The Waves of Time Long-Term Change and International Relations [Hardcover]

Since the end of the Cold War, analysts of international politics have given much greater attention to issues of change. It has become increasingly clear to specialists from many fields that any understanding of large-scale political change must encompass far longer timescales than has been usual in the study of world politics, and must incorporate multi-disciplinary perspectives.

This book evaluates and draws on relevant theoretical approaches from other disciplines such as sociology, economics, geography, history, anthropology and archaeology, as well as evolutionary theory and the mathematical study of complexity. Using an epistemological framework, Dark sets out a theory of long-term world political change: the theory of 'Macrodynamics'. This is then applied to historical, anthropological and archaeological data to explain the changing forms of political organization, from the earliest human societies to the late twentieth century. The resulting analysis is a reinterpretation of the processes of global political change in the past and present. This, in turn, opens new areas of enquiry in the study of international relations and has profound implications for how we understand the changing world of today.

Introduction
1. Beyond the Horizon: Theories of Long-Term Change in International Relations
2. How Times Change: The Interdisciplinary Context
3. Making History: Shared Perspectives and Shared Problems in the Study of Long-Term Change
4. The Waves of Time? A New Theory of Change in Socio-Political Systems
5. The Origins of International Relations: Non-State Societies
6. Cyclical States: The Long-Term Dynamics of Socio-Political Systems in the Age of the State
7. Volatile Networks: Sl3: