Face-to-Face Diplomacy
Social Neuroscience and International Relations
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Cambridge University Press
Published:8th Mar '18
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
This hardback is available in another edition too:
- Paperback£30.99(9781108404440)
Argues that face-to-face interaction undercuts the security dilemma at the interpersonal level by providing a mechanism for understanding intentions.
Face-to-face diplomacy is the most ubiquitous practice of world politics, seen as essential by leaders, but dismissed as irrelevant by political scientists. Drawing upon social neuroscience and psychology, this book addresses this puzzle to create a theory of face-to-face diplomacy that is relevant for both students and scholars of world politics as well as practitioners and policymakers.Face-to-face diplomacy has long been the lynchpin of world politics, yet it is largely dismissed by scholars of International Relations as unimportant. Marcus Holmes argues that dismissing this type of diplomacy is in stark contrast to what leaders and policy makers deem as essential and that this view is rooted in a particular set of assumptions that see an individual's intentions as fundamentally inaccessible. Building on recent evidence from social neuroscience and psychology, Holmes argues that this assumption is problematic. Marcus Holmes studies some of the most important moments of diplomacy in the twentieth century, from 'Munich' to the end of the Cold War, and by showing how face-to-face interactions allowed leaders to either reassure each other of benign defensive intentions or pick up on offensive intentions, his book challenges the notion that intentions are fundamentally unknowable in international politics, a central idea in IR theory.
'Marcus Holmes advances an innovative and compelling argument for taking face-to-face diplomacy seriously. He not only shows that it works – something that diplomats know intuitively – but also explains how and why face-to-face encounters have shaped key events in global politics.' Roland Bleiker, University of Queensland
'After many years Face-to-Face Diplomacy brings the poverty of theory in the literature on summit diplomacy to an end. This is an excellent study by a fine mind and, in that sense, a milestone.' Jan Melissen, Co-Editor of The Hague Journal of Diplomacy, Senior Research Fellow at the Netherlands Institute of International Relations 'Clingendael' and University of Antwerp
'Holmes' new book is at the forefront of an overdue turn in international relations scholarship examining the pre-rational processes that guide most human behavior and how they affect foreign policy decision-making. Face-to-Face Diplomacy unsettles strongly held assumptions in international relations scholarship, such as the idea that information must be costly to be convincing and is processed deliberately and consciously. This is a new step forward in international relations scholarship, deftly integrating insights from neuroscience and providing an answer for what leaders have long known – it is important to meet face-to-face.' Brian Rathbun, University of Southern California
'The book will be of immense interest to scholars and students of diplomatic studies, IR, world history, social neuroscience, psychology, and anyone else interested in interdisciplinary approaches to the social sciences. The book is of substantial value for practitioners - diplomats and leaders - who might find the empirical cases of interpersonal communication between state leaders enlightening, instructive, and worth keeping in mind in the continuously evolving practice of diplomacy.' Olga Krasnyak, International Studies Review
ISBN: 9781108417075
Dimensions: 235mm x 157mm x 20mm
Weight: 560g
314 pages