Chapter 7 combines the four ideal-type models from previous chapters into an attempted representation of the contemporary global international society (GIS) in all of its complexity and contradiction. It starts by attempting to allocate the relative weight of the four component models across four historical eras from classical times to the present. It then turns to the question of whether, and in what ways GIS is getting stronger or weaker. This is done by aggregating the criteria identified in the four models, and asking how this complex and often messy GIS is evolving, and how its different layers play into each other in co-constituting ways.