Resumen:
1. SCOPE AND DEFINITIONS -- THE ANCIENT STATES SYSTEMS -- 2. SUMER : The original states system -- 3. ASSYRIA: The first near eastern empire -- 4 PERSIA: Imperial Moderation -- 5. CLASSICAL GREECE: independence and hegemony -- 6. THE MACEDONIAN SYSTEM: Hellenization of the Persian system -- 7. INDIA: Multiple independences and the Mauryan Empire -- 8. CHINA: Hegemony, warring states and empire -- 9. ROME: The final classical imperial synthesis -- 10. THE BYZANTINE OIKOUMENE -- 11. THE ISLAMIC SYSTEM: Adaptation of many traditions -- 12. THE ANCIENT STATES SYSTEMS: Some theoretical implications -- The European international society -- 13. MEDIEVAL EUROPE: The originality of Latin Christendom -- 14. THE RENAISSANCE IN ITALY: The stato -- 15. THE RENAISSANCE IN EUROPE: The stato outside Italy -- 16. THE HABSBURG BID FOR HEGEMONY -- 17. WESTPHALIA: An anti-hegemonial commonwealth of states -- 18. THE AGE OF REASON AND OF BALANCE -- 19. EUROPEAN EXPANSJON: Overseas and overland -- 20. THE NAPOLEONIC EMPIRE -- 21. COLLECTIVE HEGEMONY: The nineteenth-century Concert of Europe -- The global international society -- 22. THE EUROPEAN SYSTEM BECOMES WORLDWIDE 23. THE COLLAPSE OF EUROPEAN DOMINATION -- 24. THE AGE OF THE SUPERPOWERS AND DECOLONIZATION -- 25. THE CONTEMPORARY INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY : Heir to the past -- CONCLUSION -- EPILOGUE: SOME INDICATIONS FOR THE FUTURE.
