ABSTRACT
Having been distantly involved with this whole project since its launch in Paris in 1995 at the second pan-European conference on international relations the editors have invited me to make some general comments and criticisms. I do so as a benevolent bystander, a long-time teacher on international organization and a contributor to the Cox and Jacobson 1973 volume which the editors rightly cite as a pathbreaking attempt to unpick the politics of their decision-making processes. My hope is that these comments may help provoke new research initiatives exploring the how and why of trends, decisions and non-decisions in the broadly defined area of international organization.
