The evolution of global politics and the pacific settlement of international disputes, 1794–1907
The nineteenth century witnessed a major effort amongst key historical actors at applying international arbitration to settle a range of questions between states. An increasingly globalized public sphere took great interest in arbitration and how it might be used to supplant war in what they called the ‘civilized’ world. At the fin de siècle, these two elements came together at the peace conferences at The Hague in 1899 and 1907 when diplomats institutionalized arbitration through the creation of the Permanent Court of Arbitration. This thesis examines the various contexts in which the great powers employed arbitral mechanisms in order to highlight the pivotal role arbitration played as a tool of diplomacy in this globalizing age. Moreover, it investigates the political motivations behind the eventual systematization and institutionalization of arbitration. Chapter 1 explores both the pre–nineteenth–century history of pacific settlement as well as the early development of arbitration in the opening stages of the nineteenth century. Chapter 2 analyses the ways that arbitration played a confidence–building role in the increased complexities of nineteenth–century great power politics. Chapter 3 explains how imperial powers employed arbitration to regulate their relations with non–Western governments, particularly in terms of demarcating and delimiting the boundaries of their colonies in Africa and Asia. Following on, chapter 4 examines private claims arbitration, particularly in the developing capital markets of Latin America. Chapter 5 considers how internationalist and peace movements in the west co–opted the idea of arbitration in the latter half of the nineteenth century, providing an impetus to institutionalize and systematize pacific settlement. Finally, chapter 6 considers the motivating factors as well as the impediments behind the negotiations at the two Hague conferences for the advancement of pacific settlement. The following six chapters demonstrate how the enhanced use of legal mechanisms in the nineteenth century were part of the changing vision of modern diplomatic and legal practice. At the same time, the expansion of pacific settlement represented the primary vehicle for states to implement greater structural changes in the international system for the sake of peace and progress.
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