ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses what analytical value kinship may add to the academic study of inter-state dynamics. The chapter reviews how kinship has been contended with in key contributions to IR theory on inter-state cooperation and alliances, before it proceeds to discussing, first, how kinship might be of use as an analytical category and classification system in IR and, second, how kinship, as a practical category, is used in and impacts on everyday international political and diplomatic life.
