The Closure of the International System

Lora Anne Viola is a professor of political science, researching and teaching on international organizations, international relations theory, and US foreign policy. She is co-editor of Historical Institutionalism and International Relations (Oxford University Press, 2016). She is a recipient of the American Political Science Association's Alexander L. George Article Award, as well as research funding from the German National Science Foundation.

• 1. False promises of universalism: the interdependent logics of equality and inequality in the international system; 2. The closure thesis: social closure, club dynamics, and stratification in the international system; 3. 'The master institution': diplomacy, practices of closure, and the emergence of an international system in early modern Europe; 4. 'Dwarves and giants': international law, the monopolization of sovereign rights, and stratification in the international system; 5. International organizations: between sovereign equality and the institutionalization of inequality; 6. What remains of the promise of equality?; Index.

'In this outstanding book, Lora Ann Viola shows that inclusion and exclusion are two faces of the same coin. Institutional processes that foster equality in world politics inevitably enshrine forms of inequality in parallel. This insightful argument makes for a particularly lucid account of the tragic and antagonistic nature of international history and society.' Vincent Pouliot, James McGill Professor, Department of Political Science, McGill University