Britain in Global Politics Volume 2 From Churchill to Blair

by Young, John W.; Pedaliu, Effie G. H.; Kandiah, Michael D.

• ISBN13: 9780230360396
• ISBN10: 0230360394
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2013-09-27
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

This collection of essays focuses Britain's role in global affairs since the Second World War. The essays cover a broad field, from relations with Japan and China, through European and African developments, to defence planning in Whitehall. They include also political, economic, defence, ideological and religious dimensions and, even, 'futurology'. The essays in the collection offer fresh insights and new interpretations of the way in which a weakened Britain conducted its foreign policy in order to protect its interests and retain influence in international affairs. The book presents readers with wide-ranging perspectives on Britain and the World in the Cold War and post-Cold War eras, based on the latest available evidence. This collection of essays, along with the accompanying volume covering the period from Gladstone to Churchill, is published in memory of Saki Dockrill.

Author Biography

Effie G. H. Pedaliu is Fellow at LSE IDEAS, UK. She is the author of Britain, Italy and the Origins of the Cold War, (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003) and many articles on the Cold War. Her book The Contemporary Mediterranean World will be published in 2014. She is a member of the peer review college of the Arts and Humanities Research Council.
 
John W. Young is Professor of International History at the University of Nottingham, UK, and Chair of the British International History Group. His recent publications include Twentieth Century Diplomacy: A Case Study in British Practice, 1963-76 (2008) and, co-edited with Michael Hopkins and Saul Kelly of The Washington Embassy: British Ambassadors to the United States, 1939-77 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).
 
Michael Kandiah is the Director of the Witness Seminar Programme, Institute of Contemporary British History, King's College London, UK. He regularly publishes the transcripts and findings of his oral history projects and his Elite Oral History Reader is forthcoming (2015).

Table of Contents

List of Key Publications by Saki Dockrill
List of Abbreviations
Notes on the Contributors
Preface by the Editors
Eulogy: Remembering Saki Dockrill, Professor Sir Lawrence Freedman
1. Britain and the Origins of the Religious Cold War, 1944-47; Dianne Kirby
2. 'Journey into a Desert': British perceptions of Poland's recovered western territories, 1945-48; Alastair Noble
3. 'Exodus 1947': British Propaganda and Illegal Immigration into Palestine; Catherine J. Utting
4. Britain, the US and the Issue of 'Limited War' with China, 1950-55; Kevin Ruane
5. 'To Stay or to Walk': The British and the Defence of Domestic Jurisdiction at the United Nations, 1950-56; Edward Johnson
6. 'A Cardinal Point of our World Strategy': the Foreign Office and the Normalization of Relations with Japan, 1952-63; Antony Best
7. Anglo-American Diplomacy and the Congo Crisis, 1960-63: The not so Special Relationship; John Kent
8. The US Embassy in London and Britain's Withdrawal from East of Suez, 1961-69; John W. Young
9. 'We were always realistic': The Heath Government, the EEC and the Cold War Mediterranean, June 1970 - February 1974; Effie G. H. Pedaliu
10. Keeping Britain 'at the top table' – the Perceptions of UK Policymakers, 1956-90; Michael D. Kandiah and Gillian Staerck
11. The British Embassy in Washington and Anglo-American Relations during the Blair Governments, 1997-2007; Michael F. Hopkins
12. 'The Thin Wisps of Tomorrow': the Horizon-scanner's Craft; Peter Hennessy