Revolutionary Diplomacy

This book examines the culture of the French diplomatic corps from 1789 to 1799. It analyzes how the French revolutionaries attempted, albeit unsuccessfully, to transform the diplomatic culture of the old regime, notably in etiquette, language and dress and how the ideology and dynamic of the Revolution affected certain aspects of international affairs.

From the Introduction: The principal question that is posed in this study is, what has been the influence of Mao’s united front doctrine on China’s foreign policy? A related but secondary question is also considered: In what ways, if any, has China's participation in the international system caused Peking to revise its conception of a united front in world politics? Insofar as Mao's thoughts about united fronts are part of the total array of theories and operational principles that make up the Chinese communist “ideology,” this essay considers one aspect of the relationship between ideology and foreign policy. Since this question has long been the subject of a mostly inconclusive and often circular academic debate, [Armstrong states his] reasons for returning to it here. The first is that the problem is no less important because it admits of no easy solution. Indeed, with the breakdown in the twentieth century of even the limited consensus over norms and values that permitted a great power concert to exist for part of the nineteenth, the question is clearly one of major significance in contemporary international relations. Since China has become in many ways a symbol of the postwar ideological challenge to the established order in world politics, the question is particularly relevant in a study of China’s foreign policy. Finally, by combining a strictly limited focus of enquiry with a systematic approach to the problem it may be possible to overcome some of the analytical difficulties that surround the larger issue of the relation of ideas to social practice. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1977.

Looks at the effect of the American Revolution on European relations, relates American diplomatic efforts to others of the time, and explains why England could not find allies against the colonists

"To the superficial observer there would seem never to have been an age less propitious for the birth of a new nation. The tendency of the times was altogether for the aggrandizement of big states and the consolidation of their territory at the expense of the little ones, for the extinction of the weaker nations and governments rather than for the creation of new ones. Nevertheless it was this bitter cut-throat international rivalry which was to make American independence possible." On April 15th, 1783, the Articles of Peace between the United States and Great Britain went into effect proclaiming that “His Britannic Majesty acknowledges the United States…to be free Sovereign and independent States.” That recognition, the origins of which began almost seven years earlier in Philadelphia, the fate of which was uncertain at Valley Forge and ultimately vindicated at Yorktown, represented a monumental achievement for the new American nation. It also, as Samuel Flagg Bemis shows us, marked the end of a world war. This book explains the ambitions and interests of European powers during the American Revolution. France’s search for revenge against Britain after the French and Indian War, Spain’s attempt to retake Gibraltar, the complicated trade interests of the Netherlands and Russia, Austria’s fears of a two-front war – each of these saw America’s struggle for independence as an event that affected their own strategies. And, as Bemis shows us, it is through that prism that we should consider the actions of those who supported America and Great Britain.

From the Introduction: The principal question that is posed in this study is, what has been the influence of Mao’s united front doctrine on China’s foreign policy? A related but secondary question is also considered: In what ways, if any, has China's participation in the international system caused Peking to revise its conception of a united front in world politics? Insofar as Mao's thoughts about united fronts are part of the total array of theories and operational principles that make up the Chinese communist “ideology,” this essay considers one aspect of the relationship between ideology and foreign policy. Since this question has long been the subject of a mostly inconclusive and often circular academic debate, [Armstrong states his] reasons for returning to it here. The first is that the problem is no less important because it admits of no easy solution. Indeed, with the breakdown in the twentieth century of even the limited consensus over norms and values that permitted a great power concert to exist for part of the nineteenth, the question is clearly one of major significance in contemporary international relations. Since China has become in many ways a symbol of the postwar ideological challenge to the established order in world politics, the question is particularly relevant in a study of China’s foreign policy. Finally, by combining a strictly limited focus of enquiry with a systematic approach to the problem it may be possible to overcome some of the analytical difficulties that surround the larger issue of the relation of ideas to social practice. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1977.