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"In Regensburg the sight of a Frenchman is as feared as smallpox is in Paris". Competition between Roles and Norms in the French Conception of the Reichstag, 1663-1740 - The primary instructions for the French envoys to the Reichstag at Regensburg contain enormous potential as sources for research on French foreign relations. These documents permit insights into their ideal conceptions and guiding notions. These were based on a plurality of political role ascriptions and the resulting competition of norms, with a predominance of exemplars at the levels of ceremony (prior to 1726) and peace discourse. By contrast, the role of the French King as Roi Très-Chrétien began to recede while that of the roi de guerre faded completely away. Compromise between competing conceptions in the interest of an overall strategy was never achieved and as a result France relinquished its powers of assertion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the Rhine river in the foreign policy of former German chancellor Konrad Adenauer and former French President Charles de Gaulle. Topics discussed include the thesis of Rhine as natural border between Germany and France; the German protest to the expansion of the French Territory to the Rhine; and the Boundary shift to the east in the Treaty of Campo Formio in 1797.

The article examines foreign relations between Austria and the Holy Roman Empire on the one hand and the Dutch Republic on the other in the mid-seventeenth century. The author highlights the diplomatic efforts following the Peace of Westphalia that eventually led to the conclusion of an alliance between the two countries on July 25, 1672. Themes addressed include the attitudes of the republican leader of the Netherlands, Johan de Witt, and the Holy Roman Emperor, Leopold I, toward each other, the 1668 Treaty of Aachen, Germany, and the Dutch-English-Swedish triple alliance, and the role of French policy under King Louis XIV in European politics.

The article charts the career of French mercenary Bob Denard during the post-independence civil war in the Republic of the Congo/Congo-Kinshasa in the 1960s. The author relies on records of the Portuguese colonial administration of Angola for a reconstruction of Denard's activities in the Katanga region of the Congo. Issues considered include Denard's relationship to Congolese politician Moïse Tshombé, the possible covert support for Denard from the French government, and Denard's Cold War-era anti-Communism.

The article discusses patronage networks between French diplomats and German government officials in the Holy Roman Empire after the Peace of Westphalia. Basing his arguments in sociological theories of social networks and trust, the author focuses his analysis on the ecclesiastical electorates of Mainz and Cologne in the second half of the 17th century. To this end, he examines the political, ethical, and symbolic dimensions of expressions of trust in the language of diplomacy, as evident in diplomatic correspondence and communications from the German states to France.

The founding of the Union for the Mediterranean in summer 2008 envisaged enhancing Euro-Mediterranean cooperation by focussing on concrete projects. This was combined with the hope to depoliticize Euro-Mediterranean relations, thereby reducing the negative consequences of conflicts among participants. Contrary to this intention, an opposite tendency of continuing politicization can be identified on various levels of Euro-Mediterranean relations. This article focuses on the reasons for this development and points to central elements that continue to hamper cooperation under the presidency of France and Egypt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports on the relationship between Cuba and France during the 1960s, focusing on the how the left-wing intellectuals in France influenced the French government's involvement in a social emancipation movement that led to a revolution in Cuba. Several topics are discussed, including how French intellectuals (including Jean-Paul Sartre and Claude Julien) who lived in Cuba in the 1900s were impressed by the communism in Cuba and were against the political actions of the United States towards Cuba during the Cold War, how the Cuban government worked to gain influence over the French intellectuals as well as the French Communist Party (PCF), and how the French president Charles de Gaulle was interested in weakening the hold the U.S. had over the Latin American region.

The article discusses French-Swiss relations in the early modern period, focusing on four points including the influence of the French king on Swiss politics through secret payments, criticism raised at the time against these payments. The author argues that anti-corruption sentiment was prevalent at the time, using research by Sharon Kettering to show that patronage systems bred high levels of corruption and protest, and contends that the historical phenomenon of secret influence in the higher social ranks of Europe should be understood as reflecting both patronage and corruption.