Global Diplomacy in World System History: A Network Analysis of the Multilateral Treaty System over 400 Years
(March 2008)Abstract
Global cooperation in the guise of multilateral treaty-making has a long lineage and is only now being subjected to empirical analysis with the advent of the MATRS dataset. Multilateral treaty-making emerges as a secular activity, growing steadily, even exponentially, over the last 150 years. This growth has been independent of the number of states in the system or the `interdependence' of those states as traditionally measured by relations of trade. Even more surprisingly, treaty-making appears to be independent of the existence of hegemony/leadership in the world system. Treaty-making continues apace regardless of the existence or lack of existence of a hegemon. Hegemons display a unique tendency to withdraw from the multilateral treaty-making system during their rise to power, and return to that system during their decline phase. Network analysis reinforces these trends by providing us with better- grounded measures of `closeness', `betweenness' and `core status', while a review of the network graphics reveals little.