What is International Relation........???

International Relations: 

                                  

In modern times the world has greatly shrunk as a result of scientific and technological development. As a consequence events in one part of the world have an immediate impact on the rest of the world. Therefore the states maintain regular relations with other states and the study of international relations has assumed great importance. Though some sort of international relations have been in vogue since earliest times and some of the states like Egypt, China, Greece and India have evolved code for the conduct of these relations, these rules were essentially based on morality and were not scrupulously observed by the states. Further these relations generally covered states of the same region and therefore can more appropriately be described as regional relations. It was only in the 17the century that the states established relations with other states beyond the region. This in a way marked the beginning of the international relations. The improvements in means of transport and communication and the industrial revolution further brought the states closer and greatly contributed to the development of international relations. It may be noticed that at that time the international relations, were concerned only with the study of diplomatic history, law and philosophy. The study was mainly based on facts find on facts finding and no deductions of any universal principles were made which could be helpful in understanding of the present or future relations among states. As a result, no well-conceived theory could be evolved which could help in understanding the significance of the current events.

Meaning of International Relations:

The term’ International’ was used for the first time by Jeremy Bentham in the later part of the 18^th century with regard to the laws of nations. Consequently, the term international relations was used to define the official relations between the sovereign states. However some scholars even included the economic, social and cultural relations amongst the states also within the purview of the subject. Thus there are broadly two views regarding the meaning of international relations. Those who take narrow view assert that international relation include only “the official relations conducted by the authorized leaders of the state”. To them the relations between nations, other than the official relations such as trade, financial intercourse, missionary activities, travel of students, cultural relations etc. don’t fall in the domain of international relations. Other view of is “the actual relations that take place across national boundaries or as the body of knowledge which we have of those relations at any given time.