Suchergebnisse

L'ouvrage posthume de R. Aron fournit une excellente occasion de récapituler et de réévaluer les thèses essentielles de la pensée de l'auteur dans le domaine des relations internationales. Vingt ans après la publication de Paix et guerre entre les nations, R. Aron est conduit à se demander si le système interétatique, sur lequel il a concentré ses observations, constitue l'élément le plus représentatif et le plus significatif des relations internationales. Sans aller jusqu'à remettre en cause ce postulat initial, il apparaît beaucoup plus favorable que par le passé à la prise en considération de nouveaux facteurs et de nouveaux acteurs. La voie semble ainsi ouverte à une approche qui tenterait, cette fois, d'appréhender la société internationale dans son ensemble. Mais le changement de pers­pective rejoint, en fin de compte, l'intuition fondamentale de l'auteur : c'est dans l'espace ouvert entre les deux termes de la célèbre formule « guerre improbable, paix impossible » qu'interviennent les changements de toute nature dont le système international est à la fois le théâtre et l'enjeu. Raymond posthumous work provides an excellent occasion to recapitulate and reevaluate his essential theses in the field of international relations. Twenty years after the publication of Peace and war among nations, R. Aron is led to wonder if the interstate system on which he had concentrated was the most representative and significant element of international relations. Although he does not go as far as to give up his initial postulate, he seems much more favorable than in the past to considering new factors and new actors. The road thus seems open to an approach which would try to comprehend all aspects of international society. But this change of perspective goes back, in the end to Aron's basic intuition : it is in the space left between the two terms of the famous phrase "war improbable peace impossible" that changes of all types occur, of which the international system is both the arena and the stakes.

This survey of the new approaches used by specialiste of thé new discipline of international relations starts from the observations in the Godelier Report, concerning the absence of a problematique, from which the study of international relations supposedly suffers in France. Very different conceptions of the study of international relations are already hiding behind the frequent invocation of «realism» or «empiricism». Although subject to discussion, the approaches inspired by marxism or the sociological method offer new research prospects. The problem lies less, in the end, in the absence of a problematique than in the juxtaposition of several problematiques. Because they are not correctly mode explicit, they tend to remain isolated and exclusive. Their points of convergence, indispensable to the consolidation of a discipline which too often seems to be looking for ils topic and its scope, should be found through a common effort.

The role of political parties in the elaboration of foreign policy has been neglected by specialists in the study of parties as well as by specialists in international relations. It is questioned whether this lacuna may be imputed to an excessive division of fields of investigation, or rather to the inability of parties to intervene effectively in this sector of political activity. Theoretically, parties (which are the intermediaries between the citizens & the power, & which aim to exercise or conquer this power) are in a privileged position to control the articulation between internal politics & foreign policy. In practice, their role remains secondary, as proved by the study of electoral propaganda or of parliamentary activity, as well as that of party strategy on the political chess board. Internal politics has priority over foreign policy & parties behave very timidly when participating in international relations. The failure of political parties is explained primarily by the apathy of PO, engrossed in the solution of immediate problems; but it also results from the increasingly strong pressure exerted on the orientation of national activities by external forces: continuity generally wins out over change, & when change does happen, it is associated with internal political mutations which prepare for it or make it easier to accept. Parties seem to play an obscuring role in this area rather than an encouraging one. The camouflage which results is unquestionably unhealthy, for it induces opinion to underestimate the importance of international problems; but it is almost inevitable insofar as parties are bound, in a democratic regime, to value their own capacity to solve problems under penalty of losing the support of the electors. A more correct evaluation of the limits which weigh on the actions of parties in foreign policy will perhaps allow the restitution of their proper mediation function between internal aspirations & external exigencies. AA Tr by A. Rubins.

Summary in English.