Refereed journal article or data article (A1)
UTOPIAS, COUNTERFACTUALS AND EXTERNAL AFFAIRS: (RE)VISIONING FOREIGN POLICY IN A SMALL COUNTRY CONTEXT*
List of Authors: Ville Sinkkonen, Henri Vogt
Publisher: Barbara Budrich Publishers
Place: Leverkusen
Publication year: 2015
Journal: European Review of International Studies
Journal acronym: ERIS
Volume number: 2
Issue number: 2
Start page: 66
End page: 83
Number of pages: 18
eISSN: 2196-7415
This article analyses the difficulties of visionary foreign policy thinking, by
presenting a unique experiment that we conducted in the small state context of Finland in
2013‒2014. We invited eminent International Relations scholars to write lengthy newspaper
columns contemplating the country’s future foreign policy avenues. The starting point for
these contributions was a counterfactual present wherein Finland could afford to expend a
substantial amount of additional resources on its external affairs, without the traditional sense
of cautiousness symptomatic of the country. The insights attained throughout the experiment
warrant reflection upon the utility of such heuristic devices as tools for future-oriented policy
making. The exercise highlights a number of issues pertaining to the relationship between the
disciplinary contours of IR and the concrete challenges of the policy world. Above all, the
article calls for a nuanced use of the structure-agency continuum for coming to terms with the
everyday complexities of foreign policy making.