European Small States in International Organisations – Strategies, Preferences and Adaptation

All states are nominally equal in the international arena. Practically, however, countries differ from each other, and they dispose of different influence over events in international politics. Smaller states have traditionally been treated as objects of international relations rather than subjects. They were considered ‘marginal at best and counterproductive at worst’ and often easily bought off with various side payments. Small states could rarely defend themselves from their bigger neighbours if attacked; they needed to adopt specific strategies to ensure their survival, such as balancing or bandwagoning. It was only after the end of the Cold War’s bipolarity that smaller states appeared to have more opportunities to play significant roles and became the target of more scholarly attention. International organisations are particularly important for small countries. They provide the necessary stability through established procedures and prevent stronger states’ excesses by enforcing common rules. Within their bounds, small states can gain leverage through means other than sheer power, population, or size of the economy, such as through arguing, problem-solving, or framing. However, small states remain structurally disadvantaged due to their limited personnel and means. They cannot expect to become shapers across all policies and issues. They need to pick and choose instead to concentrate capacities on priority issues. And they are, sometimes, bound to live with results that they and their domestic constituencies do not particularly like or understand. European small states have been entangled in a dense network of international organisations from sub-regional groupings, such as the Nordic Council and Visegrád Group, to integrated regimes, such as the European Union and NATO, to global institutions, such as the UN, WTO and UNESCO. Some of these organisations are crucial for the small states’ survival and prosperity; some perform a very specific and limited function; and others may only increase the countries’ prestige. They differ in size, composition, procedures, responsibility, power and policy area in which they are active. The proposed workshop will invite papers that study various aspects of small European states’ approach to and activity in international organisations. It starts with the understanding that international organisations are important for small states, but there are multiple factors that affect individual countries’ position towards individual organisations. These factors include, above all but not exclusively, policy salience, national interests, the international context, domestic politics, historical traditions and experiences, costs related to participation and internal structure and efficiency of the organisation. Thus, while firmly embedded in the area of international relations, the workshop will welcome contributions from other disciplines, such as politics, security studies, organisation studies, public policy, sociology, economics and communication studies. The workshop will look into the strategies that small states employ in relation to international organisations, how they formulate their preferences and how they are, in turn, affected by the membership and the international organisations’ activities.