Lilliputians in Gulliver’s World? Small States in International Relations

The Diplomacy of Micro States

Persuading and resisting persuasion

Dr Alex Sceberras Trigona stresses that not only persuasion but also resisting persuasion is highly important for small states, which tend to be seen as the ‘diplomatic prey’ of great powers. He analyses three examples of successful persuasion from Maltese diplomatic history. First were the negotiations on Maltese neutrality, which required a lot of persuasion of two major Cold War powers and numerous regional players in the Mediterranean.

How important is the role of small states security in the maintenance of international peace and security?

The game of International Peace and Security has for a long time been one played only by the great powers, leading to the singling out of small states in its deliberations. These states would create their own rules and be their own referees, whilst the existing small states would conduct themselves as mere spectators. However, following the effects of the end of the two World Wars, the creation of the UN and decolonization, the role of small states in the maintenance of international peace and security has gathered new responsibilities and in consequence it has made them important agents and m...

Environment and Natural Resources in Small Island Developing States

Small State Diplomacy

Small developing economies and the multilateral trading system: A Caribbean perspective

Small developing economies are often constrained in participating in the negotiation and regulation of multilateral trading rules due to severe cost and resource limitations. This article argues that, despite the costs and difficulties, small states must remain engaged in the multilateral trading system in order to ensure that their specialised commercial interests are recognised and to protect their rights. Umbrella entities like the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery (CRNM) provide a means of maximising the influence of small states in an international forum such as the World Tra...

Meeting the needs of microstate security

This article examines the pressing security concerns of microstates, particularly against the backdrop of recurring themes of vulnerability in the literature. It reviews those arguments in the early years of decolonization which expressed scepticism about the prospects for independence in such very small dependencies given their lack of defensive capacity and the geopolitical risks which they face in a potentially dangerous external milieu. The article argues that these doubts and concerns have not been realised in the actual experience of microstates particularly in terms of conventional thre...

Roaring Mice Against the Tide: The South Pacific Islands and Agenda-Building on Global Warming

Persuasion: importance of trust, relevance for small states, and limitations of computers

Dr George Vella, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Malta, argues that persuasion is central not only to diplomacy but also to society in general. He highlights three aspects of persuasion. First is the high importance of trust for persuasion: trust creates the context in which persuasion can be used.

The miscalculation of small nations

A Future for Small States: Overcoming Vulnerability

Small island states in the face of climatic change: The end of the line in international environmental responsibility

Small States and the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) of the EU: A Comparative Analysis

The National Security of Small States in a Changing World

Graduating from least developed country to middle income country status: A trap for small island developing states?

SIDS tends to perform particularly well with regards to their socio-economic achievements and development endeavours. As a result, several SIDS graduate from their Least Development Country status to Middle-Income Country status. This graduation implies that SIDS are much better-off economically and can do without the special treatments and benefits in terms of Overseas Development Assistance that they were receiving as an LDC. However, and this is the thrust of the argument in this paper, this is not the case at all. The support was and is crucial to SIDS. After all, it was the catalyst which...

Small States: Meeting Challenges in the Global Economy

Engineering Influence: The Subtile Power of Small States in the CSCE/OSCE

Small states and diplomacy: An indispensable though much diversified relation

Special Ministerial Event on Food Security and Sustainble Development in Small Island Developing States

Nation branding and the role of public diplomacy in assisting small island states in developing strong nation brands

The concept of applying branding principles and strategies to nation states has been around for decades. However, in recent years, the concept has occupied prime attention in academia and the business sector.

The Power of Small States: Diplomacy in World War II

This Is an inquiry into how the governments of small and militarily weak states can resist the strong pressure of great powers even in crisis periods. The continued existence and, in deed, startling increase in the number of small states may seem paradoxical in the age of superpowers and the drastically altered ratio of military strength between them and the rest of the world. It is well known that the ability to use violence does not alone determine the course of world politics. Some of the other determinants can be observed with exceptional clarity in the diplomacy of the small ...

Small Economies in the Face of Globalisation

21st Century Diplomacy: A Practitioner’s Guide

In the 21st century, new kinds of challenges resulting from interdependence among states and globalisation have had a determining impact of the conduct of diplomacy. Diplomacy has become multifaceted, pluri-directional, volatile and intensive, due to the increased complexity in terms of actors, dialogues subjects, modes of communication, and plurality of objectives. This unique text, written by a leading scholar and Foreign Service expert, examines all such factors to provide the definitive guide to diplomacy as it is practiced today. With a multitude of examples from around the world, includi...

Small states and NATO: Influence and accommodation

Island entrepreneurs: Insights from exceptionally successful knowledge-driven SMEs from 5 European island territories

Small Island Developing States and Climate Change: Effects, Responses and Positions beyond Durban (WP)

Small States and Alliances

A Framework of Best Practices for Caribbean Small States to Meet the Challenges of Climate Change

Caribbean Small States are considered vulnerable by virtue of their geographical peculiarities, economic exigencies, delicate ecosystems and rate of social development among other characteristics. Their ability to meet challenges such as climate change is therefore deficient.

An assessment of economic and commercial diplomacy in micro-states: A case study of Namibia

Economic diplomacy can become an important tool for foreign policy of the government to promote economic interest of Namibia in relation to trade promotion, attracting investment through channels of diplomacy.

Small Developing Economies in the World Trade Organization

The security of small nations: Challenges and defences

The 'essentially contested concept' of security is analysed, and some main kinds of ambiguity and dimensions outlined: level, kind of threat and kind of defence. Discourses on security, particularly of small nations, must avoid being trapped into dealing only with one level (national, which in practice normally means state), one kind of threat (military) and one kind of defence (again military). There is no clear relation between kind of alignment and military expenditures, but non-aligned states are overrepresented both among the very high armers and among the very low armers. Increasing gaps...

Alliances and Small Powers

In search of the most sustainable and coherent diplomatic approaches to addressing the fundamental challenges Small States (including Small Island States or SIDS) perennially face in an uncertain world of hegemonic giants

Small states, in every sphere of natural and human activity, are negatively and disproportionately impacted by crises, when compared to their hegemonic, larger and stronger counterparts.

Small States in International Relations

Is a special treatment of small island developing States possible?

What are the priorities for small states in the international system?

There is no evidence that the vigorous political action needed to implement the recommendations of previous reports on the vulnerability of small states in the Commonwealth will be forthcoming in the near future. In matters of security, economics and particularly the environment, the collective interests of small states do not appear to have been recognized in the international community. Major donors find dealing with small individual demands from multiple small states difficult, but a regional approach simplifies matters and should be the primary area of concern. The Vulnerability Index prov...

On Behalf of My Delegation,…: A Survival Guide for Developing Country Climate Negotiators

The one hundred pages of this book are in fact a useful Survival Guide for those approaching climate change negotiations for the first time. It has been written for developing country delegates, but delegates from other countries can also profit from its reading the same way that a similar survival guide for industrialized country delegates would be useful for those coming from developing countries, because it is necessary to know both sides of the story

Singapore’s Diplomacy: Vulnerability into Strength

Singapore is a practitioner of focused, innovative diplomacy, constantly in search of the political space for itself that would overcome its sense of vulnerability resulting from its geopolitical location.

Caribbean Diplomacy: Research on Diplomacy of Small States

With little recourse to traditional economic and political power in their international relations, diplomacy for Caribbean states is a key mechanism to achieve the realisation of the region’s overall development agenda. The Caribbean is no stranger to diplomatic challenges.

Small States in the Global Economy

Globalization and Governance: Essays on the Challenges for Small States

Security for small states

Small States at the United Nations

The proliferation of small states in the past few decades has brought small and larger states on the same playing field. Their increase in number triggered a wave of studies, raised concern by 'realists' and some powerful states, and led to an affirmation that at the United Nations, all states are equal, regardless of size.

The Vulnerability of the Small Island Developing States of the Caribbean

The Diplomacy of Small States

Multilateral Diplomacy for Small States: The Art of Letting Others Have Your Way

Multilateral Diplomacy for Small States: The Art of Letting Others Have Your Way

The Limits of Neorealism

The Limits of Neorealism

The Diplomacies of New Small States: The case of Slovenia with some comparison(s) from the Baltics

Milan Jazbec is the State Secretary at the Ministry of Defence in Slovenia responsible for his ministry’s co-operation and preparations for integration with NATO.

Lilliput under threat: The security problems of small island and enclave developing states

Advancing the interests of small developing countries

'Given the disparity between the participation of developing and developed countries it was clear that more support was needed for the former group to be able to understand the issues and make a meaningful input.' - Rodney Taylor from Barbados

Small States, Small Problems? Income, Growth, and Volatility in Small States

The Role of Small States in the Multilateral Framework

The current world geopolitical configuration shows how after the end of a bipolar world set by the top superpowers (United States and the Ex Soviet Republic) along with other major players (such as Germany, Great Britain, France, Japan and China, the P5 United Nations Security Council members + 1 with the full capacity of veto power in all world top decisions and procedures) set up a new world reconfiguration that has emerged since the end of the twenty century and mainly in the beginning of this 21th century standing driven from some centers of power and in parasailed with the political and e...

Climate Change and Small Island States: Power, Knowledge and the South Pacific

The changing phases of diplomacy in a Small Island Developing State: A case study of the Kingdom of Tonga

Diplomacy is an integral tool of communication utilised by nations as a means to achieve their intended interest and goals. The foundations and mode of diplomacy practiced by nations differs according to their circumstances. For Small Island Developing States who differ in size, economy, location, resources, the use of diplomacy has become a vital tool for survival.

Management of Natural and Environmental Disasters in Small Island Developing States

Small states in the global politics of development

Much of the discussion surrounding small states has treated them as a discrete category, with common vulnerabilities and opportunities. However, a productive approach is to look at the global politics of development, and then see where small states fit in. The author looks in turn at the global politics of finance, trade and the environment. He concludes that small states have been largely unsuccessful in asserting their own interests in global politics, and that (to the extent that it is possible to generalize about states which differ greatly) vulnerabilities rather than opportunities are th...

Asian Diplomacy: The Foreign Ministries of China, India, Japan, Singapore and Thailand

Based on eight years of research and interviews with over 160 professional diplomats and others, this book offers a range of information on the structures, operation and the working style of the foreign ministries of five key countries in Asia: China, India, Japan, Singapore and Thailand. The rise of Asia adds salience to this book, since it has become more important than ever before to understand the dynamics of the foreign policy process in these countries.

Climate change, small island developing states

Lilliputians in Gulliver’s World? Small States in International Relations

A social science that is worthy of its name must study the universe of its cases in its entirety. If the states system remains a key component of world politics, then the study of small states is simply part and parcel of what the discipline of International Relations (IR) is about. In this piece, we want to demonstrate the importance of studying small states in some detail. We start, in this Introduction, with an outline of justifications for small states’ studies and with some historical and conceptual observations on what “smallness” entails. In Section 2 we show how small states...