This article analyzes the bargaining process in the Eighteen Nation Disarmament Conference/Conference of the Committee on Disarmament, in Geneva during 1969–70, on the issue of the Seabeds Denuclearization Treaty, which was opened for signature in 1971. A procedure called bargaining process analysis was employed to content analyze the interactions within this forum throughout four major phases of these negotiations. Limited support was given to several hypotheses about the effects of the bargaining process on the level of agreement. First, in several phases of these negotiations, the more the negotiating strategies were characterized as soft rather than as hard, the greater was the level of agreement relative to disagreement. Second, in several phases, the higher the ratio of task-oriented to affect-oriented behavior in bargaining style, the greater was the ratio of agreements to disagreements on issues under negotiation. Finally, the bargaining process analysis was able to describe several trends in these negotiations, especially the ability of the nuclear powers to reach relatively rapid agreement after initial differences, followed by much longer bargaining where differences between the nuclear and the nonnuclear states had to be resolved. This line of division may be increasingly characteristic of multilateral arms control negotiations and may be reflected in future negotiations in which nonnuclear states are important participants.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) will probably be remembered in history as an outstanding example of relatively successful intergovernmental cooperation among developing countries. OPEC's achievements in raising the oil export income of members appear remarkable in view of the deep sociopolitical divisions among them—occasionally verging on armed conflicts. Nevertheless, OPEC countries have managed not to let these conflicts wreck their common interest in obtaining substantially better terms from the international companies and from consumer countries. That OPEC countries could obtain better terms is not only the result of member solidarity but also of the relatively inelastic demand for petroleum. Another crucial factor favoring OPEC is that major consumer countries have been moderate in their drive to collectively countervail OPEC, except indirectly by allowing their international oil companies to join forces ostensibly in defense of consumers' interests. Major consumer countries have also declined so far to split forcefully the OPEC coalition. The continued existence of OPEC largely depends on (1) members' perception of gain outweighing sacrifices or frustrations of working together, and (2) the tolerance of major industrial importing countries.

The aim of this study is to analyze the impact of the EEC on one border region, the French province of Alsace, through an examination of its economic and social transactions with West Germany since 1960. No great increase in Alsatian social ties with Germany has been observed, but there has been considerable growth in economic contacts, leading to a new prosperity for the province. Alsatian economic integration with the rest of France is not increasing as fast, but it has not been noticeably weakened. Alsatian elite and public opinion generally supports the growth of economic bonds with Germany, largely because of their contribution to economic welfare. Transaction and attitude data indicate a continuation of the present trend of important economic, but only limited social, ties between Alsace and its German neighbor.

The purpose of this research is to examine the conditions for successful United Nations elective officeholding through an interregional comparison of three types of variables. Previous studies have primarily emphasized two types of determinants. Some have suggested that behavior in the United Nations is controlled by the environment of international politics, while others have attempted to link a nation state's level of socioeconomic development to elective officeholding success. This research suggests that the legislative variable may be the most useful predictor of elective officeholding. The legislative dimension is based upon the premise that the political processes in the Organization represent a quasi-legislative system. An examination of the three types of variables led to the conclusion that legislative behavior is the most consistent predictor of elective officeholding success across regions. This finding does not negate the salience of environmental interactions or nation state attributes, but it does suggest that nation state participation in the political processes of the Organization appears to be the best predictor of officeholding success.

This article examines the intraregional conflict management activities of the Organization of African Unity (OAU). Three traditional regionalist claims are tested and suggestions concerning the future role of such organizations are provided. The findings indicate that in a number of cases the OAU was not an effective agent for conflict management; its limitations were clearest in internal disputes and those international conflicts involving allegations of subversion. Evidence from this study does not convincingly support the proposition that similarities of interests, problems, and loyalties found at the regional level make it more likely that attempts at settlement will be forthcoming and successful. Other findings indicate that the organization was able to isolate intra-regional conflicts from entanglement in more complex global disputes; this ability was, however, highly dependent on the desire of the great powers to remain uninvolved. The OAU was able to relieve the UN of the potential burden of numerous local conflicts, but this too sometimes proved dependent on policy decisions made by the United States or the Soviet Union. It is suggested that regional organizations may assist the superpowers in avoiding unwanted involvement in local disputes, but that unless the conflict management capacity of such organizations is increased, the result may be that many conflicts will remain unsettled.

This study concerns the involvement of transnational, nongovernmental associations in the international decisions leading to the 1972 UN Conference on the Human Environment, at Stockholm, and the establishment of the UN Environment Program. It identifies those organizations that were involved, characterizes the political functions performed by them, and describes their points of access into the UN environmental policy process. A number of propositions about transnational associations are also examined in light of the Stockholm experience.

This article presents both a history and an administrative analysis of the United Nations Volunteers, an international organization established by a General Assembly resolution in December 1970. The hope that the new organization would presage a new era of multinational volunteerism has proven groundless. In seeking to explain the ineffectiveness of the UN Volunteers, I look inside the organization and find that it has little or no control over its six principal functions. This extreme decentralization of responsibility is then explained not by a static description of the institutional but by focusing on the dynamic process by which state and transnational actors exercised influence during the different stages of the organization's establishment and development. Those actors whose autonomy was most jeopardized by a new volunteer organization were most active in defining and limiting the scope of its operations. The relative lobbying advantages of state and transnational actors meshed with bureaucratic and budgetary constraints to ensure an enfeebled organization.

The 1972 decision of the Norwegian people to reject admission to the European Community has raised some fresh questions about the Nordic countries and Nordic integration. Was the Norwegian decision a protest vote on mainly domestic grounds? Or was it a rejection of the whole structure, system, and ideology of the European Community—as having grown too bureaucratic, too self-centered, and too concerned about economic gains and trade and growth rates rather than about human values? Yet, if the Community was no longer an attractive alternative, what were Norway's other alternatives? The ocean-oriented, outgoing Norwegians could hardly have turned isolationists. Should we read the Norwegian referendum as a “yes” to Nordic cooperation rather than as a “no” to continental Europe? Whatever tipped the scales in Norway's 1972 referendum, the so-called Nordic alternative seems bound to become more prominent in Scandinavia, since Norway has reached a Swedish-modelled trade agreement with the European Community as a substitute for membership.

The United States and Canada have now entered a new and more difficult period in their relations with one another. The “Nixon shock” of August 1971 struck Ottawa as well as Japan; conversely, Canadian reluctance freely to supply energy, particularly oil, to the United States has jarred Americans used to taking access to Canadian resources for granted. The extremely high degree of societal interdependence between the United States and Canada ensures that Canada will be strongly affected by American policies. As the two societies experience rapid socioeconomic change, there are bound to be struggles over how to adjust and who pays the price of adjustment. Government regulations are likely to increase on both sides of the border.

The diverse interests of donors and the desires of recipients to shop for the best deals mean that coordination of projects in international assistance causes problems along with promises of greater efficiency. Evidence from East Africa indicates that political competition and lack of candor and comparability in donors' reports limit the effectiveness of efforts at donor coordination. On the other hand, the policies of Kenya and the East African Community permitting virtual autonomy to profitable public corporations in their dealings with foreign governments and businessmen compromise the opportunity to optimize the use of assistance available in a multi-donor situation.

Savage and Deutsch's relative acceptance (RA) index does not actually measure nations' preferences for transactions with one another. Using a modified measure and 1928–71 data for international merchandise trade, I conclude (1) that EEC members' preferences for one another have increased only modestly since the establishment of their Common Market; and (2) that other groups of Western industrial countries have shown a greater rise in intragroup trade preferences in the same period than the EEC. There follows a discussion on the relationship between intraregional transactions preferences and regional political integration. Two conclusions are reached: (1) high intraregional transactions saliences are necessary but not sufficient preconditions for political integration; and (2) rising intraregional transactions preferences must follow political integration. Trade data suggest that, for the EEC, intraregional saliences are probably high enough to permit integration; but slowly increasing preferences suggest that only a little integration can actually have occurred.

In the field of political science in general and in the study of international organizations in particular, leadership has been a particularly neglected concept. It has served as a kind of residual category —a handy, or bothersome, exogenous variable. Attempts that have been made, in the international organization context, to isolate leadership as an independent variable and to proceed with comparative analysis have, at best, centered on whether a particular leader followed certain maxims or strictures for good leadership or on what battery of tactics a leader may more or less successfully employ in a given context. No attempt has been made, however, to set the parameters for the relevance of various leadership maxims or to separate the quality of leadership from the specific kinds of resources and constraints that prevail in any given task environment. Thus, general comparison of leaders remains conceptually impossible.

The major difference between Canadians and Americans on the subject of their relationship is in the intensity of their perceptions. There is bound to be conflict between a people who regard the relationship as critical and those who have scarcely noticed the other country. Firmly fixed in the Canadian view is the idea that a special relationship has come to an end. When the British contemplated the end of their special relationship with the United States, they were interested in an alternative—association with the European Economic Community (EEC). The problem for Canadians is that no alternative association seems clear, attractive, or promising. In light of their relative comfort in the energy crisis of 1973, however, the need for any special relationship has seemed less urgent.

Primary attention has been paid in much of the writing on public attitudes on foreign affairs to opinions about official interstate relations and foreign policy. One of the merits of the transnational politics paradigm is that it calls attention to the possibility that intersocietal relations may condition or influence the climate as well as the agenda of interstate relations. For the public opinion analyst, the paradigm invites attention to the relative degree of importance assigned by publics to intersocietal as contrasted to interstate relations and how changes in attitudes toward one sector may influence the climate in which relations in the other sector are conducted.

In recent years, a considerable body of literature has dealt with relations between the so-called developed and developing nations. More recently, a number of analysts have attempted to gain leverage over the problem by utilizing a systemic perspective that links centers and peripheries.