scholarly journals Globalization, deglobalization and Great Power politics

2021 ◽  
Vol 97 (5) ◽  
pp. 1317-1333
Author(s):  
Norrin M Ripsman
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
The United States ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Great Power ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
The Us ◽  
Security Relations ◽  
Great Power Politics ◽  
The Cold War

Abstract Commercial liberalism would suggest that whereas globalization was conducive to great power cooperation—or at least moderated competition—deglobalization is likely to ignite greater competition amongst the Great Powers. In reality, however, the picture is much more complex. To begin with, the intense globalization of the 1990s and 2000s is not responsible for moderating Great Power tensions; instead, it is itself a product of the security situation resulting from the end of the Cold War. Furthermore, while globalization did serve to reinforce cooperation between the United States and rising challengers, such as China, which sought to harness the economic gains of globalization to accelerate their rise, it also created or intensified fault-lines that have led to heightening tensions between the Great Powers. Finally, while we are currently witnessing increasing tensions between the US and both China and Russia, deglobalization does not appear to be the primary cause. Thus, geoeconomic conditions do not drive security relations; instead, the geoeconomic environment, which is itself influenced by Great Power politics, is better understood as a medium of Great Power competition, which may affect the character of Great Power competition and its intensity, but does not determine it.

Seeking support beyond alliance? Rethinking great power partner politics after the Cold War

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lu Ding ◽  
Xuefeng Sun
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
The United States ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
The Self ◽  
Great Power ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
Self Help ◽  
Two Factors ◽  
Great Power Politics ◽  
The Cold War

Abstract Since the end of the Cold War, establishing partnerships has been part and parcel of the grand strategy of great powers. The partners that great powers seek fall under the two categories of security partners and political-economic partners. Statistics show a significant variation in the proportions of great powers’ security partners. The authors argue that such variation is mainly determined by two factors, namely, great powers’ strategic threats, and their ways of maintaining national security [self-help or security-dependent (on the United States)]. Specifically, both the security-dependent great powers that are under China’s strategic threat and the self-help great powers that are under the US’s strategic threat have a higher proportion of security partners than the security-dependent great powers that are not under China’s strategic threat and the self-help great powers that are under China’s strategic threat. These findings will help to refine the current theories of great power politics.

Intentions in Great Power Politics

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sebastian Rosato
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Interwar Period ◽  
The United States ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Great Power Politics ◽  
The Cold War

Can great powers be confident that their peers have benign intentions? States that trust each other can live at peace; those that mistrust each other are doomed to compete for arms and allies and may even go to war. This book offers a theory—intentions pessimism—that says great powers can rarely if ever be confident that their peers have benign intentions, because it is extraordinarily difficult for them to obtain the kind of information that would allow them to reach such a conclusion. Any optimistic assertions to the contrary—and there are many—are wrong. Indeed, even in cases that supposedly involved mutual trust—Germany and Russia in the Bismarck era (1871-90); Britain and the United States during the great rapprochement (1895-1906); France and Germany, and Japan and the United States in the early interwar period (1919-30); and the Soviet Union and the United States at the end of the Cold War (1985-90)—the protagonists were acutely uncertain about each other’s intentions. As a result, they competed for security. The ramifications for the future of U.S.-China relations are profound. Uncertain about the other side’s intentions, but aware of its formidable capabilities, Washington and Beijing will go to great lengths to strengthen their military and diplomatic positions, triggering a competitive action-reaction spiral with the potential for war.

Introduction

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Sebastian Rosato
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Real World ◽  
The United States ◽  
International Relations Theory ◽  
Historical Record ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Great Power ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
The Past ◽  
Great Power Politics

This chapter begins by explaining that the question of whether or not great powers can be confident that their peers have benign intentions is of enormous importance in both the real world and in international relations theory. In a nutshell, confidence causes peace and uncertainty causes security competition with the potential for war. The chapter then addresses the intentions question in three ways. First, it briefly describes a theory—intentions pessimism—that says great powers can rarely if ever be confident that their peers have benign intentions, because it is extraordinarily difficult for them to obtain the requisite information. Second, it argues that intentions pessimism matches up well with the historical record, and specifically, that it offers a compelling explanation of how great powers have actually thought about each other’s intentions over the past 150 years. Third, it applies intentions pessimism to the future of great power politics, predicting that the United States and China will each be uncertain about the other’s intentions, which will, in turn, cause them to compete for security and perhaps go to war.

Mixed up in power politics and the Cold War: The Americans, the ICFTU and Singapore's labour movement, 1955–1960

2009 ◽  
Vol 40 (2) ◽  
pp. 323-351 ◽  
Author(s):  
S.R. Joey Long
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
The United States ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
Labour Movement ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Cold War

The United States had a hand in shaping Singapore's labour developments between the period 1955 and 1960. Utilising materials from archives in Britain, the Netherlands and the United States, this study details the impetus for, the nature of, and the outcome of the US attempt to strengthen non-communist labour institutions in Singapore.

The Soviet Factor in the US-China Military-Technical Cooperation during the Cold War

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 12-47
Author(s):  
Yinan Li
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Active Role ◽  
The United States ◽  
Technical Cooperation ◽  
Arms Sales ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Military

The development of the PRC’s armed forces included three phases when their modernization was carried out through an active introduction of foreign weapons and technologies. The first and the last of these phases (from 1949 to 1961, and from 1992 till present) received wide attention in both Chinese and Western academic literature, whereas the second one — from 1978 to 1989 —when the PRC actively purchased weapons and technologies from the Western countries remains somewhat understudied. This paper is intended to partially fill this gap. The author examines the logic of the military-technical cooperation between the PRC and the United States in the context of complex interactions within the United States — the USSR — China strategic triangle in the last years of the Cold War. The first section covers early contacts between the PRC and the United States in the security field — from the visit of R. Nixon to China till the inauguration of R. Reagan. The author shows that during this period Washington clearly subordinated the US-Chinese cooperation to the development of the US-Soviet relations out of fear to damage the fragile process of detente. The second section focuses on the evolution of the R. Reagan administration’s approaches regarding arms sales to China in the context of a new round of the Cold War. The Soviet factor significantly influenced the development of the US-Chinese military-technical cooperation during that period, which for both parties acquired not only practical, but, most importantly, political importance. It was their mutual desire to undermine strategic positions of the USSR that allowed these two countries to overcome successfully tensions over the US arms sales to Taiwan. However, this dependence of the US-China military-technical cooperation on the Soviet factor had its downside. As the third section shows, with the Soviet threat fading away, the main incentives for the military-technical cooperation between the PRC and the United States also disappeared. As a result, after the Tiananmen Square protests, this cooperation completely ceased. Thus, the author concludes that the US arms sales to China from the very beginning were conditioned by the dynamics of the Soviet-American relations and Beijing’s willingness to play an active role in the policy of containment. In that regard, the very fact of the US arms sales to China was more important than its practical effect, i.e. this cooperation was of political nature, rather than military one.

US grand strategy after the Cold War: Can realism explain it? Should realism guide it?

2018 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen M Walt
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Cold War ◽  
World Order ◽  
The United States ◽  
Grand Strategy ◽  
Structural Constraints ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Policy Elites

This article uses realism to explain past US grand strategy and prescribe what it should be today. Throughout its history, the United States has generally acted as realism depicts. The end of the Cold War reduced the structural constraints that states normally face in anarchy, and a bipartisan coalition of foreign policy elites attempted to use this favorable position to expand the US-led ‘liberal world order’. Their efforts mostly failed, however, and the United States should now return to a more realistic strategy – offshore balancing – that served it well in the past. Washington should rely on local allies to uphold the balance of power in Europe and the Middle East and focus on leading a balancing coalition in Asia. Unfortunately, President Donald Trump lacks the knowledge, competence, and character to pursue this sensible course, and his cavalier approach to foreign policy is likely to damage America’s international position significantly.

Introduction

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Charlie Laderman
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Great Power ◽  
World Power ◽  
The Us ◽  
Eastern Question

This introductory chapter outlines why the American response to the destruction of the Ottoman Armenians offers such critical insights into the US rise to world power, its evolving relationship with Britain, and the development of ideas on humanitarian intervention and global order at the turn of the twentieth century. It introduces the Armenian question, setting it within the larger Eastern question, and explains why the Ottoman Empire became a target for outside intervention by the European great powers in the nineteenth century. It explains why the United States, which had traditionally avoided political entanglement in the Near East even while its missionaries established an exceptional role there, began to take a greater interest in the region as its emergence as a great power coincided with the first large-scale Armenian massacres.

scholarly journals On Thai Transnational Subjectivity

MANUSYA ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 86-102
Author(s):  
Sudarat Musikawong
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
The United States ◽  
Film Festivals ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
Satellite Television ◽  
Immigrant Identity ◽  
The Us ◽  
Thai People ◽  
The Cold War

This paper examines the formation of transnational subjectivity through Thai political engagements in the United States (US). Thai people in the US participate in Thai homeland politics, while negotiating for a Thai immigrant identity in the US. Thai diasporas exist through political and social experiences, in which Thai communities and persons engage in homeland politics. Political acts and protests by Thais in the United States are not new, but emerged in the aftermath of the Cold War. This paper asks how political exiles, popular protests, film festivals, and satellite television challenge what Benedict Anderson has termed “long-distance” nationalism and Arjun Appadurai’s mediascapes.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document