International politics is a subdiscipline which has been dominated by US scholarship during the cold war era. Where does Scandinavian international politics scholarship stand at the end of the cold war? In addressing this question, I shall highlight some of the comparative advantages and potentials the relatively small Scandinavian research community. Thus, I shall seek to refute the traditional arguments about the weakness of the Scandinavian research community following from its peripheral and dependent

Resumé

International politics is often portrayed as a hegemonic discipline, dominated by US scholarship. the consequences of recent upheavals in world affairs for international politics research, the article suggests that the end of the cold war has exposed certain weaknesses in the US center which may be turned into advantages for the Scandinavian periphery. Specifically, Scandinavian researchers do not share the American preoccupation with theories predicated on bilateral and symmetrical relationships. Moreover, they are more prone to focus on subnational actors, they are more embedded in political science, they are generalists rather than specialists, their primary role is that of being observers rather than advisers, and they are in a better position to escape from the entrapment of an ahistorical current-events approach In conclusion, foreign policy analysis, negotiation studies, and research on international cooperation are singled out as areas where Scandinavians have been successful and where their relative success can be accounted for, at least in part, by an ability to capitalize on the comparative advantages identified.

A Hegemonic Subdiscipline?

A decade and a half ago Stanley Hoffmann (1977) characterized internationalpolitics "an American social science". The US predominance, according to Hoffmann, resulted from the convergence of three factors: intellectual predispositions, political circumstances, and institutional opportunities.The predispositions cited by Hoffmann included the conviction that all problems can be solved by applying the scientific method as well as the injection of talent provided by scholars immigrating from abroad. The political circumstance Hoffmann stressed most in explaining

why the discipline fared so well in the US, in comparison with the rest of the world, was the pre-eminence of the United States in the post-war international system. Finally, several institutional factors - such as the "inand-outer"system government, the network of foundations supporting international relations research, and the flexibility of American universities which ensured both competition and specialization - consolidated the US hegemony in the academic field of international politics, according to Hoffmann.

More recently, Kalevi Holsti (1985, 103) has concluded that "a British- American intellectual condominium" typifies the discipline. No true international of scholars exists; only the works of American and British researchers are disseminated regularly throughout the world. These are the "producers" of theories, ideas and concepts, whereas scholars in the rest of the world have become "consumers". Holsti's survey of widely used international politics textbooks in various European and Asian countries "that patterns of international exchange of scholarly knowledge our field remain far from an ideal model of an international community of scholars, and that over time parochialism in reading habits, publication for national audiences, and mutual reference is increasing". He notes the irony that "as the institutional mechanisms for reasonably symmetrical or proportional communication have developed, the scholarly enterprise in international theory has become less international" (Holsti 1985, 148).

Descriptions by Scandinavian international politics scholars of the field and their own role tend to coincide with Hoffmann's and Holsti's pictures. Among the national papers produced for the Third World Assembly of the International Studies Association in 1988, outlining the evolution of the discipline in some 40 countries, the Finnish one most explicitly adopted a center-periphery perspective (Våyrynen et al. 1988). The authors label the Finnish research community a "subordinated periphery" to the American intellectual center, rejecting the possibility that Finland might be an "interface periphery" located at the intersection of Western and Eastern cultural spheres. Finnish researchers, they argue, never exploited their favorable position in the East-West contact structure. Nor did the Soviet Union or other socialist countries constitute a favored empirical research area.

Peripheries are, by definition, penetrated and fragmented (Våyrynen et al. 1988, 2). And the Norwegian paper to the World Assembly (Knudsen 1988a) emphasizes the fragmentation of the national research community. Olav Knudsen (1988a, 32) also shows that Norwegian scholars continue to be influenced by the American research environment, with European international politics research receiving only one-fifth of the attention accorded to North America.

A similar pattern emerges from the Swedish and Danish papers presented at the World Assembly. Using references in Ph.D. dissertations as an indicator, Christer Jonsson and Bengt Sundelius (1988, 13) found that English-language books constituted 68 percent of all books cited in Swedish international politics dissertations between 1983 and 1987. Henrik Holtermann 7)., in comparison, reports that the United States is the destination of one-third of all longer research trips undertaken by Danish international politics scholars.

In sum, whatever the indicator used, it is fair to conclude that Nordic scholars "receive their main impulses from, and maintain intensive contacts with, the American research community" (Jonsson & Sundelius 1988, 17). In a sense Scandinavia can therefore be characterized as a periphery to the American - or Anglo-Saxon - center. The international politics subdiscipline general and Scandinavian scholars in particular thus form part of a broader pattern of American cultural predominance. What Hoffmann and Holsti contend is in essence that this pattern is more pronounced in the study of international politics than in other academic disciplines.

How, then, have the dramatic political changes in recent years affected the American predominance in the field of international politics? On the one hand, the end of the cold war and the dissolution of the Soviet empire have ushered in unrivaled US hegemony politically and militarily. One could therefore expect continued and even strengthened American intellectual But, as pointed out by Våyrynen et al. (1988, 1), intellectual and cultural center-periphery relations have their own dynamics and can be relatively independent of economic and military relations. The only remaining superpower, moreover, seems to be an uncertain giant, in search of its global mission after having lost its archenemy. American international politics scholars take an active part in this quest, thus illustrating close connections between the political and academic arenas.

The academic debate about America's future role was initiated by the British-born historian Paul Kennedy (1987) who argued that the United States, like other historic great powers, is declining as its economic base no longer can sustain global political and military commitments. Kennedy and other "declinists" point to the diminishing US relative share of global wealth, production and trade as well as growing trade and budget deficits as indications of lost economic hegemony. Other scholars propose that the United States is "bound to lead", to quote the title of Joseph Nye's (1990) influential book. According to Nye, there exists no other great power in today's world that is willing and able to assume a global leadership role. In addition, international power is said to have changed character: it is no longer brute force that counts, but the ability to persuade and convince. And in the post-cold-war era the United States appears as the winner of the battle of ideas.

The arguments of both sides in this scholarly debate have repercussions in the political arena. Uncertainty about America's future role, in short, affects US international politics scholars and policy-makers alike, and there is mutual feedback. But the impact of the changes in today's world on US scholarship goes beyond the issue of America's international role. In fact, recent developments cast doubts on many of the scholarly theories produced in the US center and consumed in the periphery. Not only were they unable to predict the far-reaching changes; some theories even explicitly denied that such changes were possible.

The theories that seem to have fared worst as a result of recent upheavals are the "grand" theories aiming at predicting global developments. For instance, Kenneth Waltz's (1979) theory of bipolar stability foresaw the continuation of the superpower confrontation. Robert Gilpin's (1981) theory global change pointed to war as the principal vehicle of restructuring of the international system and predicted instability as a result of a Soviet challenge to US preponderance. And a whole body of literature maintained that arms races most likely lead to war and emphatically denied that they might lead to disarmament and withdrawal from confrontations. In short, several grand theorists, most of them American, persistently predicted the continuance of the cold war confrontation (cf. Goldmann & Allan 1992).

Grand theorizing in the field of international politics has largely been the privileged domain of the center, whereas the periphery - including Scandinavia - has been more involved in testing and refining middle-range theories. Such theories, which focus on limited aspects or subprocesses of international politics (such as decision-making, conflict management, bargaining, and integration) rather than global patterns, have not been called in question by recent world events. On the contrary, these are the theories that may contribute to a better understanding of, and even suggest solutions to, today's international problems. In this respect, the division of labor between the center and periphery has turned out to work to the periphery's advantage. Is it perhaps time to abandon the inferiority complex that scholars of the periphery have so long suffered from, consciously or unconsciously?

Uncertainty and loss of self-assurance in the center present challenges and "windows of opportunity" for the periphery. This seems to be a propitious occasion for reflection on the relative advantages and disadvantages the Scandinavian research community vis-å-vis the American center. What follows is a subjective and impressionistic discussion of the prospects for Scandinavian international politics research in a turbulent world. It makes no claim to be comprehensive, by no means does it represent a detached outsider's views, and it may err on the side of optimism. But it is undertaken in the belief that self-reflection is warranted at this critical juncture in world history.

Are America's Shortcomings Scandinavia's Strengths?

In several respects recent global developments have exposed the inadequacies American international politics theorizing. Is it possible to turn these weaknesses in the strong center into advantages for the weak periphery, in a kind of intellectual jujitsu? I think so, and I shall develop my argument in six steps.

Several caveats are warranted. It is of course impossible to generalize about such a complex and variegated field as American international politics scholarship. Rather, my point of departure is some of the self-criticism that has been heard from the American academic community itself. Nor can I claim to make Scandinavian scholarship full justice. My aim is to identify certain trends and point to potentials rather than to review Scandinavian international politics in detail.

1. Bilateral and symmetrical vs. multilateral and asymmetrical perspectives. Preoccupation with the US-Soviet rivalry has led American scholars to formulate theories predicated on bilateral and symmetrical relationships. Hoffmann (1977, 58) speaks of 'a glaring focus on bipolarity, accompanied by the presumption that moves to undermine it ... would be calamitous"; the nature of the relations between the weak and the strong he considers a "zone of relative darkness" in US scholarship. The most obvious example of this bilateral, symmetrical framework is deterrence theory, but the same tendency is notable in theories of bargaining and crisis management, to mention but a few examples. Game-theoretically inspired bargaining theories from Schelling (1963) and onward have focused on interaction between two parties with similar payoff structures, US-Soviet bargaining providing the principal empirical underpinning. Similarly, the flourishing crisis management literature draws almost exclusively on cases of superpower (see, e.g., George 1991).

To American researchers, the end of the cold war has exposed the limits of theories predicated on bilateral and symmetrical relations. Their reactions vary: one scholar (Mearsheimer 1990), for example, has admonished we will soon miss the relative order and predictability of the cold war; another (Fukuyama 1989) has proclaimed the "end of history", the universalization of liberal democracy ending mankind's ideological evolution.

Scandinavian scholarship has not to the same extent been cast in a bilateral, symmetrical frame of mind. On the contrary, multilateralism and asymmetrical power relationships are natural foci of interest in weak states. The paradoxical "power of the weak" has thus been of obvious interest to Scandinavian researchers (cf., e.g., Bjøl 1968; Schou & Brundtland 1971;

Amstrup 1976; Goldmarm 1979; Lindeli & Persson 1986; Knudsen 1988b;
Våyrynen 1989).

The main point is readily illustrated by returning to examples of bargaining crisis management theory. An article by Knut Midgaard and Arild Underdal (1977) is a pioneering, oft-quoted theoretical statement on the neglected problems of multilateral negotiation. Several other studies of multilateral negotiations have been made by Scandinavian scholars (see, e.g., Stenelo 1972; Underdal 1980; Tornudd 1982; Lindell 1988). In the field of crisis management, Bengt Sundelius and Eric Stern in a recent article (1992) explore to what extent hypotheses derived from symmetrical superpower crises are applicable to asymmetric crises like the 1981 Soviet- Swedish U-137 ("Whiskey on the rocks") incident.

These are just some examples where Scandinavian scholars have contributed theory development by taking existing generalizations out of their bilateral, symmetrical mold. This is a strength to be further exploited in a world where multilateral deliberations and asymmetrical power relationships constitute the rule rather than the exceptions.

2. States_ys. subnational actors. Despite temporary attention to "linkage politics" (Rosenau 1969) and "transnational relations" (Keohane & Nye 1972), American scholarship has by and large adhered to "state-as-actor" approaches. In Hoffmann's (1977, 53) words, "linkage theory . . . has remained in the frozen stage of static taxonomies'. In addition, only those subnational actors which loom large in the US political system have been highlighted. The "bureaucratic politics" model (Allison 1971; Halperin 1974) is a case in point: it may fit the policy-making tug-of-war in Washington well, but is harder to apply to other political systems. On the other hand, corporatist structures and such subnational actors as political parties and local authorities, which are prominent in Europe generally and Scandinavia in particular, have received scant attention among scholars molded in the rather unique US political milieu.

This is not to say that there is an abundance of international politics studies focusing on subnational actors in Scandinavia. Some first steps have been taken in the study of the "micro-diplomacy" of Swedish local authorities (Andersson & Lundell 1991; Jerneck 1991) and of the internationalization political parties and "party diplomacy" (Gidlund 1992; Jerneck 1990). But this seems to be one research area of great significance and potential where Scandinavian scholars have obvious comparative advantages.

3. International relationists vs. political scientists. In contrast to US
academia, international relations has not been established as a separate
discipline in Scandinavia but has developed mainly within political science.

While there are chairs of international politics in some Scandinavian countries,no university departments have been created. To be sure, there have been plans, especially in Norway and Sweden, of creating separate institutes of international relations. In the early 19605, for example, Nils Ørvik, Norwegian national security specialist, set in motion a series of initiatives to create a unit for international politics within the University of Oslo which never came to fruition (Knudsen 1988a, 6-7). Today Norway is in a somewhat exceptional position in the Scandinavian family, insofar as several speci alized research institutes have in fact emerged in the field of international relations. In the mid-1960s the Swedish Ministry of Education appointed a Royal Commission of Investigation which also proposed the establishment of a central Institute of International Relations with transdisciplinary research and postgraduate education as its primary functions. Yet the proposed institute was never created (Jonsson & Sundelius1988,

In Scandinavia it was instead peace research that received government support to establish itself as a separate discipline with its own university departments and research institutes, again in contrast to the United States. International politics, for its part, has thrived within political science departments: there has been a steady increase in the number of researchers and research projects as well as undergraduate and graduate students.

The unbroken links with other branches of political science have proved to be a source of strength. This conclusion is reinforced by Hoffmann's diagnosis that the neglect of the relation of domestic politics to international affairs is a serious gap in US scholarship, caused by the desire to distinguish the discipline of international relations from the rest of political science: "•scholars who study a given political system do not usually pay all that much attention to foreign policy, and the specialists of international politics simply do not know enough about foreign political systems. The only country for which the bond between domestic and external behavior has been examined in some depth is, not so surprisingly, the United States" (Hoffmann 1977, 58).

The borderline between domestic and international politics is becoming increasingly diffuse and difficult to uphold, "a line in water" (Goldmann 1989). Most contemporary international issues involve a complex mixture of domestic and international political processes that cannot be well understoodseparately. for example, "internationalization", the growth of communication, transactions and organization across state borders. This is a trend that has implications for our conceptualizations of domestic as well as international politics; it challenges conventional theories of national democracy and international anarchy alike (cf. Egeberg 1980; Karvonen & Sundelius 1987; Hansson & Stenelo 1990). Not only are internationalization trends more easily recognized and more profoundly felt in small, peripheral

countries than in a self-absorbed superpower; they are also more adequately
analyzed in an academic environment which encourages merging rather
than separating comparative politics and international politics.

The advantages of having international politics embedded in political science are equally obvious when it comes to analyzing other pertinent themes of the post-cold-war era, such as democratization, ethnicity and human rights. To cite another example, I have myself (Jonsson 1986,1987) wondered at the mutual neglect of organization theory and the study of international organization. Widely used textbooks on organization theory include no systematic treatment of international organizations. Nor do the authors of textbooks on international organization make use of general organization theory. This appears to be yet another unfortunate effect of an artificial separation of political science subfields. Scandinavian scholars seem better equipped than their American counterparts to avoid such limitations and to exploit the synergetic effects of mutual influences within the broad and diversified discipline of political science.

4. Specialists vs. generalists. The US academic culture encourages specialization. a scholar has established him/herself as an authority in one specific area - be it defined in functional (arms control, international organization, negotiation) or geographical terms (Soviet, Middle East, Latin American experts) - he/she tends to stay within that narrowly defined field of research and expertise. The academic reward structure, as well as the university educational system of a multitude of specialized courses provide strong incentives for such lifelong specialization. The Scandinavian academic culture is different in this regard. University courses are designed to give general overviews of broad subfields of political science (comparative public administration, international politics, etc.), and there is a premium on versatility in academic appointments. The Scandinavian in short, tends to foster generalists rather than specialists.

The buildup of area centers and area studies, for example, is largely a US invention which only belatedly and half-heartedly has been imported by the Scandinavian periphery. The selection of geographical areas worthy of research and training has been politically motivated. The Soviet Union and Eastern Europe thus became the primary focus of attention in the United States, with other areas of political interest, such as the Middle East and East Asia, as additional targets of specialized institutes.

Area specialists tend to emphasize the unique and idiosyncratic features of their country or region at the expense of generic theories and hypotheses. The Soviet Union (or the Arab world, or Japan, as the case may be), they argue, is sui generis; social science theories may apply to all other countries except this one; anyone who is not well versed in the language and culture of the country is in principle disqualified from studying it.

As educational and research institutes, area centers are controversial. Critics argue that in-depth knowledge of a specific country or area takes precedence over solid theoretical and methodological grounding in an academic discipline. The best point of departure for scientific research, they claim, is to identify not a geographical region but a generic problem. Moreover, the delineation of regions is by no means given but mostly politically tainted. What is "Eastern Europe" if not a political label? Where on the map does the Middle East begin and where does it end? In short, critics maintain that area specialization means cutting the pie the wrong way.

There are of course area specialists in Scandinavia, but they are usually more versatile than their US counterparts. For example, Daniel Heradstveit, leading Norwegian Middle East expert, has at the same time made significant contributions to cognitive theory and rhetorical approaches to international politics. The relative lack of strict specialization and the prevalence of generalists among Scandinavian international politics scholars can of course be seen as a weakness: "too many subjects studied, too few subjects mastered", for example, is said to be a major weakness of Norwegian international politics research (Knudsen 1988a, 27).

On the other hand, recent developments in what we used to call the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe have exposed the weaknesses of area specialization while accentuating the need for generalists. The breakup of the Soviet empire has created a demand not necessarily for sovietologists but for students of democratization, decolonization, the role of media in social upheavals, and the like; in short, for studies of generic problems rather than specific regions. It could thus be argued that present-day realities have strengthened the hand of generalists and weakened that of area specialists.

There is another aspect of the specialist-generalist dichotomy worth noting. The pressure to acquire a specialist profile in US academia makes for clear identification with, and commitment to, a certain approach. International politics scholars are unambiguously labeled as game theorists, deconstructivists, regime analysts, and so on, with little overflow between the categories. This is an environment which is more prone to battles between conflicting approaches or schools of thought than the Scandinavian environment of generalists striving to keep abreast of different areas of the field.

Scandinavian scholars thus seem to be in a better position to synthesize ideas and findings from different research traditions. And there are indeed several bridge-builders among Scandinavian international politics researchers. Kjell Goldmann, for example, in his theory of foreign policy stabilizers (1982, 1988) integrates hypotheses from various approaches. Raimo Vayrynen and Helge Hveem, to cite just two other examples, are

equally active in the international politics and peace research communities, and their publications span a multitude of research traditions. The list can be made much longer, but suffice it to note that bridge-building is another forte of Scandinavian generalists which no doubt will prove useful in an increasingly complex world, haunted by multidimensional problems and issues.

5. Advisers vs. observers. Hoffmann (1977, 47) found a "remarkable chronological convergence" between US policy-makers' needs and international scholars' performance. Moreover, the "in-and-outer" system, whereby scholars alternate between academia and government, puts academics "not merely in the corridors but also in the kitchens of power" (Hoffmann 1977, 49). US scholars, in brief, have to a considerable extent been advisers, both in terms of their choice of research topics and in terms of their recruitment to policy-making organs.

Scandinavia differs in this respect. International politics scholars have traditionally been observers rather than advisers, often choosing research topics that are unrelated to their country's foreign policy. Finland may be an exception in this regard; until the early 1970s Finnish international politics researchers, "instead of acting as an intellectual vanguard, opted for loyalty to the new foreign policy orientation, later known as the Paasikivi-Kekkonen line" (Våyrynen et al. 1988, 31).

The "in-and-outer" career style is a rare species in Scandinavia. There are a few prominent exceptions, such as Norway's Johan-Jørgen Hoist, Finland's Klaus Tornudd and Sweden's Krister Wahlbåck. But overall, the relative lack of interchange between academia and government has been lamented by many who argue that the Scandinavian countries are too small not to take advantage of all available expertise. If American international politics researchers have been "too close to the fire" (Hoffmann 1977, 59), their Scandinavian counterparts largely remain out in the cold.

The other, positive side of the same coin is greater independence. National foreign policy needs do not set the agenda for research. And most of the production of Scandinavian international politics scholars is primarily for consumption within the national and international academic community; journalists and practitioners seldom read the research products. Not being bound by a parochial agenda or perspective, Scandinavian researchers have gained a reputation as active participants in the international scholarly discourse. This is an advantage they can capitalize on in the future. For the development of theory and method, access to global academic forums will be more important than access to national policy-making forums.

6. Current events vs. history. One aspect of the "glide into policy science"
(Hoffmann 1977, 59) on the part of American international politics is

preoccupation with the present. Hoffmann's scathing criticism is worth
quoting:

It leads not only to the neglect of a wealth of past experiences . . . but also to a real deficiency in our understanding of the international system of the present. Because we have an inadequate basis for comparison, we are tempted to exaggerate either continuity with a past that we know badly, or the radical originality of the present, depending on whether we are more struck by the features we deem permanent, or with those we do not believe existed before. And yet a more rigorous examination of the past might reveal that what we sense as new really is not, and that some of the "traditional" features are far more complex than we think (Hoffmann 1977, 57).

Kalevi Holsti (1985, 130-31) makes a similar assessment, distinguishing two intellectual pitfalls that North American scholars in particular are prone to fall into. First, the emphasis on innovation entails a bias to search for new phenomena and new ways of looking at international politics. Without solid historical background, innovations are likely to be little more than old ideas rediscovered. Related to the neglect of the history of ideas is the tendency "to develop theoretical innovations on the basis of recent diplomatic developments - even before these developments have assumed the character of long-term trends or patterns of behavior".

The perils of an ahistorical perspective have been exposed by recent events. The tendency to treat the present as the normal state of affairs, to construct theories predicated on the permanence of the cold war left scholars unprepared for the thoroughgoing changes we have experienced. At the same time, today's developments in Eastern Europe and Russia are unintelligible if one disregards the region's history. The period we live through should serve as a reminder that if we seriously strive for generalizations, ought to reconsider studies based on a longer term than a couple of decades.

Scandinavian international politics scholars are by no means immune to charges of having been preoccupied with the present. On the whole, they have been caught in the same trap as their US counterparts. However, Scandinavian researchers are arguably in a better position to escape from this entrapment. Along with international law, history is the "mother" discipline of the early study of international politics in several of the Scandinavian countries (cf. Knudsen 1988a, 1; Holtermann 1988, 3). Leadingexponents the international politics discipline, past and present, have their background in history. Examples include Ole Karup Pedersen and Nikolaj Petersen, v/ho hold chairs in Copenhagen and Aarhus, and Bo Huldt, the former director of the Swedish Institute of International Affairs as well as the late John Sanness, who for many years led the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs. The first modern Swedish political science Ph.D. dissertation dealing with international politics (Petersson 1964) had a historical topic: varying conceptions of a future world order in the wake

of World War I. Looking ahead, one might argue that Scandinavian international politics scholars, by going back to their roots and making better use of history, can exploit their comparative advantage and contributeto theoriies and generalized knowledge extending beyond the cold war era.

Shortcomings of Scandinavian Scholarship

Lest this overview appear overly optimistic, let me point to some of the obvious weaknesses of Scandinavian scholarship. One reason why Scandinavian scholarship was not as shattered by the end of the cold war may be the lack of bold theory-building and predictions. The less you say, the less likely you are to be proven wrong. There is a kernel of truth in that argument. The above optimistic outline refers not only, and perhaps not primarily, to past achievements; above all it concerns future potentials.

Furthermore, several disadvantages follow from the limited size of the Scandinavian international politics research community, which corresponds roughly to the number of researchers at five or six large US universities. In addition, it is not really one coherent research community, but rather several national ones with different profiles and unique features. Yet there exists a relatively well-functioning Scandinavian network of informal research contacts. An impression based on discussions at the ISA World Assembly in 1988 is that regional cooperation is probably more developed in Scandinavia than in other parts of the world.

Contributing to my optimism is the recent diversification of external contacts and impulses. For several decades Scandinavian scholars have been oriented chiefly to the United States in terms of travel, transnational meeting ground, research networks, and theoretical inspiration. At the European level, there has been less organized collaboration and crossfertilization. is now changing. Expanding university exchange programs students and young researchers to develop European contacts. A group of Danish scholars has initiated organized research collaboration with British colleagues (Buzan et al. 1990; Buzan et al. forthcoming). The first pan-European conference in international studies met in Heidelberg in September 1992. A fruitful network pattern of concentric circles is emerging, with Scandinavian cooperation as a stepping-stone to European and, finally, global contacts.

Conclusions

I have tried to identify some comparative advantages of the Scandinavian
international politics research community which arguably could be capitalizedon

talizedonin the future. By adopting multilateral and asymmetrical rather than bilateral and symmetrical perspectives, by taking subnational actors into account, by seeking integration with rather than separation from political science, by avoiding the pitfalls of too far-reaching specialization and too much emphasis on the adviser role, and by making better use of history, Scandinavian scholars should be able to find their own niche in the international academic: division of labor.

In conclusion, let me point to three areas of research where, in my opinion, Scandinavians have been successful and where their relative success be accounted for, at least in part, by an ability to capitalize on the comparative advantages referred to above.

Foreign policy analysis. Several Scandinavian scholars have been active in developing the field of comparative foreign policy. Proceeding from a skeptical view of the US events-data movement (see, e.g., Faurby 1976), they have contributed to theory development in various ways. As could be expected, they have brought the foreign policies of the small Scandinavian countries into focus as a counterweight to the conventional emphasis on the great powers. And they have made unconventional comparisons, such as that between US and Soviet: foreign policy (Jonsson 1984). But their contributions go beyond choices of empirical cases, including the following:

(1) Refinement and empirical tests of theoretical ideas developed elsewhere. case in point is the amplification and application of the "adaptation" concept, originally suggested by James Rosenau, by Danish scholars (Petersen 1977; Mouritzen 1988).

(2) Treatment of aspects of external behavior neglected in conventional foreign policy analysis* A Swedish project analyzing government use of open criticism and opinion formation in foreign relations can be cited as an illustration (Jerneck 1983; Stenelo 1984; cf. Hveem 1970), as can studies of the role of predictions in foreign policy-making (Stenelo 1980, Cooperation and Conflict 1981) and of foreign policy stabilizers (Goldmann 1982, 1988).

(3) Focus on unconventional independent variables, ranging from ideology 1986) to democracy (Goldmann et al. 1986) and global interdependence (Karvonen & Sundelius 1987, 1990). The study of foreign policy "doctrines" has become a kind of Scandinavian cottage industry (cf. Brodin 1977; Liden 1979; Mouritzen 1981; Bjereld 1989).

In fact, Ole Wæver (1990, 335-36) has alluded to a "Scandinavian approach" to foreign policy analysis, distinct from the US oscillation between the extremes of general theory and pure empiricism as well as from the British commitment to "middle range theory". The Scandinavian approach, according; to Wæver. involves attempts to grasp the object of

research in new ways and posing specific questions. Theory is seen as a mode of highlighting aspects of foreign policy rather than determining relations between "factors". The Scandinavian approach may herald the recreation of political theory in foreign policy studies.

In addition to typifying the comparative advantages alluded to above, especially the links with political science at large, Scandinavian foreign policy analysts have actively built networks not only among themselves but also with the global environment. The so-called Stockholm Comparative Foreign Policy Group, bringing together researchers from Scandinavia, the rest of Europe and North America, has held several meetings and workshops. One issue of Cooperation and Conflict (vol. 24, nos. 3/4, 1989) contains a series of articles emanating from one of these gatherings.

Negotiation studies. The political science departments of the universities of Oslo and Lund have evolved into two regional centers of research on international negotiation. They have proceeded from different theoretical and methodological points of departure: the "situation logic" of rationalchoice game theory in Oslo (see, e.g., Midgaard 1965; Underdal 1980); the "actor logic" of bounded-rationality and cognitive theory in Lund (see, e.g., Jonsson 1979, 1990). Yet the two schools have been engaged in a continuous and fruitful dialogue, probing the merits and limitations of each approach - another example of the relative absence of scholastic battles in the Scandinavian generalist culture.

Scandinavian negotiation theorists have been active network participants as well. Several of them participate in the PIN (Processes of International Negotiation) project within the framework of lIASA (International Institute Applied Systems Analysis), and a recent volume published under the auspices of this project includes three contributions by Scandinavian scholars (Underdal 1991; Jonsson 1991; Sjostedt 1991). Gunnar Sjostedt is at present a member of the steering committee of the PIN project. Participation this project has also been instrumental in establishing closer Scandinavian contacts with French and Russian students of negotiation.

International cooperation. The study of the cooperative aspects of international is another area where Scandinavian scholars figure prominently. cooperation is a natural, yet not overly researched object of study (Sundelius 1978). European integration is the subject of the day, with several departments and institutes launching new research projects,. This is an area which clearly follows political cycles. Integration theories are making their reappearance after a long hiatus (cf. Kelstrup 1990), as the EC has entered a dynamic phase and has become a primary focus of the external relations of the Scandinavian countries.

Global cooperative patterns and regimes in various issue areas constitute
a burgeoning research area. The Fridtjof Nansen Institute in Norway,
which specializes in environmental issues, is a leading exponent with several

ongoing research projects in collaboration with European and North Americanresearchers. such project, a comparative analysis of regimes concerning the Arctic area, finds no support for the hegemonic stability theory, which has long been in the forefront of US regime studies, but points to the importance of institutional bargaining in regime creation (Young forthcoming). This exemplifies how existing theory can be refined through bridge-building across different approaches.

In summary, I have painted a relatively optimistic picture of the prospects for the international politics discipline in the Scandinavian periphery. This picture has emerged through a comparison with the North American center. The emphasis on US shortcomings should not be taken as anti-Americanism or as an implicit call for turning away from the US research community. On the contrary, links and cooperation with American colleagues have been, and will continue to be, vital for the development of the discipline in Scandinavia. And all of the areas identified above as Scandinavian accomplishments are characterized by intense US-Scandinavian research collaboration. My vision is rather this: At a time when the American center may seem disoriented, Scandinavian international politics scholars appear well equipped to help, however marginally, to reorient the discipline, find their own niche, and shake off the stifling sense of intellectual dependency.

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