A Contribution to a Theory of International Systems Change

Building on Gilpin's taxonomy of international change, the book sketches a theory of international systems change. It stresses the impossibility to assign overall priority to any of the main spheres of human activities on which the main theoretical traditions focus, namely economy, politics and culture. It suggests that major change can start in any of these sphere, and that the crucial element is their interaction, which may trigger dynamics of change or resist them. Insights from political realism, historical materialism and social constructivism and the theory of ideology are used to this end, together with historical analyses which employ similar framework of analysis.