The aim of this thesis is to investigate how American power is adapting to a changing post- Cold War global landscape. It is commonly accepted that many of the most visible cultural expressions of globalisation are American. However, contemporary accounts have proven inadequate in assessing how such forces have helped provide the infrastructure for America’s global dominance. With growing debate over the decline of American influence, the thesis intends to address how American statecraft is attempting to redefine itself for a digital age. With the accelerated transmission of information, images and sounds, nation-states are gradually losing the ability to either dictate their official narrative or control their global image. The new info-war that lies at the heart of contemporary American statecraft thus involves the wholesale integration of struggles over information, technology, communication and culture into the conflict itself. The thesis, therefore, investigates how American military and diplomatic efforts are both shaping and being reshaped by modern techno-culture. The thesis pieces together a contemporary genealogy of American cultural diplomacy in the Middle East from the Cold War through to the “war on terror”. This genealogy pays particular attention to both the continued hold of civilisationist discourses and the shifting question of race in American foreign policy – from the instrumentalisation of jazz at the height of the ideological antagonism of the Cold War, to rap music as a soundtrack to American Empire. The attention paid to African American culture aims to highlight the ways in which the radical traditions of struggle for freedom from the underside of the American Empire are transforming our world today for both better and worse. The thesis concludes by contextualising the evolving relationship between consumption, technology, communication and (national) security, and situating the Occupied Palestinian Territories within these global capital and cultural flows. This takes the form of an analysis of the multiple local and international socio-economic initiatives taking hold in the West Bank – from governmental institutions and NGOs, to the business sector and consumer industries – and their particular attempts at reshaping Palestinian public spheres.

When Tony Blair took Britain to war in Iraq in 2003, he overruled vociferous opposition from both the wider public and members of his own governing party. Public opinion was exercised by the issue on a vast scale. Over one million marched in London against the war. Opinion polls uniformly showed majority opposition to the use of force. Newspapers, the engine of media debate in this country, mostly attacked the government line, and encouraged their readers to protest or even, in one case, to rebel. The story of Iraq, however, is not simply one of an ideological or misguided premier dragging the entire nation to battle against its will. It is not simply one of ‘spin’, dossiers, Alastair Campbell, and Weapons of Mass Destruction. Much of the debate, and much of the hostility it generated, focused on areas that foreign policy analysts would consider peripheral; the domestic political consequences of war, the role of ‘spin doctors’ in the assessment of intelligence, and the question of whether the Prime Minister’s (successful) efforts to build a strong alliance with the world’s last superpower had transformed him into the President’s ‘poodle’. Interactions between ministers and the media were conditioned on both sides by an intimidating array of structural pressures. Diplomatic and journalistic calculations often clashed, trapping the government in the middle of an immensely complex ‘multi-level game’. News management influenced substantive foreign policy just as policy influenced news management, and the media arguably affected both, albeit often indirectly. The substance and the communication of the decision to go to war proved to be inseparable, both in the course of decision-making, and in their later retrospective assessment. Public Opinion, broadly defined, had a significant impact on British foreign policy at this time. Crucially, however, this impact operated through political communication mechanisms usually ignored by FPA.

This thesis is an exploration into the consequential interrelation of official British discourse, identity, securitization, and counterterrorism from 1968 to 2011. Through a relational-securitization approach, the thesis narrative explains how discourse is both constitutive and causal for outcomes in a particular case. It is a relational mechanism based analysis that investigates how observed rhetorical commonplaces came together to influence intersubjective understanding and security practice. The ways that identities were temporarily stabilized across discourse through particular configurations was essential to how British counterterrorism emerged, was maintained, and became normalized. The thesis does not argue that possible insecurities categorized as “terrorism” do not exist, or that a security response is in itself surprising. However, how this response unfolded was not predetermined, and instead depended upon a securitization of terrorism along distinctive patterns of us/them construction. These patterns influenced the trajectory of counterterrorism by enabling certain outcomes to arise over others. Collective understandings of identity shape the conditions of possibility for political action. As such, discourses of securitization have a causal impact over intersubjective understanding and counterterrorism ractice. Historical moments, such as the 1974 Birmingham pub bombings or 11 September 2001 attacks, can facilitate a more rapid passage of exceptional measures. But the maintenance and normalization of these powers depends upon us/them and inside/outside boundary markers. Violent acts may thus influence outcomes, but they do not determine their substance or direction. Reasserted and/or reconfigured perceptions of distance and danger stabilizing the threat and referent in particular ways played a key role in counterterrorism’s transition from emergency response to permanent practice. Through a relational-securitization approach, analysis can better map out how processes of identity construction were essential to the securitization of terrorism, and contributed to the emergence, legitimation, and normalization of British counterterrorism from 1968 to 2011.

The goal of this thesis is to analyse the impact of Arctic ecology on the development of international systems in the circumpolar world. It is a goal pursued in two steps: (i) by developing an analytical approach capable of tracing the mutual constitution of international and ecological systems in world history; and (ii) by using the resulting toolkit to establish a baseline understanding of the international systems of the polar basin. Part One adapts the analytical approach pioneered by Barry Buzan and Richard Little to study international systems in world history, adding a contextual axis to their analytical matrix in order to escape the anthropocentric cul-de-sac that has heretofore limited IR’s ability to consider ecology’s role in the constitution of international units, processes, and structures. The resulting approach – defined in terms of SocioEcological Coevolution – describes this relationship in terms of three sources of explanation: coevolutionary process, ecological capacity and biogeographical structure. Part Two uses the toolkit to analyse the past four hundred years of Arctic history, charting the impact of ecological systems on the principles of membership and behaviour that define international systems in circumpolar world. Through discussions of socio-ecological coevolution, ecological capacity and biogeographical structure, the project identifies the Arctic as a region defined by competing sets of Westphalian and imperial principles. The balance between the Arctic’s anarchic states system and its hierarchic imperial systems has its fulcrum on a socio-ecological ecotone – a transitional gradient that divides its neo-European and non-European biomes and marks a shift from Westphalian to imperial social principles. Though designed to answer specific questions about the constitution of international systems in the circumpolar North, Coevolution proves itself to be a promising tool for ecological analysis in IR with potential applicability to regions outside of the Arctic Basin.

The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) along with other agreements was concluded in the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations in 1994. However, negotiations continued within the WTO framework and are still a work in progress on some specific issues under the GATS including the question of Emergency Safeguard Measures, which has been raised in Article X of the GATS as part of its ‘built-in agenda’. The thesis looks at the concept of the Emergency Safeguards Measures (ESMs) in the GATT/WTO and tries to develop an answer to the ‘question of ESMs’, which is deluding the negotiators and researchers for more than fifteen years. The thesis tries to analyse whether the GATT type ESMs can be transposed to GATS. It also explores that whether ESMs that are modelled on GATT are feasible under GATS, and if feasible, are these really desirable. If these are feasible and desirable then what should be their possible structure remaining within the existing GATT paradigm. The thesis walks through the provisions that already exist in the GATS to meet the circumstances perceived by the countries that are seeking specific ESMs under GATS and whether these provisions address the concerns of the demanders of the concept. The thesis not only takes into account the academic and legal literature on the subject but also and perhaps more practically, takes into account the dynamics of the negotiations, discussions and debates within the WTO system on the subject. The thesis tries to provide an in-depth analysis of the issue and goes beyond what is already available in the International Trade Law literature on the ESMs under the cross border trade in services. It seeks to answer a question that presently exists in the International Trade Law especially with reference to the law emerging out of WTO.

The thesis explores the concept of grand strategy and applies it to the development of Taiwan’s grand strategy between 1949 and 2008, from Presidents Chiang Kai-shek, Chiang Ching-kuo and Lee Teng-hui to Chen Shui-bian. The thesis first examines the debates between the ‘classical’ war-centred and ‘neo-classical’ peace-centred perspectives in the realm of strategic studies and argues that these need not be mutually exclusive, but can in fact supplement one another. The thesis then adopts a stance of theoretical pluralism, whereby grand strategy is regarded as a process of power practice across periods of war and peace; it defines grand strategy as a cognitive state agent taking action to create and manipulate power in furthering its desired ends in a dynamic international society. This convergent perspective of grand strategy is designed to embrace these two schools of thought, since it is equally important for those who seek a better understanding of grand strategy in general and the evolution of Taiwan’s grand strategy in particular to focus both on how best to wage war and how best to preserve peace. To make sense of and to apply the concept of grand strategy, as an operational term, this thesis proposes four strategic analytical dimensions, namely, capability, choice, environment and posture, which are informed by the duality of four analytical pairs: ideational and material factors, ends and means, agency and structure, and defence and offence. Building upon this strategic analytical framework, the thesis moves to explore the perspective of leadership in Taipei against the backdrop of the politicalmilitary confrontation between the ROC on Taiwan and the PRC. The thesis investigates how and how far Taiwan’s grand strategy had been conditioned and developed by the influence of the Taipei-Beijing competition for sovereignty, changes in the international context, the unique strategic perspective of the successive presidents, domestic political developments and the asymmetry of national power between Taiwan and China. Through its investigation, the thesis argues that Taiwan’s grand strategy over the past six decades has been fundamentally driven by one prime factor: to secure the perspective of the ROC’s sovereign status as understood by Taipei’s leaders, not only across the Strait but also in international society.

How do norms guiding peacekeeping change, and who are the important actors in this process? Using sociology of professions and practice theory, this thesis seeks to advance constructivist theorizing of norm change in international organizations by a closer look at UN peacekeeping. The thesis argues that ambiguity is deep-seated in UN peacekeeping and that basic norms (grundnorms) and norms guiding peacekeeping operations are often in conflict. The thesis highlights the role of practices in two ways. First, special envoys and representatives of the Secretary-General (SRSGs) can act as norm arbitrators through actions in the field and have bottom–up influence on norm change in the organization. Second, various ‘ecologies’ such as think tanks and academia have, together with member states and UN officials, formed informal policy alliances to establish new norms, principles, and concepts such as ‘responsibility to protect’ and ‘integrated missions,’ effectively constituting and driving norm change in the international system. This thesis sees these processes as social practices that advance change in the organization. With this contribution, the study further expands the understanding of which actors have agency and what sources of authority they draw on in norm change processes in international organizations. The UN can be seen as a competitive arena where informal policy alliances, or ‘linked ecologies,’ put forward ideas on how to solve policy issues. In a broad sense, the UN is an arena where informal alliances are formed around issues of common concern; and, with the financial support of donor states and knowledge production of think tanks, academia and the working level of the UN, ownership among member states is built in consultative processes.

Since 9/11, intelligence liaison has increased exponentially. Yet, both in international affairs and within the academic fields of international relations (IR) and intelligence studies, the phenomenon of intelligence liaison remains under-researched and under-theorised. Moreover, intelligence studies remain remarkably disconnected from IR. Accordingly, this study attempts to advance a timely understanding of both international intelligence liaison generally, and UK-US intelligence liaison specifically, in a contemporary context. Methodologically, this is accomplished through conducting a qualitative analysis of UK-US intelligence liaison focussed on two ‘critical’ and ‘intensive’ case studies. These represent the key issues over which the UK and US have liaised, namely counter-terrorism and weapons of mass destruction (WMD) non-/counter-proliferation. In practical terms, the ‘rise’ of intelligence liaison can be substantially explained. However, the phenomenon itself can only be ‘theorised’ so far. Intelligence is, by its very nature, a fragmented subject. Accordingly, cascades of complexities increasingly enter, especially at the lower/micro levels of analysis - where the details and specifics concerning particular sources and operations matter further. Therefore, intelligence liaison effectively represents the concept of ‘complex co-existence plurality’ in action. This is both at and across all its different, yet closely interrelated, levels of analysis, and also when broken down into eight systemic variables or attributes. Notwithstanding this complexity, wider conclusions can be drawn, allowing this thesis to advance the proposition that we are now witnessing the globalisation of intelligence. Overall, this trend is facilitated through the developments occurring in a web of overlapping international intelligence liaison arrangements, which collectively span the globe. Reflective of a continuously evolving attempt for ‘optimum outreach’, these intraliaison developments include: firstly, the establishing of frameworks and defining of operational parameters for the intelligence liaison arrangements, and then their subsequent consolidation (or normalisation) and optimisation over time. These wider trends are simultaneously observable in the microcosm of UK-US intelligence liaison relations, which are also on ‘a continuum with expansion’ as the UK and US remain broadly exemplary ‘friends and allies’.

This study problematises two theoretical propositions that have prevailed in the mainstream International Relations (IR) literature: the first concerns the negative understanding of the role of entities in the margins; and the second is the attention paid to material resources and physical capabilities in comparison to the politics of norms or identities. Building on insights from Constructivism, this thesis advances the idea of ‘norm competition’, which international norms compete with each other to gain initiative, and it explores this with reference to nuclear norm entrepreneurship in the Western Alliance in the early Cold War. In so doing, the study traces the historical paths towards the creation of EURATOM between 1955 and 1957 at two levels. First, the external relations of EURATOM are examined in the framework of norm competition; that is, between the emerging norms of EURATOM, and existing norms in the form of US nuclear regulations developed after the end of World War II. I argue that favourable temporal and spatial conditions, as well as an ‘agree-and-deepen policy’, a communication skill carefully designed to increase one’s political leverage by exploiting one’s own identification, helped the creation of EURATOM and the emergence of alternative norms in the nuclear field. Second, the inner-dynamics of EURATOM with regard to its member states, specifically Belgium and France, is explored in terms of their motivation for joining EURATOM and its influence on them with respect to their post-war foreign policy identity—namely, the ‘hyphen role’ of Belgium and the ‘exceptionalism’ of France. It is argued that EURATOM played a key role in creating room for its own autonomy and its member states in relation to nuclear norms. In turn, Belgium and France contributed to the creation of EURATOM by exploiting their unique identities. Finally, it concludes that norm entrepreneurship can increase the political leverage of margins in relation to centres, and therefore being marginal does not necessarily mean being powerless.

Why do states behave as they do in world politics? Put differently, how can analysts develop a more precise and complete explanation of the causation of foreign policy behaviour? Drawing upon the insights of actor-specific Foreign Policy Analysis scholarship, this thesis argues that we need an approach which posits a human agent as an important analytical category in its own right. However, this thesis also emphasises that the state‘s foreign policy behaviour cannot be fully explained solely in terms of the actions and intentions of individual human agents. While it is indeed conscious human agents who make foreign policies, the parameters of their capacity to do so are constrained and/or facilitated by the structural conditions with which their nations are confronted. The key point here is that structural and agential sources of the state‘s foreign policy behaviour should neither be deemed exclusive nor be granted explanatory priority a priori. In this regard, this thesis presents rationales and guidelines for why and how one should pursue a multicausal approach to the study of foreign policy behaviour. Relatedly, it explores the structure-agent problem in international relations and rethinks currently dominant conceptions of causation in the field of IR. Then this thesis establishes a multicausal framework for the analysis of foreign policy behaviour. The framework consists of three factors associated with human (agential) elements and international structural conditions. With the aim of discerning the fruitfulness of the multicausal approach advocated here and of producing the empirical evidence that shows causation of complex foreign policy actions, this thesis undertakes intensive and comparative case study. The specific question that the case study aims to answer is why South Korea and Australia reacted to the US-led war in Iraq as they did: these two cases have neither received appropriate empirical attention nor been provided with any satisfactory theoretical explanation. The empirical findings gained from the case study leads to a testing and refinement of existing leading IR theories. Also, based on the case study findings and on the multicausal analytical framework built, this thesis creates an integrated theory of a particular type of foreign policy behaviour (i.e. weaker state behaviour vis-à-vis a dominant power) which encompasses both structural and agential perspectives. In a related vein, it discusses the role of theory for IR scholarship and modes of construction of IR. Ultimately it is suggested that a multicausal approach can contribute to the cumulative development and refinement of predictions and generalisations about why states behave as they do on the world stage.