There are at least four approaches useful in predicting what will happen in China after Mao. The “environmental approach” stresses that the Chinese setting—physical, cultural, economic, and international—will govern the courses taken by political actors. The “personality approach” is the opposite, stressing that people, not their surroundings, will determine succession politics. The “societal approach” postulates that it is society (defined as the social environment, including influences from Chinese culture, history, and the structure and operation of Chinese social-political-familial-economic institutions) that is the operationally significant variable. Finally, the “politics approach” assumes that politics itself is the central concern of Chinese life, necessitating a search for general “rules” of politics in China to project the future. These approaches and their implications are each examined in detail, with the conclusion that none is adequate of itself to explain post-Mao politics in China. By combining them, however, it is possible to periodize developments after Mao. Four stages are envisaged. An initial stage would last about three months, during which a collective leadership would form. A second, transitional phase, possibly lasting several years, would be marked by the advent of major policy questions not solvable by Maoist precedent. A third phase would see the emergence of a new leadership, probably operating on a factionalist model. Finally, a fourth stage would be defined after China has returned to normal, “gotten over” Mao's death, and when events are no longer viewable in terms of “succession politics.”

Students of world politics have tended to assume that states act as units. Yet trans-governmental relations—direct interactions among sub-units not controlled or closely guided by the policies of cabinets or chief executives—are frequently important. Trans-governmental relations are facilitated by extensive personal contacts among officials and by conflicts of interest between departments or agencies within modern governments. International organizations can play important roles in transgovernmental networks by (i) affecting the definition of issues; (2) promoting coalitions among governmental subunits with similar interests; and (3) serving as points of policy intervention in trans-national systems. As policy interdependence among developed-country governments becomes more extensive and complex, these roles of international organizations are likely to become increasingly important. Internationalism of this relatively informal, non-institutionalized type is not a “dead end.”

Classic, optimistic, post-World War II development strategy (whereunder the new states, catalyzed by temporary, modest injections of foreign aid, were to achieve accelerated growth, improved mass welfare, and national self-reliance) already was in trouble before it was overtaken by growing awareness of natural-resource scarcities. But, at least in their Limits-of-Growth version, the latter seem to challenge the strategy fundamentally. Six hypotheses for reconciling scarcities and development are: (1) world zero population growth needs urgent promotion; but (2) there is no comparable early need for arresting global economic growth; (3) the poor countries, along with more equity, need faster growth and therefore continuing regularized net transfers from the rich; (4) the rich, while sharing some of their growth dividends with the poor through scarcity-related market adjustments, will keep growing enough also to provide net transfers; (5) the oil crisis is so extreme a case of the problem that it confuses more than it teaches; (6) in a system that is still nation-state dominated, the mixture of cooperative and conflicted scenarios for promoting development in a context of scarcity may veer toward the former as affluent decision makers are “subverted” into planetary perspectives.

Fundamental to modern politics is the fact that politics of security and diplomacy are central to society. Historically, foreign and security politics have been the main priorities of the political center, conducted primarily on that level. Since 1945, these political centers have gained predominance in die U.S. In the absence of well-integrated political elites, a highly centralized political party or parties, and powerful and permanent bureaucracies and civil service, the presidential political center has become the pivotal political center with almost exclusive control over foreign affairs and national security. The locus and degree of power widiin the American political and constitutional context, rather than elite orientations and practices, are identified to explain who dominates American foreign policy.

An extensive literature analyzes military participation in Latin American politics. Case studies and a few comparative works undermine the faith of a decade ago—that military involvement in Latin American politics would decline as a result of economic development, social modernization, military professionalization, and American influence. Attention has turned increasingly to die variety of military involvements: direct and indirect; personal, factional, and institutional; intermittent and long-term; reformist and regressive. Analyses stressing the confluence and interaction of macro-social factors with those internal to the military institution seem most persuasive in explaining the diverse political roles played by Latin American officers. One central proposition which deserves further research is that the relation between the levels of military institutionalization and the institutionalization of civilian political procedures importantly affects these varying roles.

Strategic intelligence, die evaluated informational product of intelligence bureaucracies, is a potentially important element in foreign policy decision making. But the role and impact of intelligence reports are very difficult to analyze, because of bodi secrecy and conceptual or definitional problems. Some new light is shed by a number of recent books, in three categories: essentially uncritical works by former insiders, muckraking exposes, and historical case studies. Collectively, these books improve our understanding of the variables that condition the impact of strategic intelligence on policy, or they illuminate die policy and bureaucratic context of intelligence activities. But only one of the recent books has a theoretical thrust. Great need remains, and opportunities exist, to move toward better dieoretical understanding of intelligence, or at least toward inproved information about when, how, or whether intelligence activities or reports have measurable impact on foreign policy decision making and policy outcomes in world politics.