Taking Center Stage: Decoding Status Hierarchies from Group Photos of European Leaders
European Union Politics, Forthcoming
32 Pages Posted: 21 Jun 2018
Date Written: June 8, 2018
Abstract
I investigate whether group photos of international leaders can provide useful data on interstate status perceptions. I formulate a spatial model of social hierarchy and evaluate it against newly gathered data on the placement of leaders in 121 European Council group photos between 1975 and 2015. I find support for determinants of placement at the international, institutional, and individual levels. The results suggest that: (a) group photos provide a previously untapped source of data on international status; (b) data derived from group photos can supplement existing status proxies based on material capabilities or diplomatic connectivity; (c) group pictures can be particularly useful for discerning status hierarchies among sets of relatively homogenous countries, such as those of the European Union.
Keywords: Status, EU, G-20, International Status, Hierarchy, Methodology
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