LIST OF PANELS

Relations between neighbours dominate the history of civilization, and likely even before the invention of writing and record keeping. The most ancient records describe the struggles and interaction between neighbouring tribes, settlements, villages, clans, houses, dynasties, city-sates, empires and others.

In the past two centuries the nation-state proliferated across the globe and replaced other forms of political actors. Today relationships are nearly always between sovereign national governments. A new academic discipline – international relations – has arisen to study and explain the relations between modern nations.

After the end of the First World War multilateral relationships have become more important than in the past, and it seemed that bilateral relations would become minor.  The creation of the League of Nations and its successor the United Nations and the rivalry of the Cold War decades made multilateral relations more central than ever. Multilateral trade agreements proliferated, often supported by the World Trade Organization, and a plethora of agencies, such as the World Health Organization, came into existence, along with other multilateral fora such as the World Bank. In addition, regional agreements and organizations, most notably the European Union, arose on every continent. It appeared that bilateral relations might gradually but eventually be subsumed by global or at least regional forms of governance. 

Yet, the fall of the Soviet Union, a less powerful United States on the world stage and increasing nationalism, and the failure of the multilateral arrangement to deliver on promises, heralded an increase or resurgence in the role of bilateral relationships between neighbours. Arguably during the first quarter century of the 21st millennium bilateral dynamics have increased in importance and their impact remains paramount.

The most prominent recent example is the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Civil wars, such as in Syria, Yemen, Ethiopia and in other nations have taken on bilateral or multilateral dimensions as neighbouring countries intervene. Notwithstanding the global supply chain, the majority of trade remains between neighbouring nations. The United States exports more to, and imports more from, its two neighbours (Canada and Mexico) than it does with China. Similarly, China trades more with its regional neighbours than it does with the United States. 

Notwithstanding the rise of multilateral and regional groups (most notably is the European Union), bilateral relations remain at the core of many of the current multilateral forums, whether regional or international organizations.

Relationships – whether bilateral, that is between two nations, or multilateral – take any number of forms: from warfare to cooperation on a specific project of development. Almost by definition relationships are asymmetrical in that no two or three or more nations are entirely equal in all regards.

The rise and return of populism and nativism, the intensity of the competition between the United States, China and Russia, the lack of coordination and collaboration between states in response to the pandemic, all highlight the challenges of international and bilateral relations in the third decade of the twenty-first century.

Smaller states, in particular, living beside a larger country are affected by the politics and priorities of their neighbors. This timely panel will examine and compare asymmetrical bilateral relations between states sharing a border from the perspective of the smaller of the two neighbors. The panel is not anchored in a particular theoretical tradition but rather seeks to explore what is most significant in the relationship from the standpoint of the smaller state, whether that be political, economic, social, or cultural.

Questions and topics to be analyzed include: What are the implications of living in the shadow of an elephant? How are smaller states influenced by their neighbor, and how do they manage that relationship?

Drawing from multiple illustrative cases from around the world, the panel will highlights the complexity of asymmetrical bilateral relations as well as the implications for smaller countries regarding policymaking, including foreign policy, and for citizens in general.