Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Modes of context
- 3 Context as changing meaning
- 4 Contextual indicators
- 5 Rational actor and diffusion models
- 6 Barrier models of context
- 7 Oil nationalization, 1918–1980 (with Nathan Adams)
- 8 Eastern Europe, 1945–1989 (with Jon Solem)
- 9 Historical contexts
- 10 Enduring rivalries, or plus ça change …
- 11 The context of international norms
- 12 The norm of decolonization
- 13 Postface: interacting contexts and explaining contexts
- References
- Index
- CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
3 - Context as changing meaning
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 May 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Modes of context
- 3 Context as changing meaning
- 4 Contextual indicators
- 5 Rational actor and diffusion models
- 6 Barrier models of context
- 7 Oil nationalization, 1918–1980 (with Nathan Adams)
- 8 Eastern Europe, 1945–1989 (with Jon Solem)
- 9 Historical contexts
- 10 Enduring rivalries, or plus ça change …
- 11 The context of international norms
- 12 The norm of decolonization
- 13 Postface: interacting contexts and explaining contexts
- References
- Index
- CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
Summary
For some years now, the word context has been fashionable in article titles as genuine contextual analysis has been missing. In general, the specification of context and its treatment as either an exogenous or endogenous variable remains vague.
Heinz Eulau (1987, p. 256)Introduction
Eulau's remarks illustrate the common view of context as a cause or an effect. In this chapter I suggest another alternative: context can influence relationships. The causal arrow from the context is not directed to or from another variable but at another arrow. Using this model of context makes international relations look much more like comparative politics, which has always been concerned with how the same variables can have different effects in different societies. In comparative politics national boundaries separate systems, thus there is a natural concern for the variability of relationships in different societies. But there is no such obvious dividing line between systems at the global level. In general there are many potential useful criteria for defining different contexts; ultimately each individual is unique (and even she may have multiple selves, Elster 1986). Context as changing meaning emphasizes how similar the theoretical and empirical problems of international relations and comparative politics really are.
This chapter develops some of the ramifications of the concept of context as changing meaning for the study of international politics. “Contextual” models are familiar to students of American politics but not to those who study international relations (see the Postscript to this chapter for a discussion of the “American” contextual literature from my perspective).
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- Chapter
- Information
- Contexts of International Politics , pp. 34 - 51Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1994