Power Politics

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex J. Bellamy
Keyword(s):  
East Asia ◽  
National Security ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Military Power ◽  
Nuclear Deterrence ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
Security Practices ◽  
Security Relations

This chapter explores the role of “power politics”—the domain of national security interests and the procurement and use of military power—in the decline of mass atrocities in East Asia. It suggests that power politics made an important, but not the singularly most important, contribution. The chapter has three parts. First, it explores how conventional power politics contributed to the decline of mass atrocities in East Asia. Although not central to the overall story, once they were established, the balance of power and both conventional and nuclear deterrence played a role in limiting the further escalation of potential conflicts. Second, it examines the limits of power politics. Third, it points to specific security practices that were more consequential, including the development of omnidirectional security relations, a tendency to avoid destabilizing competition, de-polarization, and the enmeshing of great powers in the region’s norms

International Politics in the Age of Existential Threats

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathan Alexander Sears
Keyword(s):  
National Security ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
First Century ◽  
Military Force ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
Nation States ◽  
Security Practices ◽  
Political Units ◽  
International Anarchy

Abstract Humans in the twenty-first century live under the specter of anthropogenic existential threats to human civilization and survival. What is the significance of humanity’s capacity for self-destruction to the meaning of “security” and “survival” in international politics? The argument is that it constitutes a material “revolution” in international politics—that is, the growing spectrum of anthropogenic existential threats represents a radical transformation in the material context of international politics that turns established truths about security and survival on their heads. The paper develops a theoretical framework based in historical security materialism, especially the theoretical proposition that the material circumstances of the “forces of destruction” determine the security viability of different “modes of protection”, political “units” and “structures”, and “security ideologies” in international politics. The argument seeks to demonstrate the growing disjuncture (or “contradiction”) between the material context of anthropogenic existential threats (“forces of destruction”); and the security practices of war, the use of military force, and the balance-of-power (“modes of protection”); the political units of nation-states and structure of international anarchy (“political superstructure”); and the primacy of “national security” and doctrines of “self-help” and “power politics” in international politics (“security ideologies”). Specifically, humanityapos;s survival interdependence with respect to anthropogenic existential threats calls into question the centrality of national security and survival in international politics. In an age of existential threats, “security” is better understood as about the survival of humanity.

After Victory

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. John Ikenberry
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Politics ◽  
World Order ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
The United States ◽  
Big Bang ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Napoleonic Wars ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
The Cold War

The end of the Cold War was a “big bang” reminiscent of earlier moments after major wars, such as the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 and the end of the world wars in 1919 and 1945. But what do states that win wars do with their newfound power, and how do they use it to build order? This book examines postwar settlements in modern history, arguing that powerful countries do seek to build stable and cooperative relations, but the type of order that emerges hinges on their ability to make commitments and restrain power. The book explains that only with the spread of democracy in the twentieth century and the innovative use of international institutions—both linked to the emergence of the United States as a world power—has order been created that goes beyond balance of power politics to exhibit “constitutional” characteristics. Blending comparative politics with international relations, and history with theory, the book will be of interest to anyone concerned with the organization of world order, the role of institutions in world politics, and the lessons of past postwar settlements for today.

scholarly journals The Power of Nations: Measuring What Matters

2018 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 7-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Beckley
Keyword(s):  
Goodness Of Fit ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
The United States ◽  
Important Variable ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Military Power ◽  
The Past ◽  
Policy Analysts ◽  
Leading Journals

Power is the most important variable in world politics, but scholars and policy analysts systematically mismeasure it. Most studies evaluate countries’ power using broad indicators of economic and military resources, such as gross domestic product and military spending, that tally their wealth and military assets without deducting the costs they pay to police, protect, and serve their people. As a result, standard indicators exaggerate the wealth and military power of poor, populous countries, such as China and India. A sounder approach accounts for these costs by measuring power in net rather than gross terms. This approach predicts war and dispute outcomes involving great powers over the past 200 years more accurately than those that use gross indicators of power. In addition, it improves the in-sample goodness-of-fit in the majority of studies published in leading journals over the past five years. Applying this improved framework to the current balance of power suggests that the United States’ economic and military lead over other countries is much larger than typically assumed, and that the trends are mostly in America's favor.

Conclusion

2020 ◽  
pp. 120-132
Author(s):  
Keir A. Lieber ◽  
Daryl G. Press
Keyword(s):  
National Security ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
International Politics ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
Close Attention ◽  
National Interests ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
Nuclear Age

This chapter summarizes key findings in the proponents of the “theory of the nuclear revolution,” which contend that nuclear weapons are transformative because they greatly reduce the need for countries to engage in intense security competition. It emphasizes that although nuclear weapons are the greatest tools of deterrence ever created, they do not automatically confer national security benefits on their owners, much less guarantee enduring safety from foreign threats. The chapter looks into the unfortunate reality of international politics in the shadow of nuclear weapons, in which countries must still pay close attention to the balance of power, search for ways to change the balance when they find themselves at a disadvantage and contemplate and plan for war in order to protect vital national interests. It explains how fears that tragically drove international politics for centuries still exist and how those fears are justified. The nuclear age remains an age of power politics.

Europe: Strategies for Co-operation and Joint Solutions

2014 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 259-270
Author(s):  
Adam Daniel Rotfeld
Keyword(s):  
National Security ◽  
Qualitative Change ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
European Security ◽  
The West ◽  
The Core ◽  
Security Environment ◽  
Ukraine Crisis ◽  
Emerging Powers

The article examines the sustainability and adaptability of European security institutions, structures and organizations in the context of the fundamental and qualitative change of the post-Helsinki European security order. Suggestions are presented for managing the Ukraine crisis by military and political restraint, the observance of the Helsinki Decalogue of principles and by upgrading executive mechanisms of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (osce). In a new European security order, the core political components would be constituted by the inviolability of frontiers and the incontestability of internal political order. In broader international change, the relative decrease of the role of old powers has to be accommodated with the growing clout of emerging powers. Since most of the conflicts take place within the States and not between them the risks and new threats have to be dealt with by transformed and upgraded security institutions adapted to the new security environment. At the same time, there is a manifested lack of interests by the great powers to rely on multilateral security institutions unless they are used as instruments in pursuing their own strategies. The new common security arrangement for the West and Russia has to reconcile the adversary national security interests within the Euro-Atlantic Security Forum.

Moral Authority as a Power Resource

1997 ◽  
Vol 51 (4) ◽  
pp. 591-622 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rodney Bruce Hall
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Political Process ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
Moral Authority ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
Power Resource

Nearly half a century has passed since Harold D. Lasswell and Abraham Kaplan generated a treatise on political theory that advocated analysis of power as a framework for analysis of political process. Fully half a century has passed since Hans J. Morgenthau confidently assured us of the universality, in politics as in nature, of the principle of the balance of power and defined the interests of states in terms of power. More than half a century has passed since Edward Hallett Carr set out to disabuse institutionalists and “idealists” of what he regarded as their utopian illusions and asserted a fundamental precept of the realist critique of prewar institutionalism, that politics is “in one sense always power politics.”3 The central role of power as an analytic construct in classical realist, structural realist, and structural neorealist scholarship has been so pervasive that the assertion requires no further elaboration. Still, the notion of “power” in the discipline and its usefulness as an analytic construct remain “essentially contested.”

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.

scholarly journals International Influences and Democratic Regression in Interwar Europe: Disentangling the Impact of Power Politics and Demonstration Effects

2016 ◽  
Vol 52 (4) ◽  
pp. 559-586 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jørgen Møller ◽  
Svend-Erik Skaaning ◽  
Jakob Tolstrup
Keyword(s):  
Political System ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
International Order ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Political Polarization ◽  
Political Regime ◽  
Theoretical Frameworks ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
Interwar Europe ◽  
The Impact

Scholars have convincingly argued that theoretical frameworks that combine international influences and domestic factors are needed to understand political regime developments. We argue that exogenous shifts in the balance of power between great powers (‘power politics’) spark demonstration effects. These, in turn, are filtered into the domestic political system of smaller states via changes in political polarization – but with the effects being conditional on the domestic vulnerability of democracy. To assess this framework we turn to interwar Europe, where the international order changed from undergirding democracy to facilitating autocratic rule. An analysis of three countries (Poland, Austria and Denmark), backed by a more general glance at the remaining interwar cases, shows that the interaction between demonstration effects, pressure from great powers and the domestic resilience of democracy offers substantial leverage in accounting for patterns of democratic regression.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document