
of the parliamentary legality, being named chancellor by president Hindenburg (in January, 1933). In
Japan, the institution of the universal suffrage in 1925 lead to a greater ministerial instability, which
discredited durably the parliamentary system.
This depreciation caused several aborted attempts of a putsh, until the Coup of 26 th February 1936.

While denying the rebels, the Emperor confided to general Hayashi - who had taken the initiative of
the occupation of Manchuria in 1931 - the care of training the new cabinet. The scenario was even
more brutal in Spain, where the Republic established in April, 1931 did not resist the elections of
1936. While the right had obtained the majority of votes, the « Frente Popular » took him in number of
seats.

In a climate of more and more violent disorders, the murder of a monarchic deputy by the police was a
pretext for general Franco. This one took in July, 1936 the command of the revolt which ends in the
defeat of the Republicans in March 1939.

Somewhere else, the contesting of the parliamentarism took less radical forms but affected durably
the capacity of Democrats to answer to the dangers of totalitarisms. Appeared during the Xxs in
France, the Leagues catalysed the opposition of the nationalist right and fed at the same time on the
ministerial instability (30 successive governments between 1920 and 1934) and of the political
corruption (scandal of the Newspaper of the Franc, fusses Stavisky). February 6th, 1934
established(constituted) the peak of this movement which tried to lay siege of the Chamber of the
Deputies.

3. The lackings of public authorities

The crisis of 1929 revealed finally the organization deficiencies of public authorities. In the United
States, the too much reduced commiment by the federal budget did not allow the ailing firms to deal
with the provoked fall in demand, in full period of overproduction, by the stock market crisis.
According to Charles Kindelberger, the refusal of the republican administration to behave as a lender
in the last resort of economy, was the main cause of increase of the crisis.

In Great Britain, the abrogation of Gold Standard Act36 in September, 1931, was translated by an
unofficial devaluation of the pound which lost 40 % of his(her,its) value in two months.

36 Fix gold weight got abandonned.

55
The implemented deflationary politics(policy) by the government imposed a reduction of
unemployment benefits and treatment(processing) of the state employees, which pulled(entailed)
violent riots and mutinies in the navy. In France, the appeal(recourse) to the monetary creation to
finance welfare expenditures refueled inflation, for a period when the deficit of the balance of
payments (caused(provoked) by the reduction in the pound britannique2) emptied the reserves of the
Bank of France.

This policy succeeded to weaken the Poincaré franc and drove the Laval Government to operate a
deflationnist policy.
This one generated a generalized dissatisfaction, by making support(bear) too brutally to the whole
population the cost of the inflationary politics(policy) followed by the previous governments.

Too expensive (government Tardieu in France or too afraid (reaction of the republican administration
to the United States between 1929 and 1932), public authorities were incapable to bring the
satisfactory answers to avoid the distribution of the crisis. If the Welfare state was the solution to the
crisis of 1929 (simultaneity of the implementation of New Deal in the United States and publication of
John's M. Keynes theories), its laborious genesis revealed the fracture separating government and
citizens.

New Deal: created by Roosevelt, interventionist politics between 1933 and 1938 organized to fight
against the effects of the Great Depression in the United States. The purpose being to support the
poorest classes in the USA, to reform financial markets, to rerevitalize the American economy.

E. A FALSED DEVOLUTION OF POWER

The tensions of the inter-war period found their origin in badly negotiated and badly applied peace
treaties. They were amplified by the abstention of the United States, with refused in March, to refuse
to participate to the LON in 1920.

This devolvement falsified by the power succeeds to attribute in France and in Great Britain the
responsibilities which they did not have the means any more to exercise. The regulation of the
international system hesitated then between two methods: the idealism and the balance of power. The
idealism was embodied in League of Nations but also gained spheres leaders of States (1). By reaction,
the failure of this new diplomacy justified the appeal(recourse) to policies of force which, for lack of
effective mechanisms of collective security, resulted in the second world conflict ( 2 ).

1. Idealism and pacifism

The will of creating radical international mecanisms , different from the past, appearred even before
the end of the War in France where a Commission steared by the lawyer Léon Bourgeois has been
charged to thin, about conditions of the instauration of a durable peace under the aegis of the League
of Nations .

Léon Bourgeois : member of the Parliament of the 3rd Republic, the Nobel Peace Prize in 1920, first
president of the LON. Theorist of the solidarism « Solidarity 1996 », answer to the liberalism and

56
socialism, in order to favor the construction of a Republic based on the mutual insurance and not on
charity. The income tax, the tax on the succession, the pension for workers.

President Wilson resumed these works in his 14th Point which gave to the future international
organization the care to maintain peace. The basic idea of the Unityed States was to replace the
former secret diplomacy, made responsible for war, by a multilateral and public diplomacy within the
Framework of the LON.

The idealism of this new speech had the purpose to found itself on concepts of a longlasting peace
seated on the tryptic of arbitrage, security and disarmament. This deep pacific movement was
represented by 5 points :

1. The collective security.

2. The outlawing of war.

3. The disarmament.

4. International arbitration.

5. The french-german reconciliation and the European union.

2. Politics of strenght

The Versailles treaty (of June 1919) contained in germ, all the factors of instability of this period. The
responsibility of the war imputed to Germany (article 231) made the latte being bond to repair the
damage, while the disarmament which was imposed on him, contradicted the principle of equality
between nations.

By dismembering Austria-Hungary, Saint Germain's treaties (from September, 1919) and the Trianon
treaty (from June, 1920) released the nationalities, in the quite fast disappointed hope, to freeze the
territorial claims in Central Europe. Finally, the treaty of Sèvres concluded with Turkey (in August,
1920) - which was renegotiated by the treaty of Lausanne (in July, 1923) after the victory of Mustapha
Kemal on the Greeks – did not bring a sustainable solution to the instability of the Balkans.

When, in March, 1920, the American Congress refused the membership of the United States to the
LEAGUE OF NATIONS, the new organization was deprived of the military wing which would have
allowed her to enforce by the strength the new international law. Peace treaties focused then all the
antagonisms between partisans of the status quo and revisionist nations. The story of the interwar
period so spells in counterpoint of the idealism of the exposed intentions.

a. The bankruptcy of collective security

LEAGUE OF NATIONS had for mission to promote a new form of public and multilateral diplomacy,
intended to implement a collective security taken out of the frame of the alliances. She came up
against weight of the habits and on the return to the secret diplomacy's old practices.

During all the period, France strove to complete "the encirclement" of Germany. From the twenties,
she restored her system of alliances by signing military conventions with three member countries of
the Small Agreement, established in 1920 by Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and Romania. These
conventions completed the French-Polish Treaty, concluded from January, 1921, which appeared as a
very classic alliance of lapel. The secret diplomacy became again of a current usage, as gave evidence

57
the unpublished military convention crossed between France and Belgium in September, 1920. This
device was completed, in the thirties, by the signature in 1932 of a non-aggression pact with Soviet
Union, which was transformed into pact of mutual assistance in 1936.

This encirclement of Germany and Hitler's ambitions led Germany to make use of the same processes
by the constitution of the anti-Comintern pact, concluded on November 25th, 1936 by Germany with
Japan and spread next year in Italy (in November 6th, 1937). Defensive originally, this Axis was
transformed into offensive alliance by the signature in May, 1939 of the Pact of German-Italian Steel,
which was completed by the German-Soviet treaty of August 23rd, 1939.

b. The failure of the outlawed putting of the war

From the 20s, LEAGUE OF NATIONS was in the incapacity to sanction(punish) the takeovers by
force (Fiume on 1923, Memel on 1924), as to intervene in the current(in class) wars (Russian-Polish
war of 1920-1921, Greco-Turkish war of 1921-22). In spite of her(its) universal character, she(it)
besides gave the impression of losing interest in extra-European conflicts (conflict of the Chaco
between Bolivia and Paraguay, conflict of Leticia between Peru and Colombia). Incapable to intervene
in these confrontations of low(weak) amplitude, LEAGUE OF NATIONS gave evidence of its
powerlessness(impotence) in the first conflicts of the 30s which, by joining, trained(formed) the
Second World War.

The first one of these conflicts had theater the Manchuria.

LEAGUE OF NATIONS failed again in its mission in October 1935, at the beginning of the Italian
offensive in Ethiopia.

Finally, the internationalization of the Spanish Civil War demonstrated that LEAGUE OF NATIONS
had definitively lost any possibility of framing(supervising) the violence. While 20 000 German
soldiers and 40 000 Italians fought(disputed) in 1937 in the side of the rebellion, League of Nations
was blocked(surrounded) by the agreement of nonintervention proposed by the government Blum.
Nonintervention ends in the defeat of the Republicans in March, 1939 and favored the constitution of
the Rome-Berlin Axis in October, 1936.

Lausane conference: organized between June 16th and July 9th, 1932 in Lausanne. It gathers
representatives from France, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Germany to solve the problem of the war
repairs owed by Germany following the World War I, by the Treaty of Versailles.
After the shock of the Great Depression, Germany is in the incapacity to pay the 132 billion
Reichsmarks and the conference returns this amount to 5 billion payable marks after a moratorium of
three years.

After the seizure of power of Hitler, Nazi Germany did not pay off this amount. However, after the
defeat of the Second World War, the international conference of London of 1953 establishes that
Germany would pay off this debt after a possible reunification.

West Germany paid off the main part of the debt in 1980. In 2010, Germany eventually, payed off the
interests.

Anschluss: in July 25th, 1934 - Murder of the Austrian democratic Christian chancellor
Dollfuss,sponsored by Hitler, troubles between Austrian Nazi party and the Austrian communist
party.

1938 - Chancelier von Schuschnigg organized a referendum because he believed that Austrian were
attached to their independence, but it was a failure. Wehrmacht invaded and approve by a large
majority 99 % of Anschluss.

58
4. The increase of takeovers by force

The European Union had been envisaged to weld the French-German reconciliation, negotiated by
Briand and Stresemann. These projects did not resist the resurgence of the antagonism caused by the
definitive abandonment of the repairs during the conference of Lausanne from July1932. This
conference marked the end of a period during which peace treaties remained the referent of the
diplomatic action. Of this time dates the rise of the dangers which, with Hitler's ascencion to power,
had to precipitate the World War II.

The Austrian question was the first symbol of the break with peace treaties. A first attempt of
annexation (Anschluss) had taken place in July, 1934 but had been stopped by the intervention of
Mussolini. Four years later, in March, 1938, the constitution of the Rome-Berlin Axis made possible
this annexation, in front of which the democracies contented with protesting.

Hardly, of this absence of reaction of the democracies, Hitler questioned the spirit of Locarno by
claiming the fastening of the region of the Sudetes, incorporated in the Czechoslovakia but the
population of which was of German origin. The claimings of Berlin seemed to have to result in the
war. An international conference, proposed by Chamberlain1 and Daladier2, meets in Munich in
September, 1938 and gave, contrary to all expectations, satisfaction in Germany.

The occupation of the Sudetes region preceded a dismemberment generalized by the Czechoslovakia,
in which took part Poland, and Hungary, and lead in March 1939 to the disappearance of the
Czechoslovak State.

Again, the passivity of the democracies encouraged Hitler who claimed in March, 1939 the city of
Danzig, claiming(demand) which was a pretext for a more general war to get back territories lost in
1919. Having concluded the Iron pact with Italy (in May 28th, 1939), the signature of the German-
Soviet pact August 23rd, 1939 raised the mortgage of a possible coalition between the democracies
and the USSR. Hitler was then capable of activating(starting) the hostilities, which began 1 " in
September with the entrance(entry) of the German troops to Poland . September 3rd, France and Great
Britain declared war to Germany.

Sudetes: western Zone of Bohemia (30 % at the beginning of the XXth century) - Moravia. German
colonization which goes back to the Middle Ages. King of Bohemia asks German to come to settle
down on lands to cultivate and bring to it their know-how. They become little by little majority in
cities, mutual resentment between the Czechs and the Sudites.

Pol Pangermaniste justified also by the theory of Fichte "the limit of the German nation is the
language." Weltpolitik 1905.

59
III. The COLD WAR (1945 – 1989)

A. Ideological competition and interdependance

1. The public space fencing :

a. The decolonization

The decolonization was the main demonstration(appearance) of this fence(close) of the space. The
division(sharing) of the world in multiple sovereign entities marked the end of the wars of conquest
and contributed to unify the political future of the planet. The progressive membership(support) of
these new States to the UNO imposed the principle of respect for their sovereign equality, principle
which corrected the effects of the territorial scattering bound(connected) to the disappearance of the
Empires.

The decolonization was not made in a linear way.

Package deal 1955: the USSR ends a practice of mutual veto of the USA - every time a State had to
enter the UNO for purely ideological reasons. From there on, the entry of new countries was made in
a automatic way to demonstrate: the Existence, a political Viability.

OVA: organization of the African Union, the charter of 1963 in Ethiopia.

Brief reference to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. Come into effect at signature
of 2/3 of the members native. Today repealed and replaced by the Constitution of the African Union
come into effect in 2002.

Envisaged in the name of the right of peoples to self-determination, the decolonization imposed at the
same time to accept the contradictory principle of the respect for the territorial integrity (article 2 § 3
of the OUA Charter of May 25th, 1963), which meant denying the right to self-determination of
minorities incorporated into the new States. This contradiction was solved to the advantage of the
intangibility of the borders: once the decolonization of the former European colonies(summer camps)
was finished, the right of peoples to self-determination was abandoned for the benefit of the respect for
the territorial integrity.

b. A unified strategical field

1. The appearaance of the nuclear weapon caused first of all a worldwide moral conflict on the dangers
threatening the whole humanity.

First act of the United Nations General Assembly, the resolution 1 (1), adopted unanimously on
January 24th 1946, suggested eliminating all the atomic weapons and from massive destruction.

The signature of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty on July 1st 1968, was the outcome of this
initiative.

2. The clarification of the ballistic vectors established the second stage of opening of this unified
strategic field.

60
By removing the natural boundaries, the intercontinental missiles contributed to annihilate the notion
of distance. Capable of reaching their targets from continent to continent within thirty minutes (seven
minutes for the missiles of Cuba), the ballistic vectors destroyed illusory protection time and reduced
to nothing any possibility of setting up a really credible defensive system.

3. In an ultimate stage, threats of holocaust bound to nuclear power modified the modes of exercise of
the violence. From March, 1953, the Soviet citizens drew the conclusions of the impossibility to resort
to the war in the era of nuclear power (doctrine of the peaceful coexistence). "The confrontation of the
ideas" was then substituted for the armed struggle, as soon as this one risked to result in the
employment of weapons of mass destruction.

This lead to two consequences :

First of all became blurred the border between the peace and the war.

On the other hand, major powers became, directly or indirectly, stakeholders in any conflict, which
represented a demonstration(appearance) located(localized) by their global confrontation.

61
Marcel Merle, pioneer of the sociology study of the international relations. In his works on
international life "he indicated, beside the interstate relations, the importance of the other relations
between other actors and other flows which we could not consider anymore simple contexts and
constraints in actions of States. He is also fascinated by the decolonization. In 1974, his "sociology of
the international relations" at the same time republished and updated, opened the way for the study of
the new international relations and what Bertrand Badie and Marie-Claude Smouts had to call "The
reversal of the world.
Very early reserved face to face by the « néo—réalistic tradition », embodied by Raymond Aron, he
was not for all that an ardent supporter of what we named(appointed) since " the liberal
internationalism " and some more of the neoliberalism, to see even of the humanitarian legalism of
which he did not think capable of replacing " the political internationalism ". Member(limb) of the
committee(commission) " Justice and Peace ", the regular collaborator of The Cross, he was very
attached to it. He(it) was interested in the notion of " international civil society(non-trading company)
". He was especially a professor at the university of Paris I having succeeded Maurice Duverger.

d. Universal international organizations

The exclusion from Soviet Union of LEAGUE OF NATIONS imposed to create a new international
organization.
The principle of this creation was put by the common Declaration of United Nations, adopted on
January 1st, 1942 during the conference of Arcadie1. The meeting of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of
Moscou2 (in October, 1943) held the principle of an international organization based on the sovereign
equality of all the peaceful States and opened to everyone.
As LON, the new oganization suggested establishing a mechanism of guarantee of peace to come.

Peaceful coexistence: doctrine of foreign Soviet politics. Limitation of the confrontation with the
USA to arrive eventually at a Soviet final victory. In 1960: proof which only the dialogue could
involve not to destroy the space human being on earth in case of atomic war.

The subject was approached in Teheran in 1943, when Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin agreed with the
idea of a management board of major powers asked to enforce the principles of the organization, more
the organization of the future landing in June, 1944 in Normandy and the Balkans.
Major powers required however the possibility of bringing into conflict their veto, what made them
obligation to act in unison and what excluded any possibility of intervention of United Nations in their
spheres of competence. Following the Conference of Yalta (in February 4-11th, 1945), the Charter of
the United Nations was adopted on June 26th, 1945 in San Francisco.

The universality of the new organization was confirmed by the participation of the Argentina at this
conference, while this country had refused to make a commitment in the war.

The universality of the UNO also came true in the material point of view by the creation of specialized
institutions.
These were intended to develop the work of the Offices of LON by favoring the international
cooperation in multiple technical domains: FAO for food and agriculture (in October, 1945), WHO for
health (in June, 1946), UNESCO for culture (in November, 1946)...

62
Resolution N 1514 of the UN General Assembly on the granting of the independence in
countires and to the colonial peoples, of December 14th 1960

« General Assembly

Conscious of what the peoples of the world declared themselves, in the Charter of the United Nations,
resolute to proclaim again their faith in the fundamental rights of the man, in the dignity and the value
of the human person, in the equality of rights of men and the women, as well as the nations, big and
small, and to favor the social progress and to establish better living conditions in a bigger freedom,

Aware(Conscious) of the necessity of creating conditions of stability and well-being and peaceful and
friendly relations based(established) on the respect for the principles of the equality of rights and for
the free determination of all the peoples, and of assuring(insuring) the universal and actual respect for
human rights and for fundamental liberties for all without purebred distinction, for sex, for langage
or for religion,

Recognizing the desire passionate about freedom of all the dependent peoples and the decisive
rôle of these peoples in their entry in the indpendence,

Considering the important role of the United Nations Organization as ways to help the movement
towards the independence in trust territories and not autonomous territories?

Recognizing that the peoples of the world wish ardently the end of the colonialism in all its
demonstrations, Convinced that the preservation of the colonialism prevents the development
of the international economic cooperation, hinders the social, cultural and economic
development of the dependent peoples and goes against the ideal of world peace of United
Nations,

63
Asserting that the peoples can, for their own purposes, have freely their wealth and natural resources
without prejudice obligations(bonds) which would ensue from the international economic
cooperation, based(established) on the principle of the mutual advantage, and the international law?

Persuaded that the process of liberation is irresistible and irreversible and that, to avoid grave crises, it
is necessary to end the colonialism and all the practices of segregation and discrimination with which
it comes along ?

Congratulating itself on the fact that a large number of dependent territories reached the freedom and
the independence during these last years, and recognizing the trends(tendencies) always stronger
towards the freedom which show themselves in the territories which have not reached the
independence yet,

Convinced that all the peoples are entitled an inalienable right to the full freedom, to the exercise of
their sovereignty and to the integrity of their national territory?
Proclaim solemnly the necessity of putting quickly and unconditionally at the end in the colonialism
under all its forms and in all its appearences.

And, to this end, Declares what follows:

1. The subjection of the peoples to a subjugation, to a domination and to a foreign exploitation

constitute a denial of the fundamental rights of the man, is against the Charter of the United Nations
and compromises the cause of the world peace and the cooperation.

2. All the peoples have the right to free determination; by virtue of this right, they determine freely
their political status and pursue their economic, social and cultural development freely.

3. The lack of preparation in the political, economic or social domains or in that of the
education(teaching) must be never taken as pretext to delay the independence.

4. Any armed action will be given an end, and any measures of repression, whatever kind they are,
managed against the dependent peoples, to allow these peoples to practice peacefully and freely their
right for a complete independence, and the integrity of their national territory will be respected .

5. Immediate measures will be taken, in trust territories, not autonomous territories and all other
territories which have not reached the independence yet, to transfer any powers to the peoples of these
territories, without any condition nor reserve, according to their will and to their freely expressed
wishes, without any purebred distinction, of faith or color, to allow them to enjoy an independence
and a freedom complete.?

6. Any attempt to destroy partially or totally the national unity and the territorial integrity of a country
is incompatible with the purposes and the principles of the Charter of the United Nations.

7. All the States have to observe faithfully and strictly the capacities of the Charter of the United
Nations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the present Declaration on the basis of the
equality, on the basis of the not intervention in the internal affairs of States and respect for sovereign
rights and for territorial integrity of all the peoples.

64
THE UNO has to face the increasing rise of international terrorism in the world. The very first
attempt of fight was in the form of a Convention for the prevention and the representation of the
terrorism, adopted by LEAGUE OF NATIONS on November 6th, 1937. She was settled by a failure
partially because of the release of the 2nd world war. In the years 50-60, multiplication of the
terrorism. Several conventions concerning the safety of the aviation are born. In 1972, the question of
the terrorism is at the heart of the debates.

The phenomenon of international terrorism appears as real and complex. The modern technologies
gives the latter a fearsome dimension. The resolution 3034 creates a special committee, which met
three times, in 1973, 1977, 1979. At the end of its meetings, member states seem divided.

Two groups dominate :

The first one led by the USA with the aim of warning(preventing) and repressing the terrorism
Second one Arab and African countries to look for the underlying causes of the terrorism

Between 1972 and 1998, five international agreements(conventions) on the crimes(murders)

associated to the terrorism were able to be developed.
There are at the moment 12 international conventions and 7 conventions régionales.1 The international
convention for the repression of terrorist attacks in the explosive is adopted by the General assembly
December 9th, 1999. Several measures to eliminate the international terrorism are taken (resolution
49/60) and for it, the cooperation is the key word of the measures to be set up by States. The
information exchange (on the groups financing terrorists, technology transfer …), the judicial
cooperation (legal aid in case of request of a State and administrative cooperation, miseen place of
agreements of extradition of the suspects or the recognized authors of terrorist acts), are applied.

Certain questions remain nevertheless not settled(adjusted):

- The problem of the definition of terrorism

According to the agreement(convention) for the repression of the terrorism financing, a "terrorist act"
is all the acts having been the object of international conventions, but also according to the article 2b
" all other different acts intended to cause the death or physical injury engraves(burns) to every
person who does not participate directly in the hostilities in a situation of armed conflict, when this act
is intended to intimidate a population or to force a government or an international organization to
carry out any act " to obtain an overview of the definition of the terrorism it is thus necessary, to read
all of agreement(convention) international.

- The principle of the right of the peoples to the self-determination

THE UNO considers the terrorism as criminal and indefensible, whatever is the author of the act, that
he occurs, and whatever are his motives. However you should not forget a fundamental principle
expressed in the Charter of the United Nations, worth knowing the inalienable right of the peoples in
the automobile determination. But, how can it be done the distinction between repressible terrorism
and fight of the peoples for the automobile determination? The General assembly omitted to settle.

The new forms of terrorism

We often associate with the international terrorism the illicit traffic of drugs, weapons, smuggling,
money laundering and industrial espionage. " Grey zones " (terrae incogitae), allow the terrorist
organizations to train and prepare their activities without having to hide, but also to dedicate itself to
any other illicit activity.

The new weapons of terrorism

Thanks to the very fast development of internet, the terrorists cannot only communicate easily and
quickly to prepare their actions, but also get themselves of the material with complete impunity. In the
face of it, the UNO remains powerless.

65
B. The Korean War – June 1950 – JULY 1953

1. The conflict

In 1945: THE USSR occupies the North 38 ° parallel and the USA the South, the decision in Yalta.

In 1948, establishment of two Korean governments (Kim Il Sung), each of Koreas are legally going to
invade the other one.

The government of the North refuses to recognize justifiable, the elections led to the South.
The government of the South takes pretext in the guardianship of the UNO to say that he wants a
justifiable government for all Korea, while the UNO had established of the justifiable elections only
for the South (Syngman Rhee, the first one presides of the Republic of Korea, or South Korea, of 1948
in 1960-78 years).

In 1950: invasion of the South by the North with the support of the USSR. On June 27th, 1950, the
UNO recommends in the USA to defend(forbid) the South.
- Truman sends an American division in Japan, then Holland, GB, Turks, Belgians, France
-Mc Arthur ( 70 years) repels the attack until the Chinese border
-China sends volunteers to support North Korea
-In 1951 South Korea is reduced to the " perimeter of Busan " There are only 3 cities / 55 under
control of the South
-Replacement of Mc Arthur by Ridgway (because killed in a car accident) and stabilization of the war-
front around 38 ° parallel.
-Creation of both Koreas on July 27th, 1953 in favor of Stalin

All in all, the South Korean army lost 147 000 soldiers, that of the North at least 520 000. UN forces
count(record) 55 000 deaths, essentially Americans. The Chinese losses are estimated(esteemed) at
200 000 tués1. 315 Soviet servicemen died in it conflit.

But the civil losses are more considerable still: between 4 and 5 million deaths on the 30 million
inhabitants of the péninsula. The scale of the civil losses is understandable by the massive bombings.
According to the American official statistics, US Air Forces poured at least 454 000 tons of bombs and
the American historian Bruce Cumings calculated that 3,2 million liters of napalm had been used by
the US Air Force during the Korean War.

3. The after – War period

The armistice did not terminate the border incidents and the raids of commando squads coming from
the North to attack the South and the tension remains lively between both Koreas. The war of the Crab
since the 1990s caused several naval battles. June 13th, 2000, North Korean leader Kim Jong-il - son
and successor of Kim Il-sung - and South Korean president Kim Dae-Jung meet during the first
summit ever organized between the leaders of both Koreas: a common statement is adopted, both
countries making a commitment to look for the peace and to work on a possible reunification.

At the end of the second inter-Korean summit of the heads of state on October 4th, 2007, Kim Jong-il
and the South Korean president Roh Moo-hyun make a commitment in favour of a peace agreement in
the Korean peninsula.

66
However in 2009 and 2010, maritime collisions took place along "Northern Limit Line" (NLL),
proving again that the inter-Korean conflicts are always on the agenda. May 27th, 2009, within the
framework of the Korean north nuclear crisis, North Korea declares to be more bound by the armistice
wich put an end to the fights of the Korean war37.

End of March, 2013, North Korea (from now on governed by Kim Jong - Un, son of Kim Jong-il and
grandson of Kim Il - sung) ends the peace treaties with South Korea and announces to be again in a
state of war.

Ending of May, 2013, Pyongyang suggests in Seoul signing a peace agreement to end officially the
war between both States. While Tokyo wished to resume the initiative of the dialogue with the RPDC
and while an envoy of the North Korean leader met a Chinese top leader to try to obtain a maintenance
of Kim Jong - One with president Xi-Jinping; the situation again seems to wrinkle.

Under the pressure of the United States following a summit in Califonie who took place between
presidents Obama and Xi Jinping on June 7th and 8th, 2013 and during whom the subject of the peace
in the peninsula would have been evoked, China seemed to want to want to press the RPDC so that it
normalizes.

The RPDC seems to become emancipated little by little politically and economically, also the diverse
international penalties consecutive to the diverse nuclear tests of Pyongyang appear to remain
ineffective.

Since Kim Jon-Un's arrival at the head of the country in 2012 North Korea applies to demonstrate to
the whole world that it deserves the status of full power. Nevertheless, showing itself more and more
aggressive on the international scene and more and more isolated, the headlong rush seems inevitable.

In the biggest tradition of the military parades of Soviet time, Pau paid one more time tribute to the
unique party on October 10th, 2015 for the 70th anniversary of the Workers' Party of Korea.

On September 11th, 2016 the RPDC made its 5th nuclear test in a date which leaves nothing at
random and which aims to be to influence the western public opinions this way. On July 4th, 2017
Pyongyang repeated the day of the American national holiday. "We celebrate enthusiastically the
successful launch of the intercontinental ballistic missile, the bigger realization of the history of our
republic", we could read on a banner suspended on the place Kim Il-Sung.

37 The ambiguous strategy of Pyongyang towards South Korea [archive] - Le Monde, in May 27th, 2009

67
The diverse military tries undertaken by North Korea led the Council of the UN to adopt even heavier
penalties against Pyongyang since 2016. INDEED, the voted measures come to complete those
already current: arms embargo and the military material(equipment), non-proliferation of the nuclear
network, eviction towards Korea of numerous diplomats representatives of the government and other
nationals of the RPDC, the bans bound(connected) to transport with destination or from RPDC, freeze
of assets, bans to travel, financial retaliations etc.

In spite of the hardness of the penalties, the UNO does not seem to be capable of breaking the will of
the RPDC.

C. THE VIETNAM WAR (1954-1975)

After Geneva Agreements (in July 21st, 1954) the division of Vietnam deteriorated with the institution
in the South of a dictatorship under the yoke of Ngô Dinh Diêm and the creation of an insurrectionary
movement of opposition, the National Front of liberation of Vietnam of the South (FNL). The Viet
Nam Sud (capital Saigon steady and financed by the USA from 1961 15 000 US servicemen) and the
North (socialist capital Hanoi Ho, created the FNL in 1960)

The sabotages and the raids in the North and in the South multiply and in 1964, the US congress gives
the green light in the direct military intervention further to the naval accident in the gulf of Tonkin.

From February, 1965 till April, 1968 there are 500 000 tons of bombs. In March, 1965: direct
intervention of the USA. Until 1968: 500 000 GI, 700 000 South Vietnam, 200 000 militiamen, 300
000 the North Viet Nam.

It was the first broadcast conflict what what caused(provoked) a considerable impact on the opinion
and made the demonstration of the incapacity of the US to finish it.

January 30th, 1968: generalized offensive called Offensive of Tet, begins in BOOED and lasts 80
days, it is the first failure of the North Viet Nam, but the western public opinions want no more war:
conference of Paris in January, 1969. There is a vietnamization of the conflict from 1969 wanted by
Nixon.
-US retreat in 1972
- The North attacks the South
- Agreements of Paris on January 27th 1973, but considered as null by the North in 1974+, at the end
of the US help : victory of the North in 1975.
- First conflict lost by the USA.

7 Million tons of US bombs, meaning twice as much as all bombs used by the allied during 2nd WW,
5 Million North Vietnamese killed, 260 000 in the South, 450 000 civilians killed and 60 000 on the
side of the US. Materiel loss costs : 800 Millions $.

D. War IN AFGHANISTAN

NB : 650 000 Km2 = France 674,800 km²

December 27th 1979 : invasion of the USSR to support the communist regime in position which, in
front of reformes, made many dissatisfied leading to uprisings.

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The USSR murders revolutionary president of the Council Amin, because he's a double agent and
replaces him by Barak Karmal, in 1986 replaced himself by Najibullah.

Over 10 years : 15 000 deaths, 75 000 wounded persons, 1,2 Million killed Afghans and 6 millions of
uncalled / refugees, at the most/ 120 000 present soldiers.

The Geneva Agreements of 1988 fix the timetable of withdrawal of the USSR and the beginning of its
end. Then, there's a civil war between resistance fighters and there's a victory of the Talibans.

The reasons of the Soviet engagement : historicaly it has been the only one to help for the
developement of a country :

- From 1963 till 1970: the USSR was debtor, supplier and customer.
- Numerous students went to Moscow, they return to occupy posts of persons in charge: rehang the
Soviet ideology
- Coup d'état of 1978 install the army to the orders and socialism: dissatisfaction of the inhabitants
because decision taken at the level power plant without dialogue, murders of the representatives of the
government
- Amin opposes in Moscow: risk of destabilization of the socialist republics all around (Tajikistan,
Uzbekistan)
- RussianGeopolitics : Push towards the hot seas
- Oppositions to the view of Pakistan on Afghanistan + GB

E. THE GROWTH OF EXCHANGES

The second characteristic of the world of the cold War lays in the intensification of commercial trades.
This evolution was all the more remarkable as the creation of the Council of mutual economic
assistance (Comecon - January, 1949) organized a market peculiar to the socialist economies and
institutionalized the break of the world economic space in two blocks.

F. ACCELERATION OF TECHNICAL PROGRESS AND IMMEDIACY OF COMMUNICATIONS

The third characteristic of the world of the cold war can be found in the exponential acceleration of
the technical progress and in the momentariness of the communications which resulted from it.
The acceleration of the technical progress came true in a symbolic way in IT material(subject) where
the capacities of calculations of computers doubled every eighteen months. This acceleration
confronted by the increase of the scientific publications for only year of 1985, the volume of the
publications was upper to all the papers published since the invention of the printing office until the
environment(middle) of the XXth century (in 1450 by Gutenberg in 1950 = 500 years) .Cette
acceleration aroused reactions contradictory as showed the attitude of it towards the computing:
suspected in his(her,its) origins to be the instrument of the individual's emancipation (Arab
Revolution, rôle of NICT).

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The political consequences of this technical progress were particularly sensitive perceptible in military
material. Between 1945 and 1990, six scientific "revolutions" upset the structure of arsenals:

- Appearance of the nuclear Army in 1945.

- The thermonulcear weapon from 195238.
- Deployement of the first balistic missiles in 1957-1958
- Development of multiples warheads (MIRV)39 from 1964 on,
- Improved Impact Accuracy of MARV warheads40 (1974)
- Possibility to envisage a credible anti-missile defense system from 1983 on.

These successive transfers ended in a paradox: the utility of the nuclear weapon tended to decrease
from the moment it was possible to destroy exactly a precise objective (smart bombs), whereas the
reduction of the power of weapons returned the use of easier nuclear power.

The cold war was so the period of expansion of the television which had three major incidences on the
practice of international relations:

The progress of information mirrors put an almost definitive term to the secret diplomacy. Made
responsible for the World War I, this secret diplomacy had reappeared in the meantime wars.
The development of the television contributed to make more difficult even impossible this type of
negotiation (exception made by the Chinese -American link, negotiated in the greatest secrecy by H.
Kissinger between 1970 and 1972).

The facilitated access to the information contributed to shape a world public opinion which became
one of the central parameters of the political decision. The Vietnam War was, as such, the period
during which public authorities seemed the most dependent on the reactions of this public opinion41.

The ideological break amplified finally the symbolism of the images, so confirming the premonition of
McLuhan for whom the medium established from now on the message.

38 The energy results from the fusion of light cores after one first one atomic explosion (of two or three
floors) Example: H-bombs amount to approximately 1000 Littleboys - The H-bomb of the USA from the end of
the 50s (IVY MIKE) was of a power of 10 méga tons. The most powerful termonucléaire bomb never to build
was Soviet (TSAR BOMBA 1961) and consisted of 3 floors (3rd restrained): fission, fusion, fission and
reached(affected) a power of 57 méga tons.
39 Multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle – Warheads with multiples distinct targets
40 Maneuvrable reentry vehicle = capable of changing it's flighying objective, ex : Pershing II
41 Armed internventions more acceptable by the public opinion.

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At a time when the confrontation of the ideas replaced the armed struggle (doctrine of the peaceful
coexistence), the control of the information became an objective and an instrument of power.

The manipulation of Timisoara, which led to the Romanian revolution in December 1989, consacrated
the recogintion of the medias powers.

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G. BIPOLARITY

Rivalry between Sparta and Athens: Peloponnesian War (the most Southern peninsula of mountainous
Greece, cradle of the Mycenaean civilization shared in 8 states.)
The dynasty of Pélopides was knocked down(spilled) in 1190 before JC: Sparta becomes the center of
the establishment Donien. She(it) becomes dominating in the Peloponnese and creates the league of
14 cities of which Corynthe; Sicyone; Epidaure: ect … The rivalry between Sparta and Athens ended
by the victory of Sparta in 404 before JC. Athens in the governance of the Peloponnese and the
invasion of Athens but Sparta fell in front of Macedonians. Roman domination of the Peloponnese in
146 before JC. Thucydide was the historian of this War. Athens hatred lead to Sparta's success, the
trigger being the siege of Potidée by Athens which brought Corynthe in convinced the league of the
Peloponnese and declared the war in Athens since Sparta in 431 before JC.

Sparta different from Athens:

Three social classes: Homoioi public-spirited (equals) - Minority - 18 years and more born in Sparta
and having undergone an education + participation in the collective meals.

Périèques autonomous community, not citizens, free

Hilotes slaves,
Spartan education: selected in the birth on beauty of new - been born (otherwise killed) not
educational intellectual. Not educational of the parents(relatives).
From 20 years to 30 years in barracks.
From 30 years to 60 years mobilization but could live at his home(with him).
Political organ: four institutions share the power such as Lycurgue wanted him(it) in 7th century
before JC.

Sparta different from Athens:

Three social classes: Homoioi (equals) Citizens - Minority - 18 years and more born in Sparta and
having undergone an education + participation in the collective meals autonomous
Périèques community, not citizens, free
Hilotes slaves,
Spartan upbringing: selected at the birth on beauty of new - been born (otherwise killed) not
educational intellectual. Not educational of the parents.
From 20 years to 30 years in barracks,
From 30 years to 60 years mobilization but could live at his home.
Political organ: four institutions share the power such as Lycurgue wanted him in the 7th century
before JC. 2 equal Kings stemming from Spartan families Assemblée compound of Spartan citizens 5
Ephores chaired the assemblies, the elected representatives for one year
Gerousie 28 members of more than 60 years old elected for life

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 1. The constraints of Bipolarity

The actors of the international system do not react in the same way in a configuration of powers of
bipolar or multipolar type. The structure of the diplomatic system imposes the rules of the game to
which all the actors of the international life have to adapt themselves.
So, Hans J. Morgenthau142 he noticed that " there is a determinism applicable to the political facts
among which rules and laws are independent from our preferences; so the people challenge them or
pass besides only at their own risk ".

The inherent constraints to any bipolar configuration are among four:

- The creation of blocks (1),
- The Non-intervention in the opposite sphere (2),
- The non-participation in the quarrels of the allies (3)
- And the imperative of communication (4).

a. The creation of the blocs

b. The Western Bloc

Marshall plan: aid plan during a four years development. 13 million dollars all in all. With the aim
of helping Europe and the USSR to recover.
Interest + does not want his countries to become again the prey of dictatorships. 16 countries accept
(all the countries having escaped the activity the USSR including Switzerland + on 1949 FRG)
Molotov the commissioner of the people in the Foreign Affairs of the USSR refuse and we begin to
see Europe dividing into two blocks. All the countries occupied by the USSR also refuse.
In April, 1948: creation of the organization of blow and economic development. On 1949 in reaction
and after refusal of the Marshall plan the USSR creates the COMECON.
Conclusion: countries has solid social order: immediate efficiency + export the USA - Europe.
Countries with social order less advanced, the help disappear in opaque circuits and have few results.

Thus the Atlantic pact appeared as a classic defensive alliance. The Korean war, activated by the
North Korean offensive in June, 1950, imposed on the Americans to cross an additional step.
The Atlantic pact was then completed by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (in October, 1950)
which contained a military command integrated under the aegis of the United States.

42 1904-1979, studied the philosophy and the right(law) for Munich, then for Geneva. On the eve of the
Second World War and in 1937 emigrate in the USA and lives till the end of his(her,its) life in Chicago and NY.
" Polytricks among nations " 1948, emits(utters) the hypothesis that any engine of the international
politics(policy) is the search(research) for power. " Defense of national interest " 1951: the moral interests are
bound(connected) to the international interests which(who) spreads(broadcasts) them.
Was among the first ones to criticize the war of Viet Nam (no country has to deliver a war at the risk of losing
face during a retreat(withdrawal)) Theorist of foreign policy who supplied a key for reading the international
relations, applies the philosophy to human rights, it is necessary to look for a purely pragmatic interest.
Justified international Interest based on : a wide territory, many citizens, a strong economy, an
advanced technology (mature d eterminers) – Effective Diplomacy, Government, important national feeling
(immatur determiners).

73
Somewhere else in the world, the Korean War was also at the origin of an American commitment
increased in the form of multiple alliances ANZUS in the Pacific (1951), the SEATO in South-East
Asia (1954), Pact from Baghdad to the Middle East 2 (1955).

ii. The Soviet bloc

The creation of the Eastern bloc was made in parallel in the constitution of the western block but
according to different modalities. Contrary to the United States, which had initially envisaged an
economic assistance, Soviet Union set up a political organization of its sphere of influence.
October 5th, 1947 was created « Kominform » with the aim of coordinating the action share of the
European communist parties. This political organization was completed by the bringing to heel of the
governments of the satellite countries.

This political organization was secondly completed by the creation of the Council of mutual economic
assistance (Comecon or CAEM). This organization was originally intended to record the bilateral
agreements concluded by each of his members with the USSR. The economic unification was
envisaged only in 1961 within the framework of " the division Socialist International of the work ".

b. Non intervention in the adverse sphere

The creation of blocks imposed, in corollary, not to intervene in the affairs of the other camp to protect
the bipolar balance. This imperative meant for the Westerners the acceptance of the sustainable cut of
Europe.
Soviet Union was the first one to draw the conclusions of this necessity. Following Stalin's death (in
March 5th, 1953), the new Soviet direction agreed to resume the negotiations committed after the
conference of Potsdam (in July-August, 1945) within the framework of the conference of Ministers of
Foreign Affairs, which had to develop peace treaties intended to terminate officially the Second World
War.

c. Non Participation in allied quarels

During the Hungarian events, the Suez crisis allowed to specify the third condition essential to the
stabilization of the bipolar balance: non intervention in the quarrels of the allies.

The origins of the Suez crisis must be looked for in three directions. The death
scheduled(programmed) by the colonial empires was the first reason of this crisis caused by the
nationalization of the Suez Canal and the support brought by Cairo to the Algerian uprising.

The Arab-Israeli conflict, been born with the creation of the State of Israel in May, 1948, ends in the
training of a secret alliance between English , French and Israelians43.

H. The IMPERATIF OF COMMUNICATION

The instability of any bipolar balance finally imposed to maintain any reliable networks of
communication open, between major powers. Following the conference of Berlin of 1954, the Geneva
Summit of July, 1955 was the first meeting at the level of the heads of state and at the level of
governments since the conference of Yalta of February, 1945 and the conference of Potsdam of July-
August 1945.

43

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 CUBA'S MISSILE CRISIS (1962)

The crisis of the missiles of Cuba is a continuation of events arisen from October 16th till October
28th, 1962 and which brought into conflict the United States and Soviet Union about the Soviet
nuclear missiles pointed in the direction of the territory of the United States since the island of Cuba,
which led both blocks at the edge of the nuclear war.

The problem was the reach of the Russian missiles in 1960 which could not reach the territory the
USA in its entirety while the USA could glaze all the USSR.

Paroxystic moment of the cold war, the crisis of Cuba underlined the limits of the peaceful
coexistence, and ended in a withdrawal of the USSR in exchange for a public concession and for two
confidential promises granted(tuned) by the Kennedy Administration. Seemingly minors at that time,
they were considered in West in the very binding as next decades for the foreign policy of the United
States. A "hot line" connecting(binding) directly the White House with the Kremlin was
installed(settled) after the crisis to be able to establish a direct communication enter the executive of
both superpowers and avoid that a new crisis of this kind(genre) results in a diplomatic dead end. The
resolution of this crisis opened the way to a new period of the cold war, the Relaxation.

Following this crisis, during which was envisaged the possibility of a nuclear war, Americans and
Soviet citizens decided on June 20th, 1963 to establish a direct connection by teleprinter to maintain
the contact in period of crise1.
This "hot line" was twice modernized in 1971 and in 1984, the second modernization occurring for a
new period of extreme tension (crisis of Euromissiles).

At the same time as this direct line of communication, Washington and Moscow decided to meet
regularly in bilateral summits the first one of which was held in Vienna in 1961 and the last one in
Moscow in July, 1991.

EUROMISSILES

The agreement SALT 1 of 1972 contained weaknesses, allowing the Soviet citizens to equip in
missiles SS 20 the zones of HAD power plant.
= Change of strategy: SS 4 and SS 5 are little precise missiles but with very short charges =
destruction of civil objectives (cities)
SS 20 = much more precise and military objectives which can affect all the allies of the USA who are
too rivals + them rivals (ISR-country of the Gulf - China - Japan), which could affect in 1st the USA.
In NATO reaction deploy, in spite of the threats of the Eastern bloc, Pershing II (1800 km) and cruse
Missile (2500 km)
1983. The USSR: shake the opponents in countries close to the USA and in the USA.
Ex: pacifist enemy movements and demonstrations in the Brook PB - FRG - the USA etc. … Even the
West will remain firm otherwise = the USSR would have had a right to inspect on foreign policies of
these countries. On 1983 Ronald Reagan and the "Star Wars" reclaims economically the USSR.
Summit of Washington.

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IV. THE PAX ATOMICA

The respect of those principles of action was the essential condition of maintaining a bipolar
equilibrium. In an identical configuration, Sparta and Athens were not however able to protect the
peace. Washington and Moscow succeeded nevertheless in avoiding the worst because of the existence
of the nuclear weapon. Thus in the constraints of the bipolarity were added the imperatives of nuclear
power to establish a more stable international order, if not less violent.
" The peace arising from the war, noticed Raymond Aron at the beginning of the 60s, it would be
neither the first one nor the worst of the guiles of the Reason ". This pax atomica rested on 3
instruments:

- The diversification of weapons

-The stabilization of the strategic doctrines
- And the negotiations of control of armaments

V. COOPERATION AND COMPETITION

A minimal agreement had come out during the first years of the cold war (1947-1962). The relaxation
institutionalized him between 1963 and 1975, before does not re-appear the inevitable tension between
two rival blocks. Outside the domains where a convergence of interests grew to the American-Soviet
link, the tension persisted. The bipolar era so appeared as an ambiguous period during which the
cooperation between both Big from common interests of safety (1) removed by no means the
competition between two representations different from the future of the world (2).

A. BIPOLARITY AND COOPERATION

The cold war had gradually bounded the possible zones of convergence between Americans and
Soviet citizens from imperative outbuildings of security. The relaxation formalized this evolution, by
creating instruments necessary for this common management of the future of the world. This one was
transformed into an « American – Soviet » condominium44, which articulated itself around three
instruments:
- The management of the crises
- The sharing of the spheres of influence
- The bringing to heel of the objectors

The United States and Soviet Union got on(heard each other) first of all to manage of concert the
crises where they were not directly hired. The meeting of Glassboro1, which took place after the
Arab-Israeli war of Six Days, was the most obvious demonstration.
In spite of their alliances with the countries of the region, the United States and Soviet Union fixed of
concert the principles of a global regulation(payment) in the Near East (vote of the resolution 242 of
November 22nd, 1967). Later, Soviet Union agreed to stand back, while the United States assisted
Israel and Egypt in the negotiation of a part payment (peace agreement of Washington of March 26th,
1979).

44The sharing of sphere of influence was the second demonstration of this American-Soviet
condominium.

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B. BIPOLARITY AND COMPETITION

The doctrine of peaceful coexistence formulated by the Soviet citizens in 1953 defined the limits of
the American-Soviet link made necessary because of the existence of nuclear weapons. In the domains
where the safety of both Big was not threatened, the competition remained the rule. This one took
three forms: the peripheral conflicts, the ideological confrontation on human rights and choice of
policy "on the edge of the abyss".
The peripheral conflicts included all the wars led on the periphery of the spheres of influence of both
Big. These conflicts, considered as being secondary, did not put at stake their vital interests. Caused or
manipulated by the Americans and the Soviet citizens, these wars were envisaged as means to spread
their sphere of influence. Two conflicts more particularly hold attention: the Vietnam War and the
Afghanistan War.

VI. The POST COLD – WAR (From 1900 TO NOWADAYS)

The cold war ended without war. The world of States was so well upstart to channel its turbulences,
that it surmounted an earthquake of an extraordinary magnitude without major conflict. Paradoxically,
this smooth transition aroused a double concern as for the will of the United States to remain the only
major power titular and as for the nature of this new unipolar environment.

Taken by surprise by this unprecedented evolution, the international system appeared to vacillate on
his assizes. While in the past, a great deal of applicants claimed the row of major power, no nation
expressed the will to assume the load which resulted from this superiority.
The illusion of the upheaval lasted the time to notice that the institution of the new international
configuration took place according to modalities strangely similar to the past.

The uncertainty holding to the notion of power and the hesitations of the dominant nation to be
assumed its responsibilities called back in fact the precedents of 1918 and 1945. After the World War
I, France and Great Britain had claimed the gratitude of the status of major power, without having
ways as high as their ambitions. The international community reached their request because the only
nation which had made the proof of its capacity act on the scale of the world - the United States -
preferred to refrain.

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The conflict extension in favor of the communitarist dimension

78
79
 CONCLUSION

It is still too early to find the unity of the XXth century. The breaks which established both world
conflicts were too brutal and are still too close to be considered simple brackets in long evolutions.
This fast flying over the international relations in the XXth century allows however to raise a report
and to identify a paradox.

A. The report lives in the fence of the space. The feeling to share the same ground domain, which
seems to be reduced as progress the sciences and the techniques, is a constant which we find
throughout the century. The world is so more and more perceived as one and the same set, so much
political point of view that from the economic point of view.

On the political level, the unity of the international system exposes itself by the participation of a
ceaselessly increasing number of States to real universal organizations. She also comes true by the
trend to the concentration of the powers. Still multipolar at the beginning of the century, the
diplomatic configuration evolved into a bipolar plan setting the Triple Alliance against the Triple
Alliance. After the latency period which established the interwar period, the bipolarity settled down
durably during the cold war before making way in unipolar American in him after cold war. Finally,
the political unity(unit) of the international system shows itself by the distribution(broadcasting) of the
democratic values following the conference of Vienna of June, 1993 the final document of which
recognized " the universal character of human rights ". 120 nations so had institutions being inspired
by democratic values in 1997 against hardly 40 in 1974 (World Bank, Report on the development in
the world 1997);

·The tendency to the unification of the economic field is even more obvious, because it succeeded in
raising the obstacles placed across the progress of the globalization. The economy-world, observable
before the World War I, was split so durably at the same time within the market economies
(consequences of the crisis of 1929 and requirements of the reconstruction between 1945 and 1960)
and by the implementation of alternative models in socialist countries and the Third World. Since the
end of the Second World War, the market organized between industrialized countries resumed its
expansion as were given up the models of planned economy and autarkic development.

B. The paradox of this 20th century lives in the resistances led by this unification of the planet: the
inexorable walking towards the globalization caused, by reaction, a reaffirmation of the local identities
and a contesting perms dominant political frames. In the factors of unification of the world, thus
opposed the centrifugal forces, which rejected the hegemony of a unique model. So, throughout the
XXth century, the order of States was perpetually questioned by state actors who rejected the
subjections been imperative by major powers, as by non-state actors who claimed an increased
autonomy (the civil society, the economic players).

Thus, it is remarkable to notice as, if the modalitites of this contesting changed (transformation of
forms of violence, for example), the called reasons remained identical (injustice of the order of the
powers, the decay of the State, the narrow-mindedness of the national borders). The resumption of the
same arguments with more or less regular intervals imposes then, to put into perspective the arisen
ruptures and appears as an electrical wire to envisage the unity of the century.

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