The Power of Performance: Summit Diplomacy and World Politics

What is this practice that states engage in frequently which we call summit diplomacy? The existing literature in International Relations (IR) has reduced this practice to visits, leader interactions, and negotiations while analytically marginalizing the audience dimension. In this book, I draw on the English School of IR, sociology, and social psychology to offer a macro-sociological story about a type of diplomatic practice that has become common since 1945. I argue that summits are performances of the state system personifying states and inter-state relations. Because summitry taps into our underlying need to feel assured that the system of states works regardless of policy or tangible outcomes, leaders, policymakers, and laypeople have an inherent desire for summits to be "successful." 

Using an original dataset of bilateral and multilateral summits involving major powers since 1945, survey experiments, and focus group study, I show that summits allow for myriad possibilities and the reimagining of relations of separateness among states, leaders, and the mass. I illustrate my theory by analyzing historic summits involving former or current adversaries during and after the Cold War: between the US and its adversaries (China, Vietnam, Cuba, and North Korea) and in East Asia (Japan-South Korea, inter-Korea, and Taiwan-PRC). The book raises implications for the IR literature on audience cost theory, global governance and public opinion, and the politics of inter-state rapprochement and reconciliation.