ABSTRACT
Gatherings of heads of state and government were quite rare until 1975. Nonetheless, they were certainly not unique as is exemplified by such notorious cases as the Vienna Congress and the Conference of Yalta. What is conspicuous, is that they are a recurrent phenomenon and that they deal predominantly with economic issues. Their being repetitive is only new, however, for the Western developed world as a whole (but not for the European Community) since the Warsaw Pact/Comecon countries as well as such congregations as the Organisation for African Unity and the non-aligned countries have been organising summits for decades. Rather, the striking property of Western summitry since 1975 is its economic character.
