Britain and the Decline of the International Control of Small Arms in the Twentieth Century

Abstract

The article examines the peak and decline in interest in international small arms control during the trans-First World War period. It traces this process from the 1908 Brussels Conference, through the 1919 St-Germain Convention to the 1925 Geneva Convention, with the coda of the 1935 Royal Commission on the Manufacture of and Trade in Armaments. The research identifies the pivotal role of the 1917 Islington Committee. The article argues that realist and idealist small arms controllers have fundamentally different objectives: practical small arms control has tended to be a realist concern, whereas small arms campaigns are, for idealists, a lever to achieve wider goals. The history of small arms control provides a point of entry into understanding the cycles of international politics. The renaissance of interest in small arms control, the article suggests, is the mirror image of the decline in emphasis during the twentieth century.