Localizing Foreign Policy

Book excerpt: Accompanying the oft-noted globalisation of international relations, there is an equally significant trend towards 'localisation' as a range of subnational constituencies and the authorities that represent them respond to externally-generated pressures on the one hand, and seek to exploit enhanced opportunities to operate in the international arena on the other. The book examines these developments in the context of the growing international involvement of the non-central governments within federal states. Employing a number of case studies, it argues that the significance of these developments can best be understood as one facet of an increasingly complex, multilayered, diplomacy as national policy makers are forced to negotiate simultaneously with domestic and foreign interests in the pursuit of policy objectives.