This paper takes as its starting point the possibility of empirical and theoretical cross‐fertilization between strategic culturalists and realists. Indeed, recent neoclassical realist writings indicate that there is currently a move away from the more abstract theorizing of Waltzian neorealism. In order to conduct detailed foreign policy analysis, these authors have included an increasing array of variables including nonmaterial factors. The paper argues that much can be gained from examination of the alternative explanations of state behavior provided by strategic culture and neoclassical realism. Yet the benefits of competitive collaboration depend upon the particular conception of strategic culture under consideration. The paper identifies four main conceptions of strategic culture and examines the type of collaboration with neoclassical realism that is possible for each one.

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This article critically examines recent works on resilience. In so doing, it argues that rather than representing some radical rupture with current practices heralding the dawn of a new era, as David Chandler claims, the emphasis on individuals as resilient subjects simply represents a new phase in the neoliberal shift from the state as provider to state as enabler and promoter of self-reliance. Indeed, our present preoccupation with complexity, uncertainty, and resilience can best be understood as reflecting the consequences of neoliberal policies Moreover, the article further argues that there is an attendant danger that resilience thinking may further promote neoliberal forms of governmentality and encourage a degree of political passivity. The emphasis on resilience is in danger of depoliticising highly political choices, shifting attention toward ex-post policies of survival and recovery rather than challenging the current economic order and resisting the further imposition of neoliberal policies on already beleaguered populations. This article therefore argues for shifting our emphasis towards a Foucauldian analysis of power and resistance.

This paper examines the assertion that economic globalization has led to the decline of welfare spending in recent decades. Although it is often argued that the increasing intensity of globalization has led to such a decline in the industrialized states, the paper fi nds that there has been little, if any, downturn in either levels of state expenditure in general or in levels of welfare spending in particular. However, the experience of the developing states has been rather different. In their case, the last few decades indicate that stagnation or a decline in welfare spending has occurred, particularly during the period of structural adjustment implementation. It is argued that the OECD countries still manage to provide a high level of social welfare to their populations that closely resembles the compensatory state model. In contradistinction, many of the states in the South have struggled to maintain their levels of social expenditure and therefore most resemble Cerny's competitive state model. In order to explain these two divergent outcomes, the paper examines the way in which the behaviour of certain key international fi nancial actors (investors, multinational companies, international fi nancial institutions) differs with regard to these two sets of countries. This paper examines the contention that economic globalization has led to the decline of welfare spending in recent decades. 1 In so doing, it is argued that the experience of the industrialized and less industrialized states has been radically different. The OECD countries have experienced little, if any, downturn in either levels of state expenditure in general or in levels of welfare spending in particular. In contradistinction, many of the developing states have experienced signifi cant declines in welfare spending, particularly during the period of structural adjustment implementation. In order to explain these two divergent outcomes, the paper examines the way in which the behaviour of international investors, multinational companies and the international fi nancial institutions differs in relation to these two sets of countries.It is argued that the current period of economic globalization, i.e. the intensification of economic relations between states, was actually initiated by the highly industrialized countries themselves following the economic stagnation of the 1970s. During this period, many OECD countries moved towards full liberalization of their capital accounts. 2 Many have also encouraged the expansion of their domestic companies' overseas operations in order to take advantage of lower production costs International Relations

Recent writings on globalization have tended to argue that such economic interconnectedness is, in one way or another, geographically delimited. Three competing views appear in the literature, regionalization, triadization and the involutionist perspective. This article challenges the portrayal of these perspectives as competing conceptions and instead argues that each perspective furnishes us with a partial view of a larger process. In so doing, this paper revisits the involutionist perspective, arguing that, in relation to the developing countries’ relative share of world trade and investment shares, the use of the term ‘globalization’ should be questioned. Rather, in relation to trade, involution is a more apt description. However, in terms of FDI, stasis better describes the contemporary international economy. The article then examines the trade and investment patterns within the triad, corroborating earlier findings that each leg of the triad is increasingly trading more with their neighbours than with each other, but that inter‐triad FDI is indeed increasing. Three main factors are presented in order to explain the contemporary patterns of trade and investment associated with involution, regionalization and triadization: product differentiation, vertical specialization and the continuing concentration on primary product production in much of the developing world.