OF BLIND MEN, ELEPHANTS AND INTERNATIONAL INTEGRATION*

BY DONALD J. PUCHALA

Columbia University

THE story of the blind men and the elephant is universally known. Several blind men
approached an elephant and each touched the animal in an effort to discover what the beast
lookcd like. Each blind man, however, touched a different part of the large animal, and each
concluded that the elephant had the a pearance of the part he had touched. elephant inust be tall
and slender, while his fellow who touched the beast’s ear concluded that an elephant must be
oblong and flat. Others of course reached different conclusions. The total result was that no
man arrived at a very accurate description of the elephant. Yet, each man had gained enough
evidence from his own experience to disbelieve his fellows and to maintain a lively debate
about the nature of the beast. The experience of scholars who have been conceptually grappling
with contemporary international integration is not unlike the episode of the blind men and the
elephant.1 More than fifteen years of defining, redefining, refining, modeling and theorizing
have failed to generate satisfactory conceptualizations of exactly what it is we are talking about
when we refer to ‘international integration’ and exactly what it is we are trying to learn when
we study this phenomenon. Part of the problem stems from the fact that different researchers
have been looking at different parts, dimensions or manifestations of the phenomenon.

Furthermore, different schools of researchers have exalted different parts of the integration
‘elephant’. They have claimed either that their parts were in fact whole beasts, or that their parts
were the most important ones, the others being of marginal interest. Added conceptual
confusion has followed from the fact that the phenomenon under investigation-international
integration and all it involves-has turned out to be more complex than anyone initially
suspected.3 Consequently, uncertainty within schools of researchers currently compounds
dissension between the schools. Alas, the ‘elephant’ grew in size and changed in form at the
very moment that the blind men sought to grasp it ! Finally, many of those who have tried to
describe and explain international integration have been influenced in their intellectual efforts
by normative preferences. As a result we have all too often found international integration
discussed in terms of what it should be and what it should be leading toward rather than in terms
of what it really is and is actually leading toward. In light of the reigning conceptual confusion
in the realm of integration studies it is difficult to see why the field has acquired a reputation
for theoretical sophistication.4 Rather, I should think that those of us in the field would be rather
embarrassed at the fact that after fifteen years of effort we are still uncertain about what it is we
are studying. This paper is about international integration, about what it is, and about what it is
not. My problem: what is actually taking place ‘out there’ in the empirical world when we say
that something we call international integration is taking place? Since questions of definition
and description continue to pose barriers to cumulative research and theoretical synthesis in
integration studies, what I offer here is yet another tilt at the definitional windmill. My hope is
that some youthful irreverence combined with new thinking about international relations in our
world today will lend fresh meaning to the concept ‘international integration’. The reader will
note that my effort in this paper leads to a call for new empirical research within the framework
of a new descriptive model of the international integration phenomenon. Consequently, the
points that I make are much more in the nature of hypotheses and notions rather than assertions.
Similarly, the evidence I present is suggestive rather than conclusive; most of it is drawn from
secondarysources cited throughout, and some of it is purely impressionistic and based upon my
experiences studying Western Euro ean integration. I will develop this paper in two parts, the
first a criticireview of some popular conceptualizations of international integration, and the
second a poposal for some new thinking about the phenomenon.

I. THE INADEQUACIES OF CONVENTIONAL CONCEPTUALIZATIONS

One of the most diflicult intellectual feats to accomplish is to confront an essentially new
phenomenon, recognize its novelty, and then go on to describe and explain this novelty without
destroying it with blunt and inappropriate analytical instruments. More specifically, I believe
that I can make a fairly strong case for the assertion that those clusterings of events we label
‘international integration’ are essentially new happenings peculiar to the post-World War I1
era. Contemporary international integration is a product of forces, interests and attitudes
peculiarly prevalent in the post-1945 world.5 It consequently embodies structures and processes
and thrives in an attitudinal environment characteristic of this new postwar world. Despite this,
however, we in integration studies have continually insisted upon analyzing cases of this new
phenomenon as if they were instances of more familiar and timetested patterns. That is, instead
of asking ‘what is contemporary international inte ration?’ and thereby opening our minds to
its novelty, we have asked, is it federalism?’ ‘is it nationalism?’ ‘is it functionalism?’ or ‘is it
old-fashioned power politics?’ As it has turned out, after some fifteen years of research,
contemporary international integration is none of these, nor any combination of them.6
Therefore, conventional analytical models reflecting traditional familiar phenomena do not
accurately describe, do not satisfactorily explain, and do not even raise very productive
questions about the new, unfamiliar, and rather unconventional phenomenon, contemporary
international integration. For example : it is not classical federalism.7 Thus far, the patterns of
political-economic interaction in different regions of the world-Western Europe, Central
America, East Africa, Eastern Europe-which have attracted the attentions of students of
international integration, have not by and large resembled patterns suggested by the federalist
model. For example, no new central governments have been established to assume functions
traditionally allotted to federal governments. Not even in Western Europe are new central
authorities representing groups of states in international relations. On the occasions when the
Commission speaks for the Six internationally, as in the case of the Kennedy Round
negotiations or with regard to association agreements, its positions symbolize multi-lateral
diplomatic compromises among six governments much more than they represent the policies
of any central or ‘federal’ government.8 In addition, even when the Commission intermittently
speaks for the ‘Six’ each member-state continues to speak for itself in world councils and
capitals. Then, too, let us not forget that all international integration arrangements currently in
existence, including the Western European system, are functionally limited mostly to economic
concerns, and therefore poorly approximate the functionally diffuse systems implicit in the
federalist model. In fairness, it is true that analysts using federalist models as guides to inquiry
have looked upon contemporary international integration as emergent’ rather than ‘mature’
federalism.9 Nevertheless, the point is that they have been preoccupied (if not obsessed) with
questions about the degree of central authority present, the degree of state sovereignty
relinquished, and the parcelling of prerogative, power and jurisdiction among national and
international authorities. Moreover, these same analysts have tended to equate ‘progress’ or
‘success’ in international integration with movement toward central government. Such analysis
is of course legitimate. But it has not been very productive. Most obviously it has not turned up
very much federalism in contemporary international integration.10 But more importantly,
conceptualizing and conducting inquiry in terms of the federalist model has tended to blind
analysts to a number of interesting questions. Most broadly, is it really true that no progress
toward international integration in various parts of the world has been made simply because
little movement in the direction of regional central government has been registered? More
provocatively perhaps, to what extent does participation in an international integration
arrangement actually enhance rather than undermine national sovereignty? Relatedly, to what
extent does an international integration arrangement preserve rather than supersede an
international state system? Clearly, the analyst in the federalist mode is not prompted to ask
these latter sorts of questions. Is he missing something of significance? (2) Neither is
International Integration Acttially ‘Nationalism’ at the Regional Level-So ingrained has the
nationalism model become in Western political thinking and analysis, that we frnd it difficult
to conceive of a non-national international actor, or a political system uncomplemented by an
underlying community of people or peoples. Naturally, then, when talk of and movement
toward regional unity in different parts of the world attracted the attentions of scholars, a good
many assumed that movement toward international integration had to be progress toward the
social and cultural assimilation of nationalitiesi.e. toward riationalism at the regional level.11
For example, cued by historical precedents we looked for evidence of integration in Western
Europe in the‘Europeanization’ of Frenchmen, Germans and Italians, much in the way that
historians sought and found evidence of national integration in the Frenchifjring of Normans,
the Germanization of Bavarians and the Italianization of Neopolitans.12 The nationalism model
led us to focus upon the assimilatory impacts of interactions and transactions among diverse
peoples manifested in enhanced fadiarity, responsiveness, and mutual identification, as well as
emergent in-group/ out-group consciousness. 13 But though we were guided by validated and
operational theories of nationalism, and despite the fact that we wielded the most sophisticated
methodological tools of modern social science, our researchs turned up few ‘Europeans’, even
fewer ‘Central Americans’ and ‘East Africans’ and no ‘East Europeans’, at all.14 This lacking
evidence of progress toward the social and cultural assimilation of nationalities led some
analysts to conclude that contemporary international integration was more myth than reality-no
nationalism therefore no integration !IS Others, however, cherished evidence drawn from youth
studies and concluded that regional nationalism, at least in Western Europe, was present after
all, and that the heyday of European community would arrive as the current younger generation
gained maturity and as its members acquired positions of influence and responsibility.16 Still
others, convinced that assimilation simply had to be a component of contemporary international
integration, worded and reworded survey questions until ‘regional nationality’ did at last
emerge in poll results, irrespective ofwhether it existed in respondents’ attitudes. Credit goes to
the nationalism analysts for recognizing that contemporary international integration requires a
particular kind of attitudinal environment. However, the environment they seek has failed to
materialize. Problems in using the nationalism model as a guide to analyzing contemporary
international integration are similar to those involved in using the federalism model. First,
testing the model against reality in Western Europe, in Central America and elsewhere produces
negative results. Regional nationalism, as noted, turns out not to be a component of international
integration. Second, as with the federalist case, asking the analytical questions suggested by the
nationalism model, deters thinking about a range of interesting alternative questions. For
example, the analyst guided by the nationalism model is directed toward asking questions about
people-to-people interactions and transactions, about similarities and differences in peoples’
life styles, value systems and cultural norms, and especially about their attitudes toward one
another and attendant perceptions of ‘we-ness’. But are these really the appropriate questions
to ask about the attitudinal environments supportive of inter-governmental cooperation and
international institutionalization? Does it really matter what peoples think about one another?
Or, rather, does it perhaps matter more what these people think about international cooperation
and about supranational decision-making?l7 The point here is that while the analyst guided by
the nationalism model has been primarily concerned with links and bonds among peoples, he
has by and large ignored links and bonds between peoples and their governments and between
peoples and international organizations and processes. Is he missing something of significance?
(3) Nor is Contemporary International Integration Functionalism in the Mifruny Trudition-
Functionalist analysts have achieved greater descriptive accuracy than others grappling with
contemporary international integration.18 Part ofthis accuracy, of course, must be accounted
for by the fact that architects of international integration in Western Europe and elsewhere were
directly influenced by functionalist thinking and therefore constructed their systems from
functionalist blueprints.19 Still, let us give credit where credit is due. Functionalist analysts
have accurately located the origins of international cooperation in realms of functional
interdependence; they have pinpointed the significance of sector approaches ; they have grasped
the importance of non-governmental transnational actors. Yet, very little in contemporary
international integration has actually ‘worked’ the way the functionalist design said that it
would. Most revealingly, national governments have remained conspicuous and pivotal in
internationally integratin systems, quite in contrast to the Leadership, initiative and prerogative
have by and large remained with national governments. They have not gravitated to technocrats,
bureaucrats and non-governmental actors. Moreover, national governments participating in
international integration schemes have proven far more interested in ‘welfare’ pursuits and far
more restrained in ‘power’ pursuits than functionalist theorizing would have led us to believe.21
Equally significant, functional task-areas in international economics, communications, science
and technology, which the functionalist model stipulates immune from international politics,
have in fact turned out to be the central issue-areas in the lively international politics of
international integration. There are simply no non-political issues in relations among states !
Most important, the functionalist model misses the essence of the growth and expansion of
international regime during international integration. So concerned are functionalist analysts
with sector-tosector task expansion, that many have failed first to recognize that this sectoral
‘spillover’ is but one possible variety of expansion or growth during international integration.
It is also, incidently, the variety of growth that is least in evidence in existing cases.22 But, at
least two other varieties can be monitored. First, there is expansion in the volume of
internationally coordinative activities within given functional sectors.2~ In addition, and much
more important, there is possible expansion in the political system brought into being when
functional sectors are integrated internationally.24 Such systemic expansion is evidenced by
the entrance of increasing numbers of actors and interests into international program planning
and policy making. Second, neither have functionalist analysts been fully cognizant of the fact
that sector-to-sector task expansion, spillover or its variants index integrative progress only if
one assumes that ‘functional federation’ or multi-sector merger is the end product of
international integration25 Here again, we are evaluating the present in terms of a hypothetical
future which may never come about. if multi-sector merger is not the end product of
international integration, if integration does not really go very far beyond the nation-state, then
other varieties of systemic growth which reflect activity and complexity rather than extension
might be the more telling indicators of healthy and productive international integration. In sum,
the functionalist analyst too has been partially strait-jacketed by his framework for thinking
about international integration. He asked how men may achieve international cooperation by
circumventing politics among nations. But, he has not asked how international cooperation is
in fact achieved during international integration in the very course of international politics.
Then, he has asked how functional integration s reads or s ills over in the direction of federal
Europe, might it not have been more productive to ask ow a program of transnational sectoral
merger fits into and becomes an integral part of a broader pattern of intra-regional international
relations? That is, what if the termination state for international integration in fact resembles
Western Europe, circa 1970? Why do some sectors get merged and others do not? More
significantly, what kind of international politics results in a system where some functional
sectors are transnationally merged and others are not? Im ressionistically speaking, it would
seem that this ‘broader pattern o P intraregional international relations’, this com lex of merged
and unmerged sectors and the aggregation of associate dp governing authorities of one type or
another begins to approximate what we are really talking about when we speak of contemporary
international integration. Does the functionalist analyst really recognize this? Is he missing
something if he does not? (4) Nor, Finally, Is Contemporary International Inte ration Simply
thought about international integration within the framework of ‘Realist’ or Mach Politik
models have fallen short of understanding what the phenomenon is or involves. To these
analysts, international integration is a process of mutual ex loitation wherein governments in
the interest of enhancing their own power.26 Power is to be enhanced so that traditional ends
ofpolitics among nations may be accomplishedi.e. international autonomy, military security,
diplomatic influence and heightened prestige. In Realist thinking, international organizations
created in the course of international integration are but instruments to be used by national
governments pursuing self-interests. They are made at the convergent whims of these
governments, and flounder or fossilize as their usefhess as instruments of foreign policy comes
into question. 27 Over all, the Realist analyst argues that what we are observing ‘out there’ and
calling international integration are really international marriages of convenience, comfortable
for all partners as long as self-interests are satisfied, but destined for divorce the moment any
partner’s interests are seriously frustrated. Hence, international integration drives not toward
federalism or nationalism or functionalism, but toward disintegration. It never gets beyond the
nation-state.28 The wisdom of the Realist model is that it conceives of international integration
as a pattern of international relations and not as something above, beyond or aside from politics
among nations. But the shortcoming in the model is that it conceives of international integration
as traditional internutiorid relations played by traditional actors, using traditional means in
pursuit of traditional ends. So convinced is the political realist that ‘there is nothing new under
the sun’ in international relations that he never seriously asks whether international actors other
than national governments may independently influence the allocation of international rewards.
Nor does he ask whether actors committed to international integration may be pursiung any
other than the traditional inventory of international goals-autonomy, military security, influence
and prestige. Do these really remain important goals in contemporary international relations?
Nor, finally, does the realist ask how actors committed to integration agreements in fact define
their selfinterests. Could it be that actors engaged in international integration actually come to
consider it in their own self-interest to see that their partners accomplish their goals? In sum,
by assuming that international politics remains the ‘same old game’ and that international
integration is but a part of it, the realist analyst is not prompted to ask what is new in
contemporary international relations? Is he missing something of significance?
II. TOWARD A NEW CONCEPTUALIZATION

If there has been a central theme running through my review of analytical models, it is that our
conventional fiameworks have clouded more than they have illumined our understanding of
contemporary international integration. No model describes the integration phenomenon with
complete accuracy because all the models present images of what integration could be or should
be rather than what it is here and now. Furthermore, attempts to juxtapose or combine the
conventional frameworks for analytical purposes by and large yield no more than artificial,
untidy results.29 Clearly, to surmount the conceptual confusion we must set aside the old
models, and, beginning from the assumption that international integration could very well be
something new that we have never before witnessed in international relations, we must create
a new, more appropriate, more productive analytical framework. I contend that this new model
must rdect and raise questions about what international integration is in Western Europe,
Central America, East Africa, etc., atpresent. We must, in other words, stop testing the present
in terms of rogress toward or regression from hypothetical futures international integration is
going to end up. The remainder of this essay is a very preliminary step in the direction of a new
conceptualization of contemporary international integration.

Is It Really An ‘Elephant’ After All?

Complexity of Structure-I will hypothesize, though I cannot argue the case as convincingly as
I would like to at this moment, that contemporary international integration can best be thought
of as a set of processes that produce and sustain a Concordance System at the international
level. ‘Concordance’, according to dictionaries i have consulted means, ‘agreement’ or
‘harmony’, and ‘concord’, its root, refers to ‘peaceful relations among nations’. A
‘Concordance System’ by my definition is an international system wherein actors find it
possible consistently to harmonize their interests, compromise their differences and rea mutual
rewards from their interactions. I selected the term ‘Concor B ance System’ primarily because
I found it necessary to have a name for what I believe I see coming into being ‘out there’ in the
empirical world. But what we call this product of international integration is not very important;
how we describe it is centrally important. What does a Concordance System look like? First,
states or nationstates are among the major component units of the system, and national
governments remain central actors in it.30 While it can and will be argued that contemporary
international integration does in fact go ‘beyond the nation-state’ both organizationally and
operationally, it nonetheless does not go very far beyond. It certainly does not drive the state
into oblivion, economic, political or otherwise. Neither does it relegate the national government
to obscurity. Whatever may be the indeterminate future of present-day regional common
markets, harmonization agreements and other varieties of integrative ventures here subsumed
under the label ‘Concordance System’ these are presently clusters of cooperatively interacting
states. For all we know now, ‘international integration’ may never be more than this. Therefore,
what we are really talking about when we speak of contemporary international integration are
neither federations, nor nationalities, nor functional latticeworks, but international state systems
of a rather interesting kind. Hopefully having made the point that national governments remain
important actors in Concordance Systems, it now must be said that one of the most interesting
features of these systems is that national governments are not the only important actors. In fact,
the most complex Concordance Systems may include actors in four organizational arenas -the
subnational, the national, the transnational and the supranational.31 In contrast to famdiar
federal systems, there is no prevailing or established hieracliy or superordination-subordination
relationship among the different kinds of actors in the system. Instead, each of the actors
remains quasi-autonomous (more or less so depending upon issues in question), all are
interdependent, and all interact in pursuit of consensus that yields mutual rewards. In Western
Europe, for example, a typical question of agricultural harmonization among the Six might
bring into being a matrix of interactions similar to the one suggested in Figure I. Here, any
number of within- and between-arena interactions become part of the overall action system.
The Concordance System, then, is a pluralist system. But because it includes four organization
levels or arenas rather than two as is the case in conventional pluralist models it is a much more
complex system than that which we are accustomed to analyzing. Nevertheless, let us bear in
mind that despite its complexity and despite the novelty of some of its actors (for example,
transnational interest groups) the Concordance System is basically an international system.
Certainly, it is not the exclusively government-to-government or ‘billiard ball’ system of
traditional world politics.32 But it is essentially a system of relations among sovereign states
and separate peoples. It is a new kind of international system first created by Europeans to meet
European needs in the post-World War 11 era. Its popularity has s read. Novelty in Process-
Aside from complexity of structure, a num t: er of other distinctive features characterize the
Concordance System. Some of these have to do with the nature of interaction rocesses within
the system. First, the Concordance System tends to ge a highly institutionalized system wherein
actors channel the bulk of their transactions in all issue-areas through organizational networks
according to routinized procedures.33 That is, the process of international interaction within
the Concordance System is much more bureaucratic than it is diplomatic. ‘Bureaucratic’ as I
use it here is not meant belittlingly. Quite to the contrary, ’ust as efficient bureaucracy tends to
reflect advanced civilization, d ureaucratic international relations’ reflects ordered,
standardized, planned, efficient problem-solvin in relations among cooperation is facilitated via
institutionalized, constitutional, precedential or otherwise standardized, patterned procedures
which all actors commit themselves to use and respect.34 In a way, we can say that the
Concordance System characteristic of contemporary international integration is the farthest
thing removed from the traditional anarchy of international politics, but which is yet not a state,
nation-state or federation. Let it be noted, however, that a Concordance System need not be
institutionally centralized. Transactions are channeled through institutions, to be sure, but the
Concordance System may include any number of functionally specific organizations and any
number of standardized procedures, while it includes nothing even vague1 resembling an
overarching central government.3~ In this way, again, t i e Concordance System remains
essentially an international system. By looking at processes within the Concordance System
somewhat more abstractly, we are able to note two further distinctive features of the system.
First, political conflict is an integral part of the international interaction pattern. It occurs both
within and between all action arenas. But, quite in contrast to the modalities of traditional
international relations, and accordingly bafffing to analysts of the Realist school, most conflict
within the Concordance System follows froin divergent views about ‘ways to cooperate’ rather
than from fundamental incompatibilities in the interests of the various actors.36 That is,
common, convergent, or at least compatible ends among actors are prerequisites for the
emergence of a Concordance System; ifthese are not present no Concordance System will
develop. What actors within the system tend to disagree about most often are the kinds of
procedures they will commit themselves too as they bureaucratize their international relations.
Therefore, in observing Concordance Systems we should expect to find conflict, we should
expect this to be initiated over questions of establishing new harmonizing procedures, and we
should expect it to be terminated in agreements on new procedures acceptable to all actors. In
this sense, codict may well be functional to the Concordance System? But to be sure, incom
atibilities in actor’s basic interests and questions about Systems, as they certainly did during
Charles de Gaulle’s challenges to the EEC system in Western Europe. When such questions do
emerge and are openly contested, they become disfunctional to the continuation of the
Concordance System and could lead to its deterioration. Second, bargaining among actors
toward the achievement of convergent or collective ends is the predominant style of interaction
within the Concordance System. This bargaining, with exchanged concessions and ultimate
compromises tends to characterize interactions within and between all action arenas.38 As such,
coercion and confrontation are both alien to the Concordance System, are considered
illegitimate by actors and occur infreciuently. In the vocabulary of the Theory of Games,
primitive confrontation politics and resultant constant-sum gamesmanship are alien to
Concordance Systems. Much more typical is the variable-sum game pattern which rewards all
actors for their cooperative behavior and penalizes them for competitive behavior.39 Moreover,
the game as played in the Concordance System is a ‘full information’ game where players
readily learn of rewards from cooperation and penalties from competition by communicating
openly with one another.

In short, there is no premium on secrecy and deception in the politics of the Concordance
System as there often tends to be in more traditional diplomacy. Of course, none of this is to
say that lapses into confrontation politics, attempts at punishment and retaliation, and zero-sum
gamesmanship are completely extinguished in Concordance Systems. Again, however, to the
extent that these vestiges of traditional international olitics enter into interaction patterns of the
Concordance System, t ! e system itself comes into jeopardy. Some Attributes of Atmosphere-
The Concordance System survives and thrives in a distinctive attitudinal environment. Four
features of this psychological setting are especially notable. First, pragmatismis the prevailing
political doctrineofthe Concordance Systeni.40 Ifthe term pragmatism sounds overly formal,
call it ‘downto-earthism’. What it means is that international social, economic and political
problems are looked upon by actors involved first as real, second as soluble and third as
approachable by whatever means seem most promising of rapid, eflicient solution. Pragmatism
does not cherish any cosmic first princi les, such as those that found socialism, visions. It rather
equips its adherents to pour themselves into rob emsolving without anxiety about doctrinal
purity. Lerner an! Gordon admirably capture the pragmatic atmosphere of the present-day
Western European Concordance System : The collapse of traditional ideologies has made the
European elites into pragmatists. They have tried to face the new realities oftheir postwar
situation in ways that work. . . . They can now work more effectively with each other on
problems of common interest even when they do not share a common ideology that tells them
how to talk about these problems. . . . This is what we call, ‘the new pngmatisrn’.41 Second,
and perhaps relatedly, the Concordance System is supported by perceptions of international
interdependence, or, if not this, then at least by perceptions of national inadequacy.42 Again,
after Lerner and Gordon, and with respect to Western European Bite thinking: hdeed, there has
been a convergent consensus in Europe over the last decade (1955- 1965) that national options
are not viable and that transnational choices are the only realistic alternatives. 43 One of the
first steps toward a Concordance System, perhaps, is the emergence of the realization on the
part of governments and peoples that they need one another in vital ways. But, let it be noted
that such perceptions of national inadequacy and international interdependence as are found
among klites (and masses also) within Concordance Systems are not negations of the nation-
state, nor are they reflections of a new cosmopolitanism. They are rather recognitions of modem
economic and technological forces that transverse national frontiers, recognitions that states can
no longer relieve internal pressures by external imperialism, and indeed affirmations that
nation-states can be preserved as distinct entities only through the international pooling of
resources to confront problems that challenge their separate existence. Third, and again
probably relatedly, the ‘atmosphere’ within the Concordance System, especially in councils
where common programs are formulated and decided upon, is one of high mutual sensitivity
and responsiveness.44 To begin with, actors within the systeni tend to possess a good deal more
information about one another and about one another’s goals, objectives, preferences and needs
than is common in more traditional diplomacy where emphasis is upon one’s own needs and
upon ways to fulfill these regardless of what the other fellow may want. But even more
important, actors within the Concordance System feel some compulsion to see to it that their
partners needs as well as their own are fulfilled in decisions made and programs executed. All
of this may sound rather strange to the student of traditional international relations.
Nevertheless, it is precisely this atmosphere of shared compulsion to fmd mutually rewarding
outcomes, this felt and shared legitimacy in concession-making, and this reciprocal sensitivity
to needs that markedly distinguishes between the new international politics of the Concordance
System and the traditional politics of the Machiavellian world. Fourth, and finally, the
Concordance System includes people, or, better stated, eoples. These are the mass populations
of the nationthey accord legitimacy to the structures and processes of the system. For one thing,
they accept the subnational-national-transnationalsupranational political environment that
surrounds them, and they defer to the outcomes of the bargaining processes in the multi-arena
system. Put more simply, the mass populations of the Concordance System see the system itself
as legitimate, and its decisional outputs as authoritative. They comply accordingly. Again, this
is a far cry from traditional international relations in the age of integral nationalism ! In addition,
let it be underlined that mass populations with the Concordance System need not be assimilated
into a supranationality. In fact, they may not even like one another very much. They do,
however, recognize, accept and bow to the necessities of international cooperation in an age of
interdependence, and they support international integration accordingly.
Where Do We Go From Here?

Quite clearly, the sketch I have compiled of the Concordance System is in barest outline only.
Moreover, I have worked exclusively at the descriptive level and have not raised very many
questions about where the Concordance System comes from, how it is maintained and whether
and how it generates the outcomes that its participants expect from it. To go farther, however,
would be to go too far for one paper, and, frankly speaking, it would be to go well beyond my
own present understanding. Therefore, the question that arises is ‘where do we go from here?’
First, I have contended that what in fact we have been talking about when we have referred to
‘international integration’ in contemporary international relations is the coming into being and
maintenance of concordance Systems. Moreover, I believe that my Concordance System model
better describes international integration, and surely Western European integration, than any of
the models currently in vogue. The Concordance model not only captures aspects of structure,
process and attitudinal environment that other models miss, misinterpret or distort, but it also
avoids the logically questionable and empirically frustrating procedure of forcing the analyst to
evaluate what exists in terms of what might or might not develop sometime in the future.
Despite all ofthis, however, the most immediate answer to ‘where do we go from here?’ is that
we step out into the empirical world to see how accurate the Concordance Systemmodel of
international integration really is. Are our cases of ‘international integration’ in fact
Concordance Systems as these have been described here? Are they fundamentally interriatiorid
systems? Are they structured into multiple action arenas, and does the overall interaction pattern
which yields internationally coordinative plans, programs and policies include within and
between arena transactions? Does ‘bureaucracy’ better describe international relations within
the system than ‘diplomacy’? Are many of the system’s disturbances handled via pre-
established, standardized, routinized procedures? Is conflict concerned with disagreement over
means rather than ends? Does the overall interaction pattern approximate a non-zero-sum
positive payoff game? Are pragmatism, mutual sensitivity, perceived interdependence, and
systemic legitimacy characteristic of the attitudes of decision-makers, elites and masses within
the system? As we ask all of these questions, we might also want to consider whether
comparative integration studies become any more truly ‘comparative’ and productive when set
in the framework of the Concordance System model? Then, if we can establish that Cordance
Systems are real and that their creation and maintenance are really what we are talking about
when we discuss contemporary international integration, we can launch into investigating their
dynamics. Where in fact do they come from? How is structural complexity achieved? Why is
it accepted? How are nonzero-sum procedural norms established? Why? Why does pragmatism
come to prevail? How and why do mass populations come to extend legitimacy to the multi-
arena international system? More broadly, what maintains Concordance Systems? What do they
yield, for their members and for the larger international system? What undermines them? The
very least that could emerge from exploring the Concordance System model would be an
exciting research experience enlivened with the awareness that we are throwing off old
analytical strait-jackets and asking new and fresh questions about international integration.