Since the early 1970s, a cognitive reorientation has marked Soviet research on economic problems of the Third World. This shift arises from recognizing the primacy of scientific-technological progress, accepting the need for integration with the world market, and coming to terms with wide economic differentiation among the LDCs and the flux in their societies. Many recent Soviet studies stress the value of incremental change (as against decisive breaks with the capitalist system of production and exchange), and argue that socialism can best emerge from a sufficiently advanced economic system. In consequence, the benefits of the Western presence in the LDCs are recognized, excessive state dirigisme is discouraged, the ramifications of a mixed economy are investigated, and the relevance as development model of the Soviet experience with NEP is studied.

Based on a sample of 2,282 leaders in all walks of American life, this study probes the impact of U.S. involvement in Vietnam on the perceptions, convictions, and belief systems of those who occupy high positions of leadership. The findings clearly indicate that the post-World War II consensus on U.S. foreign policy has been shattered; that the Vietnam experience was a critical sequence of events in this respect; and that differing, largely mutually exclusive belief systems have emerged among the nation's leaders. The competing conceptions of international politics were found to be so coherent and integrated that they are unlikely to change soon or casually. Barring another traumatic event on the order of Pearl Harbor or Vietnam, the prospects for an early emergence of a new foreign policy consensus in the United States thus seem slim, and beyond the capacity of any political figure or group to fashion.

Although we live in a world of international regimes, the scholarly literature on them remains rudimentary, especially in analytic terms. This essay examines the proposition that all international regimes are social institutions, even though there is great variation among them. Among other things, this suggests that regimes are dependent upon the maintenance of convergent expectations among actors; formalization is not a necessary condition for the effective operation of regimes; and regimes are always created rather than discovered. A conceptual framework and a research agenda for the comparative study of international regimes, as laid out in this essay, would guide studies of specific regimes and improve our ability to reach general conclusions about this fundamental, yet poorly understood, international phenomenon.

This essay examines the balance of constraints and advantages set by the international environment, as that balance impinges upon national decisions relating to the acquisition of nuclear weaponry. The effect of the balance is to reduce constraints against such acquisition, and to increase advantages; thus, some increase in the number of nuclear-weapons states is likely. It is possible that the general and local effects on international stability which would follow from such an increase in number may not affect the stability of the central balance adversely. The effects in local nuclearized environments will vary, depending in part on the policies of outsiders, but any assumption of massive instability would be unwarranted.

Utilizing two editions of a Soviet textbook that was awarded a state prize and termed “the correct orientation” by a Central Committee official, the author analyzes the evolution of the Soviet view of the outside world in the first half of the 1970s. The movement away from ideological rigidity that began in the 1960s continued in the 1970s on a wide range of subjects. In addition, the analysis of the capitalist countries became intertwined with the debate on the future development of Soviet society; a number of features are said to have resulted from the imperatives of industrialization rather than the inner dynamics of capitalism, and hence are in need of adoption by the Soviet Union. The article closes with a brief survey of the issues subsequently raised in the published Soviet debates that continue on either side of the approved, centrist position.

Why do nations create institutionalized modes of multilateral collaboration? How can common interests develop in the face of inequalities in power and asymmetries in interdependence? The author explores the role of knowledge in the definition of political objectives and interests. The systematic interplay of changing knowledge and changing objectives results in the redefinition of “issues” and the practice of “issue linkage.” The dynamics of issue-linkage, in turn, tell us something about international regimes for the management of progressively more complex issue areas. An ideal-typical “regime” is described, theoretically applicable to all types of issues. Since the cognitive attributes of the actors who set up such a regime cannot be expected to remain stable, this concept of a “regime” can illuminate cliscussion and analysis, but cannot be expected to provide a clear model for desirable policy. However, it can illustrate the options open to policy makers wishing to choose a mode of collaboration. Regimes dealing with money, the oceans, and technology transfer are used for illustrative purposes.

The authors explore the often conflictual bargaining relations between transnational corporations and host governments of less developed countries. They focus particular attention on the conflict that surrounded the creation of the Mexican automobile industry (1960–1964), criticizing and reformulating a current approach to these issues. The argument proceeds in two parts—agenda setting and bargaining power. Each part is organized around a central criticism of the bargaining power approach and provides an alternative formulation which is then applied to an analysis of the bargaining relationship between the Mexican Government and the transnational automobile corporations.

The Mexican state is based on a constantly renewed bargain among several ruling groups and interests representing a broad range of ideological tendencies and social bases. Mexican political stability rests primarily not upon formal institutions, but upon the interaction of principles of political discipline (closely linked to the concept of authoritarianism) and political negotiation (associated with the concept of proto-democracy). The combination of repression and co-optation with just the “right” mix of responsiveness and compromise produces: (1) elites that are both linked to, and insulated from, their potential constituencies; (2) a pattern of political and administrative decision making called “policy incoherence”; and (3) avoidance of the crystallization of factional alliances, and their opposition to one another.

The concept of pluralism has been a familiar one in political science since the first decade of this century, and has appeared in different theoretical frameworks. Pluralism is regarded as inherent in Western democracies, but it has also been interpreted as a transitional form leading to socialism. The Western communist parties, in adopting the concept of pluralism, have found a theoretical justification for abandoning the concepts of a leading model and one authentic party. The new doctrine that embraces pluralism advocates that the communist parties transform their societies to a more advanced, partly socialistic state, and then attempt to gain power by consensual means. The main issues of debate on the transformation are the abolition of the dictatorship of the proletariat, the guarantee of human rights, and the pluralist power structure.

The effects of uncertainty in strategic analysis are generally not well understood, but are increasingly important in relating the strategic calculations by means of which we evaluate the adequacy of our strategic forces to the deterrence of attack in the world of real political leaders, in real crises. Assumptions must be made about many unknowns and uncertainties—ranging from the behavior of national leaders to the technical characteristics of weapons systems—in order to make the problem calculable. The assumptions we make for purposes of analysis, however, are not necessarily the same as those that political leaders can make in considering the actual use of nuclear forces. This distinction is at the root of the relationship between strategic analysis and real-world deterrence. Systematic examination of the uncertainties in strategic analysis, therefore, can help us to better understand the difference between our analytical model and the real world, and hence to put our strategic problems in better perspective.

There is growing realization in the U.S.S.R. that the “contemporary scientific and technological revolution” is as much a managerial and cultural revolution as a scientific and industrial revolution. The key task is to develop not only modern technical hardware, but also an effective and distinctive software appropriate for the times. Accordingly, Soviet authorities have begun to think seriously, really for the first time, about organization and the structural requirements of progress. As organizations become more complex, the area of organizational design gains importance. Because it focuses attention on interrelationships, interdependencies, and integration, the “systems approach” has emerged as a way of coping with advancing complexity. The real significance of the U.S.S.R.'s belated awakening to the modern systems age is the discovery that the Soviet system is, in fact, not a “system.” Lacking both the power and the technique to deal with contemporary issues, Soviet leaders are busy forging new organizational weapons. Despite their increasing efforts to use modern systems terminology and technology to enhance integrative capabilities, conditions militate against any radical systems engineering.

An analysis of six recent works of psychohistory. A scheme is presented for classifying such works. Four different types of psychohistory are discussed; this typology is offered as a means of understanding and controlling the methodological difficulties inherent in the genre.

Since the late 1950s, discussion of civil-military relations has taken place largely within one general conceptual framework. According to this theoretical perception, military and civilian authorities constitute two distinct groups (although they each consist of a variety of subgroups), and relations between them are inherently conflictual. What keeps the conflict within bounds is subordination of the officer corps to civilians except on matters requiring military expertise—i.e., civilian control. Shifts in civil-military relations, moreover, are a function of the degree of effectiveness of civilian control. A close examination of the experiences of the sixteen communist states indicates that these propositions lack comparative validity. It also suggests an alternative conceptualization of civil-military relations. Such relations can be thought of in terms of a continuum, with cooperation at one pole and conflict at the other. Where an individual country falls on that continuum at any time depends on a number of specific variables, of which the sharpness of the dividing line between military and civilian authorities is one. Modifications of civil-military relations can result from changes in any of these variables.

A Checklist for Negotiators, produced during a study session on negotiation in the State Department's Senior Seminar on Foreign Policy, highlights certain changes that are occurring in the diplomatic function. First, practitioners make a distinction between the internal (or domestic) and external aspects of negotiation, which reflects a growing politicization of the diplomatic function and an increasing trend toward a mediatorial model of diplomacy. Second, practitioners emphasize managerial rather than strategic concerns, which is consistent with the large, complex problems that foreign offices are increasingly facing. Third, practitioners attach more importance to issues and substantive information than to personality or sociological variables. This is a reflection of the increasing scope, and resulting anonymity, of international diplomatic processes. These three points introduce new concerns into the theoretical literature on international negotiation.

The work of Ted Robert Gurr, Chalmers Johnson, Neil Smelser, Samuel P. Huntington, and Charles Tilly has dominated the recent study of revolutions. However, Jeffrey Paige, Ellen Kay Trimberger, S. N. Eisenstadt, and Theda Skocpol have lately produced theories of revolution that are far better grounded historically than those in earlier works. Five major points were neglected by earlier theorists: (1) the variable goals and structures of states; (2) the systematic intrusion of international pressures on the domestic political and economic organization of societies; (3) the structure of peasant communities; (4) the coherence or weakness of the armed forces; and (5) the variables affecting elite behavior. Starting from these points, Paige, Trimberger, Eisenstadt, and Skocpol have produced analyses of the causes and outcomes of a variety of revolutions. Yet significant challenges to the theory of revolutions—such as extending the range of cases analyzed, clarifying the grounds of peasant behavior, and tying theoretical analysis to demographic data—still remain.

Few students of the Soviet political scene have used coalition theory to explain Soviet behavior. However, the fact that coalitions are assumed to exist suggests that the different elements of coalition theory—coalition formation and coalition maintenance—may be useful for the study of Soviet decision making. Because the Soviet political system has evolved to the point where the elements that are vital to preserving coalitions are also an integral part of the Soviet system (e.g., fear of the alternative to the coalition, unanimity rule in decision making, the existence of a power broker, and the exclusion of contentious issues), the operation of coalition maintenance may describe the decision-making process. If that is so, the key institutional actors in the Soviet hierarchy must be minimally satisfied before major decisions can be reached. Although elite harmony and coalition stability are ensured thereby, lowest-common-denominator policies will serve to rule out fundamental changes or reform attempts that are necessary for coping with emerging problems. As emerging economic problems make it difficult to satisfy the incremental demands from elite actors and the society at large, it is quite possible that the current decision-making process, or the distribution of power it ensures, will not endure.

Research on Korean communism is clearly subsumed under a new field of inquiry known as “comparative study of communism” or “studies of comparative communism.” Developed in the wake of the Sino-Soviet conflict, the comparative study of communism claims greater conceptual and methodological potency through the use of “value-neutral” models and theories developed in the social and behavioral sciences. The author critically examines the performance of current scholarship on North Korean politics in light of the promise of the comparative study of communism. Specifically, he first identifies key normative, conceptual, and methodological problems that plague the current lines of inquiry in the field. He then probes the areas of substantive strengths, weaknesses, and gaps in our present knowledge about the North Korean political system, focusing on two issues of normative and policy importance to both domestic and foreign policy—legitimacy and chuch'e. The author suggests several alternative methods and approaches for liberating the field from its intellectual isolationism and for charting a path toward a cumulative, orderly, and systematic way of building a body of knowledge about Korean communism.

In Power and Interdependence, Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye make a major contribution to the discipline by explicating a theoretical model for conceptualizing interdependence and isolating a set of variables that will enhance further understanding of the politics of such issues. What is needed next is a series of studies that explores the interrelationships among the variables Keohane and Nye identify. Because these interrelationships will surely vary with interdependency contexts within which bargaining takes place, five such contexts are outlined. Until this research is done, the advice that Keohane and Nye offer policy makers in the developed countries must be considered premature. The essay concludes with some critical comments about Keohane and Nye's discussion of political realism.

Political interpretations of Germany have shifted from their traditional concern over its instability and aggressiveness to an appreciation of West Germany's newly found stability and peacefulness. But the penchant of the Bonn Republic for stability creates new political problems in a world that experiences accelerating rates of political and economic changes.

Recently, much attention has been focused on the influence that multinational corporations (MNCs) have on the politics of developing countries. Even setting aside past legacies of sinister corporate conduct, most students of politics agree that MNCs are potentially important actors—for better or for worse—in a country's political development because they can influence the rate, direction, and beneficiaries of change. Most case studies begin with the assumption that the political impact resulting from the presence of MNCs in developing countries is primarily a function of the international economic system. However, all but one of the books under review focus on the domestic political system in individual host countries as the independent variable rather than on the international economic system. Taken together, these studies make a strong case that the analysis of the MNC and its impact on politics in developing countries must prace heavy emphasis on the particular political circumstances prevailing in each country. The wants, needs, and motivations of key domestic political actors—many of whom do not behave in the manner predicted by either Liberal or Marxist world models—appear to be of fundamental importance in determining how MNCs affect a developing country's politics, and whether that country can counter any potentially adverse political impacts that may accompany MNCs.