This book takes a relatively obscure episode—the joint Franco-German production of a state-of-the-art and very expensive military helicopter, the Tiger Helicopter (used in the James Bond film Goldeneye)—to make a groundbreaking theoretical contribution to international relations scholarship. The rivalry between Germany and France in the 19th and 20th centuries is of course well known. It was directly or indirectly responsible for four cataclysmic wars, and until relatively recently, the idea that these two states could become close partners seemed implausible. Yet following World War II and th ... More

This book takes a relatively obscure episode—the joint Franco-German production of a state-of-the-art and very expensive military helicopter, the Tiger Helicopter (used in the James Bond film Goldeneye)—to make a groundbreaking theoretical contribution to international relations scholarship. The rivalry between Germany and France in the 19th and 20th centuries is of course well known. It was directly or indirectly responsible for four cataclysmic wars, and until relatively recently, the idea that these two states could become close partners seemed implausible. Yet following World War II and the birth of the European Union, they became the closest of allies. In fact, they collaborated for three decades on the most sophisticated weapon that the EU has produced: the Tiger. How did this occur, and what does this happy albeit unforeseen outcome tell us about how interstate relations really work? Through the lens of the Tiger, the book draws from two theoretical approaches—social constructivism and historical institutionalism—to reframe our understanding of how international relationships evolve. International relations scholars have always focused on relations between states, yet have failed to think in any sustained way about how interstate relationships both remold domestic realities and derive from them. How does a relationship between states impact upon a state internally? And how do the internal institutional dynamics of a state limit such relationships?