Main trends of research in the social and human ... - unesdoc - Unesco

Political science 187
regognizable group of ‘smaller European democracies’; but if one looks towards
problems of regional unification they are part of a totally different pattern.
The importance of these ecological indicators is precisely that they enable
different categories to be chosen, with some precision of definition, for different
enquiries.
2. Categorization by institutions and their functions
Against this classification may be set another set of categories: what are the
essential institutions of any State which has achieved the minimum required for
persistence and recognition?
The present working classification of institutions is in effect a congeries of
relics of comprehensive theories which failed, and one of the problems of con-
temporary empirical theory is to find a new theoretical unity. Various effortsZ6
have been made to link institutional classification to general theory, and none
of them has been very satisfactory. The presentation used under headings D
and E, below, claims only to be a workable compromise.
3. Levels of integration
Finally, one must add yet another dimension, that of unity, decentralization
and dissolution.27 The recognition of a State is a formal act within the system of
international law, and there is a sharp ‘cut-off’ between ‘State’ and ‘not State’.
But in political analysis, one is forced also to recognize a gradient, from the
very loose institutions of the United Nations, through various regional institutions,
to functional unions such as EEC and EFTA, to federations, and then to
various forms of political and administrative decentralization within a recognized
State. A spectrum of institutional devices is available at each level: but
underlying them are questions of social and economic unity, and also the
formidable problem of nation and State, a problem which is at once descriptive,
ideological and normative.
B. International relations
International relations, as a subject distinct from international law and from
diplomatic history, was first taught in universities in the 1920s, and it then em-
braced primarily the study of international institutions, of the origins of World
War I, and of the problems of frontiers, colonies, disarmament and peace. The
importance of these topics, then and now, is unchallenged, public concern
remains intense, and it is perhaps a trivial question to ask whether these studies
do or do not constitute a discipline distinct from political science.
The view taken here is that in international relations one finds not different
problems, but an extreme case of the same problems as face all political scien-
tists, and (further) that it is still necessary to understand the international system
first as a system of States, giving at the same time adequate treatment to the
forces which cut across the juridical boundaries of States. But the problems of
scope and method are not much affected by this question of terminology.