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International Politics has been characterized as an American social science. This article traces the early development of the discipline in Sweden in the shadow of US hegemony. The advantages & disadvantages of the Swedish decision to keep International Relations (IR) within the broader discipline of Political Science are discussed. Recalling the early tensions between International Politics & Peace & Conflict Research, the author identifies some prominent traits in the development of Swedish IR in recent decades. Finally, broader developments in IR research generally are outlined in terms of consecutive debates, continuously broadening research themes, fashions, reaction to dramatic events in the world, & dialectics between paradigms emphasizing anarchy or order. References. Adapted from the source document.

In Norway, 2005 was a year of celebrations, linkel, first & foremost, to the fact that 100 years had passed since the peaceful dissolution of the personal union between Norway & Sweden. Despite the absence of broad popular support for the idea that this should merit any celebrations, government & media spent considerable resources on high-profile promotion of the 1905 story, including the side-events leading up to or following the famous 7 June Declaration of the Norwegian Storting (Parliament). In the context of nation-building, historical milestones tend to take on a flavor of history-building, -- the stuff that national myths are made of. In the saga of Norwegian nation-building, 1905 had come to play a perhaps surprisingly inflated role. Thus -- less surprisingly -- in the interpretation handed over to a contemporary audience, the various events of 1905 have been suffused with a series of myths, some of which have assumed the character of national dogmas. In particular, the author explores the myths surrounding the referendum of 12-13 November 1905, & demonstrates how vested interests have been instrumental in consolidating the popular (but false) interpretation that the real issue of the referendum was Norway's constitution (monarchy vs. republic) & not the conditions set forth by Prince Carl of Denmark for accepting the offer made by the Norwegian Government & its parliament to assume the Norwegian throne. In fact, employing devious tactics, prime Minister Michelsen succeeded not only in winning a comfortable victory for prince Carl's candidacy (whereby the prince became King Haakon VII of Norway), but he also managed to entrench the notion that the referendum above all was a resounding confirmation of a (continued) monarchical constitutional order. The long-term effect (which is still very much a defining feature of Norway's political self-image) was to give the country's republicans (who, at the onset of 1905 were a dominant force in the Norwegian political discourse) a permanently marginalized position as a fringe movement of eccentrics & certified losers. References. Adapted from the source document.

This article aims to draw the attention to a field that has been widely acknowledged worldwide but can be considered as rather new in Lithuania -- to the methods of foresighting & future studies. Foresighting can serve as a supplement to analytic research & can be applied as a significant methodological instrument in numerous fields of political science. Authors state that foresighting is particularly relevant to the research of international relations. As actors of the international system are competing for power & attempting to formulate strategies to expand their power, foresighting & construction of future scenarios becomes an inherent part of the strategic processes. A scenario constructing process & examples are presented in the article. Adapted from the source document.

This article is devoted to the Open Method of Co-ordination (OMC) as a method of the European Union (EU) governance. First, the article presents the method, its characteristics & the rationale behind its application in the EU. This is followed by an analytical framework, which includes the factors of EU & national level (independent variables), influence mechanisms of the OMC as well as public policy & institutional change (dependent variables). This analytical framework was used for structuring & summarizing the results of the OMC research in Lithuania. The main conclusion of this article is that the OMC is not effective in Lithuania due to its weak mechanisms of influence. Although according to its definition the OMC is attributable to "soft" forms of governance, its inadequate application reduces its effectiveness in Lithuania. These factors constrain the implementation of necessary reforms in Lithuania & reduce its contribution to economic growth & employment of the EU. Adapted from the source document.

The primary aim of this article is to analyze how the interpretation of "universal" geopolitical ideas, especially those related to images of US power, depend on national, publishing & rhetorical interests. By comparing various predominant intellectual stances, one can see that even after the end of the Cold War its' rhetorical tropes still propel further disputes. As a result, national interests & ambitions of some politicians merge & the lines between political realism & ideologies become blurred. For example, phrases such as "the new world order," but even more often, "the new world disorder" are used indiscriminately in hundreds of titles promising accounts of the international system & its events. Thus instead of seeing rhetoric & reality as mutually exclusive opposites (which happens whenever the rhetoric is relegated to the field of myths & lies), new studies of the Cold War now generally recognize the rhetorical component of reality. This article uses Pierre Bourdieu's concept of "cultural fields" & his theoretical focus on the international circulation of ideas to discuss the rhetoric of "soft power.". Adapted from the source document.

The article discuses the problem that was recently raised in the Lithuanian historical literature & public discourse by G. Beresnevieius, A. Bumblauskas, S. C. Rowell: was the medieval Lithuanian state (Grand Duchy of Lithuania; GDL) an empire? Important reason for the emergence of this problem was the partial rehabilitation of the very concept of "empire" due to the dissolution of the the USSR (reputed as "last empire") & the search for common legacies by the historians of the countries involved in the construction of the European Union as a transnational political community. There were important reasons for the traditional historiography to abstain from the use of the concepts of "empire" & "imperialism" in the work on GDL. For Non-Marxist Russian historians, GDL was simply another Russian state, so there could not be Russian imperialism against Russians. For Marxist historians, imperialism was a phase in the "capitalist formation," immediately preceding the socialist revolution & bound to the specific period of world history, so the research on precapitalist empires & imperialism was suspect of anachronism. For the opposite reason, deriving from the hermeneutic methodology, the talk about medieval Lithuanian empire & imperialism was an anachronism for Non-Marxist Polish & German historians too, because they considered as Empires only polities that claimed to be successors to Roman Empire: the Holy Roman Empire of German Nation, Byzantine Empire, Moscow Empire. Lithuanian political elite never raised such claims, although theory of the Lithuanian descent from Romans (Legend of Palemon) could be used for this goal. Starting from path-breaking work by S. N. Eisenstadt "The Political Systems of Empires" (1963), comparative politics, history, sociology, anthropology & theory of international relations witnessed the emergence of the field of interdisciplinary studies that can be described as comparative studies of empires & imperialism. Second section of the paper provides the survey of the theoretical work in this field in search of the ideas useful for the analysis of the peculiarities of the medieval Lithuanian state. This survey includes into its scope the work of S. N. Eisenstadt, I. Wallerstein, A. Motyl, B. Buzan, R. Little, A. Watson, M. Beissinger, Ch.Tilly & M. Doyle, whose book "Empires" is considered as the most important contribution to the theorizing of empires & imperialism up to this date. Adapted from the source document.