International relations and French geopolitical thinking: An essay in intertheoretic synthesis

This dissertation sets the scholarly literature in the French-language dealing with the geographical coordinates of international-political relations in the context of contemporary International Relations (IR) in that field's dimensions as a theoretical enterprise and as a policy science. Accordingly, it identifies the most appropriate interface of that corpus of thought with existing IR theory, proposes an effective procedure by which a useful synthesis could be developed, and considers some major aspects of the policy-relevant content of French geopolitical writing, especially as their impact is likely to be manifested in strategic and foreign-policy debates in France.;The thematic unity of the dissertation derives from the thesis defended: that French geopolitical thought can enrich both existing international-political theory and foreign-policy analysis through its thickly textured appreciation of the spatiotemporal contexts of human agency and its keen and technically advanced considerations of the areal and geographic dimensions of policy choice.;This analysis of the French-language geopolitical literature is conducted from the vantage point of political science, as that discipline is represented in the modern study of international relations. Thus, French geopolitical thought is surveyed primarily for its potential contribution to formal explanatory-theory development. The generic linkage between IR theory and normative visions of optimal outcomes, that works to mute or shade analytical compartmentalization as between explanatory theorizing and normatively mediated prescriptivist counsels in any social science, is addressed at various points throughout the dissertation. The geopolitical dimensions of foreign-policy choice in France, with particular emphasis on their ramifications for French approaches to the issues of nuclear doctrine, European futures, and the regionalist dimensions of international-security questions constitutes the concluding focus.