100 years of Chatham House: Top ten articles from the 1990s
Editorial Team
In the decade that followed the end of the Cold War International Affairs published frequently on the future of the international system. From expansions of UN peacekeeping operations to the further integration of the European Union, work in International Affairs reflected the drastic changes that were taking place in international politics. The journal also acted as a site for significant new thinking in the discipline of International Relations, from Marysia Zalewski’s articulation of the transformative impact of feminism(s) on our understanding of foreign policy, to Joseph Nye’s work on forms of power.
1) Joseph Nye on power and American strategy after the Cold War
Joseph S. Nye is an American scholar and former political advisor. Over the course of a prolific career Nye has contributed hugely to the development of neoliberal International Relations theory and played a central role in developing the concepts of soft power and smart power. As a policy advisor during the Clinton and Obama administrations, Nye has had a significant impact on US foreign policy. During the early years of the Clinton administration he served as both Assistant Secretary of Defence for International Security Affairs and Chair of the National Intelligence Council.
In 1990, Nye wrote in International Affairs on future directions for American strategy in a post-Cold War world.
From the article:
Too much emphasis on declining power in traditional terms, or too much complacency about the need to invest in international cooperation, may cause Americans to miss the importance of the changing nature of power, and as a result to pursue the wrong strategies as the world enters the post-Cold War era.
2) Geoffrey Howe on Britain’s role in the European Community
Sir Geoffrey Howe (1926–2015) was a senior British Conservative politician. Howe played a pivotal role in the rise of Thatcherism within the British Conservative Party, serving as Margaret Thatcher’s first Chancellor of the Exchequer and later as Foreign Secretary. In these capacities Howe oversaw the institution of Thatcher’s drastic shift in the domestic role of the British state, and contributed to Britain’s entrance into the European Exchange Rate Mechanism.
Howe’s resignation speech citing disagreements over Britain’s role in the European Community (EC) on the 13th of November 1990 was credited as the beginning of the end for Margaret Thatcher’s premiership. In June of the same year, Howe addressed the London School of Economics on the future of Britain’s relationship with the EC. The speech was published in International Affairs in October 1990, just a month before his resignation.
From the article:
The future of Europe is clearly open to be influenced and shaped by the constructive, active engagement of the many countries which comprise it. History offers us a unique opportunity to do that now. We must rise to the occasion with confidence.
3) Lennart Meri on Estonia’s place post-Cold War Europe
Lennart Meri (1929–2006) was an Estonian politician and writer who served as president of Estonia in the years following the fall of the Soviet Union. After Estonia’s annexation by the USSR in 1940, Meri and his family were exiled to Siberia. After the war, during the Soviet occupation of Estonia, Meri worked as a playwright and writer, producing work which attempted to raise Estonia’s profile in the West. He went on to play an important role in the struggle for Estonian independence as a founding member of the Estonian Popular Front, becoming Estonia’s first foreign minister in 1990 and serving two terms as President from 1992–2001.
In 1992 Meri addressed Chatham House on the future of Estonia in Europe.
From the article:
My firm belief is that the independence of three Baltic countries serves equally the national interests of the Baltic countries and those of the Soviet Union…why should these interests be viewed as being in conflict?
4) Nicole Gnesotto on EU security after the Cold War
Nicole Gnesotto is a scholar in the field of security studies. Over the course of her career she has held a range of senior positions in academia, the French government and numerous policy institutes. In this capacity she has been both deputy head of the French Foreign Ministry’s policy planning staff and the first director of the EU Institute for Security Studies. She has consistently been an influential voice on European security policy and the strategic position of Europe as a security actor.
In 1992, Gnesotto wrote in International Affairs on the security policy of the new European Union.
From the article:
While the objective of a common European defence policy may appear… pointless now that the direct Soviet threat has disappeared, will not the accession of certain countries to full membership of the European Communities, and maybe to European Union, revive the need for a policy of common defence?
5) Peter Kenen on European financial institutions
Peter Bain Kenen (1932–2012) was an American economist and policy advisor. Over the course of his academic career Kenen held senior positions at numerous universities. In this capacity he is most remembered for his early advocacy of floating exchange rates for smaller countries and his work on currency areas. As a policy advisor, Kenen worked with numerous institutions from the US Treasury to the International Monestary Fund and the Bank of England. Kenen was also a member on President Kennedy’s task force on foreign economic policy and was a visiting fellow at Chatham House.
In 1992 in Kenen wrote International Affairs on the negotiations around the future of a European central currency.
From the article:
The United Kingdom was the lone dissenter. It was willing to move beyond stage one by creating a new institution and a common currency, but’ common’ rather than ‘single’ was meant to endorse the hard ECU rather than the strategy favoured by its partners.
6) Marrack Goulding on UN peacekeeping
Sir Marrack Goulding (1936–2010) was a British diplomat and former Under-Secretary General of the United Nations. Goulding served as diplomat in the Foreign Office, serving in numerous embassies as well as Private Secretary to three ministers of state for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs. In 1986 Goulding became UN Under-Secretary General for Special Political Affairs. In this capacity, he was responsible for a drastic expansion in the number of serving peacekeepers following the end of the Cold War and established the Department of Peacekeeping Operations within the UN system. From 1993–1997 he held the mandate of UN Under-Secretary General for Political Affairs, serving alongside Kofi Anan and further coordinating UN peacekeeping operations.
In 1993, having presided over a historic expansion in UN peacekeeping, Goulding delivered the Cyril Foster lecture at the University of Oxford on the evolution of peacekeeping, which was published International Affairs in the same year.
From the article:
These days…the United Nations has almost too much credibility. On some recent mornings, every single item on the BBC World Service news has related to a situation in which the United Nations is engaged in peacemaking or peacekeeping or humanitarian relief.
7) Marysia Zalewski on the potential of Feminist foreign policy analysis
Marysia Zalewski is an IR scholar who has played an important role in the development of contemporary Feminist International Relations. Throughout her career, Zalewski has been a key figure in Feminist and Critical IR. She is currently working on a range of issues that vary from critical analyses of sexual and gender-based violence to work on knowledge production and creative writing in IR. In 2013 she became the first British academic to receive the International Studies Association’s Eminent Scholar Award.
In 1995 Zalewski wrote in International Affairs on the transformative potential of feminism(s) as a mode of foreign policy analysis.
From the article:
Feminists’ exposure of the double illusion of the ‘naturalness’ of gender differences and the apolitical nature of the private sphere has opened up a great swathe of possibilities for increased understanding of world politics; the asking of new questions allows the telling of new stories.
8) Farhana Yamin on Biodiversity and International Ethics
Farhana Yamin is a lawyer and academic specialising in climate change and development policy. Over the course of her career she has advised a range of organizations on international climate change including former EU Commissioner for Climate Action Connie Hedegaard, and the European Commission on Emissions Trading Directive. She is currently Director of the Climate Change and Energy Programme at the Foundation for International Environmental Law and Development, and an Associate Fellow of Chatham House.
In 1995 Yamin wrote in International Affairs on the link between Britain’s economic interests and foreign policy priorities.
From the article:
Similar developments are occurring at an alarming rate in developing countries, where the world’s remaining biodiversity is concentrated. While it is impossible to quantify future rates of loss with certainty, all estimates are disturbing.
9) Paul Krugman on conventional wisdom in economics
Paul Krugman is an economist and political commentator. Over the course of his career Krugman has become one of the most influential economists in the world, winning the 2008 Nobel Prize in Economics for his work on new trade theory and international economic geography. His work also includes significant contributions to the study of economies of scale. Krugman is also a noted advocate of Keynesian monetary policy, attracting both criticism and support for his advocacy of government spending in the aftermath of the 2008–09 global financial crisis.
In 1995 Krugman wrote in International Affairs on patterns of conventional wisdom in contemporary economics.
From the article:
Nowadays we wonder how the post-war orthodoxy could have commanded such allegiance; but surely we will someday wonder the same about today’s unquestioned truths.
10) Sir Lawrence Freedman on the relationship between military and political power in the aftermath of the Cold war
Sir Lawrence Freedman is an academic specializing in strategic studies. Freedman is a highly significant figure in the development of strategic studies as a subdiscipline in the UK and has written extensively on UK defence and nuclear strategy. He has held numerous teaching positions at UK universities and has been a researcher at both the International Institute for Strategic Studies and Chatham House. He also worked directly on UK foreign policy, contributing to the 1999 Chicago speech in which Prime Minister Tony Blair outlined the liberal interventionist principles underpinning his government’s foreign policy. He later served on the Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq War from 2009. Today he is Professor Emeritus for War Studies at King’s College London
In 1998 Freedman delivered the Lawrence Vincent Memorial Lecture on the relationship between political and military power in the post-Cold War world.
From the article:
The point about latent military power is that it can allow political relations to develop without violence. So while it might have been thought that the lack of obvious conflict scenarios would qualify American military power to the point of its irrelevance, its value may have been in reinforcing the irrelevance of other sources of military power.
We hope you enjoyed this seventh post in our series, ‘100 years of Chatham House’. Every month throughout 2020, the editorial team of International Affairs will be publishing some of the highlights from each decade since the founding of the Royal Institute of International Affairs.
Read more from the series here.
