ABSTRACT
The preceding analyses of Britain’s appeasement decisions toward Germany, Italy, and Japan have provided two vantage points for understanding their dynamics: a structure-oriented model based on the role demands of power and interests and an actor-centered model based on the role conceptions of British leaders. In this chapter the vantage point is an action-focused model based on the role enactments between Britain and these three states. The three vantage points offer different perspectives on the same phenomena— namely, the roles and counterroles that define the role dyads generated and instantiated by the strategic interactions between Britain and the three Axis powers. The three models each provide some understanding of the dynamics that govern the patterns of conflict, cooperation, domination, and submission that characterize Britain’s international relations in the Far East, the Mediterranean, and Europe during the 1930s.
