Global politics, also known as world politics, [1] names both the discipline that studies the political and economic patterns of the world and the field that is being studied. At the centre of that field are the different processes of political globalization in relation to questions of social power.
The discipline studies the relationships between cities, nation-states, shell-states, multinational corporations, non-governmental organizations and international organizations. [2] Current areas of discussion include national and ethnic conflict regulation, democracy and the politics of national self-determination, globalization and its relationship to democracy, conflict and peace studies, comparative politics, political economy, and the international political economy of the environment. One important area of global politics is contestation in the global political sphere over legitimacy. [3]
Global politics is said by some to be distinct from the field of international politics (commonly seen as a branch of international relations [1] ), as it "does not stress the primacy of intergovernmental relations and transactions". [4] This distinction however has not always been held among authors and political scientists, who often use the term "international politics" to mean global politics. [1]
It has been suggested that global politics may be best understood as an "imaginary" of a political space existing beyond the sub-national, national, and international. [5] [6] This imaginary structures global politics as both a field of study and a set of practices, and though it only rose to prominence in the late twentieth century, has longer historical roots stretching back at least to the creation of medieval mappa mundi [7] and to first contact between Afro-Eurasia and the Americas through colonialism and the Age of Sail. [8]
Beginning in the late nineteenth century, several groups extended the definition of the political community beyond nation-states to include much, if not all, of humanity. These internationalists include Marxists, human rights advocates, environmentalists, peace activists, feminists, and minority groups. This was the general direction of thinking on global politics, though the term was not used as such. [9] The way in which modern world politics is implemented is structured by a set of interpretations dating back to the rise of the European powers. They were able to overtake the rest of the world in terms of economic and military power. Europeans, with their global supremacy, imposed their own system and views on others, through envisioning the world as a whole and defining the regions of the world as 'modern' or 'backward'. They saw nation statehood as the best and highest form of political organization, therefore viewing world politics as the result of the pursuit of hegemony by competing states.
The modern world politics perspective is often identified with the works, in particular their 1972 work Transnational Relations and World Politics. Here, the authors argued that state-centric views of international relations were inadequate frameworks to utilize in political science or international relations studies due to the increased globalization. [4] Today, the practices of global politics are defined by values: norms of human rights, ideas of human development, and beliefs such as Internationalism or cosmopolitanism about how we should relate to each. Over the last couple of decades cosmopolitanism has become one of the key contested ideologies of global politics:
Cosmopolitanism can be defined as a global politics that, firstly, projects a sociality of common political engagement among all human beings across the globe, and, secondly, suggests that this sociality should be either ethically or organizationally privileged over other forms of sociality. [9]
The intensification of globalization led some writers to suggest that states were no longer relevant to global politics. [10] This view has been subject to debate:
On the other hand, other commentators have been arguing that states have remained essential to global politics. They have facilitated globalizing processes and projects; not been eclipsed by them. They have been rejuvenated because, among other reasons, they are still the primary providers of (military) security in the global arena; they are still the paramount loci for articulating the voices of (procedurally democratic) national communities, and for ordering their interactions with similar polities; and finally, they are indispensable to relations of (unequal) economic exchange insofar as they legitimize and enforce the global legal frameworks that enable globalization in the first place. [11]
George Modelski defines global order as a 'management network centred on a lead unit and contenders for leadership, (pursuing) collective action at the global level'. [12] The system is allegedly cyclical. Each cycle is about 100 years' duration and a new hegemonic power appears each time:
Portugal 1492-1580; in the Age of Discovery
The Netherlands 1580-1688; beginning with the Eighty Years' War, 1579-1588
United Kingdom (1) 1688-1792; beginning with the wars of Louis XVI
United Kingdom (2) 1792-1914; beginning with the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars
The United States 1914 to (predicted) 2030; beginning with World War I and two. [13]
Each cycle has four phases;
1, Global war, which a) involves almost all global powers, b) is 'characteristically naval' [14] c) is caused by a system breakdown, d) is extremely lethal, e) results in a new global leader, capable of tackling global problems. [15] The war is a 'decision process' analogous to a national election. [16] The Thirty Years War, though lasting and destructive, was not a 'global war' [17]
2, World power, which lasts for 'about one generation'. [18] The new incumbent power 'prioritises global problems', mobilises a coalition, is decisive and innovative. [19] Pre-modern communities become dependent on the hegemonic power [20]
3, Delegitimation. This phase can last for 20–27 years; the hegemonic power falters, as rival powers assert new nationalistic policies. [21]
4, Deconcentration. The hegemony's problem-solving capacity declines. It yields to a multipolar order of warring rivals. Pre-modern communities become less dependent. [22] A challenger appears (successively, Spain, France, France, Germany, and the USSR) [13] and a new global war ensues.
The hegemonic nations tend to have: 'insular geography'; a stable, open society; a strong economy; strategic organisation, and strong political parties. By contrast, the 'challenger' nations have: closed systems; absolute rulers; domestic instability; and continental geographic locations. [23]
The long cycle system is repetitive, but also evolutionary. According to Modelski, it originated in about 1493 through a) the decline of Venetian naval power, b) Chinese abandonment of naval exploration, and c) discovery of sea routes to India and the Americas. [24] It has developed in parallel with the growth of the nation-state, political parties, command of the sea, and 'dependency of pre-modern communities'. [25] The system is flawed, lacking in coherence, solidarity, and capacity to address the North-South divide. [26] Modelski speculates that US deconcentration might be replaced by a power based in the 'Pacific rim' or by an explicit coalition of nations, as 'co-operation is urgently required in respect of nuclear weapons'. [27]
Modelski 'dismisses the idea that international relations are anarchic'. His research, influenced by Immanuel Wallerstein, was 'measured in decades... a major achievement' says Peter J. Taylor [28]
Goldstein in 1988 [29] posited a 'hegemony cycle' of 150 years' duration, the four hegemonic powers since 1494 being;
Hapsburg Spain, 1494-1648; ended by the Thirty Years War, in which Spain itself was the 'challenger'; the Treaty of Westphalia and the beginnings of the nation-state.
the Netherlands, 1648-1815; ended by the challenge from France of the revolutionary and Napoleonic wars, the Treaty of Vienna and introduction of the Congress System
Great Britain, 1815-1945; ended by Germany's challenge in two World Wars, and the postwar settlement, including the World Bank, IMF, GATT, the United Nations and NATO
the United States, since 1945. [30]
Goldstein suggests that US hegemony may 'at an indeterminate time' be challenged and ended by China (the 'best fit'), by western Europe, Japan, or (writing in 1988) the USSR. The situation is unstable due to the continuance of Machiavellian Power politics and the deployment of nuclear weapons. The choice lies between 'global cooperation or global suicide'. Thus there may be 'an end to hegemony itself'. [31]
Goldstein speculates that Venetian hegemony, ceded to Spain in 1494, may have begun in 1350 [32]
An empire is a political unit made up of several territories and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the empire exercises political control over the peripheries. Within an empire, different populations have different sets of rights and are governed differently. Narrowly defined, an empire is a sovereign state whose head of state is an emperor or empress; but not all states with aggregate territory under the rule of supreme authorities are called empires or are ruled by an emperor; nor have all self-described empires been accepted as such by contemporaries and historians.
Hegemony is the political, economic, and military predominance of one state over other states. Hegemony can be regional or global.
International relations (IR) are the interactions among sovereign states. The scientific study of those interactions is also referred to as international studies, international politics, or international affairs. In a broader sense, the study of IR, in addition to multilateral relations, concerns all activities among states—such as war, diplomacy, trade, and foreign policy—as well as relations with and among other international actors, such as intergovernmental organizations (IGOs), international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs), international legal bodies, and multinational corporations (MNCs). There are several schools of thought within IR, of which the most prominent are realism, liberalism, and constructivism.
In international relations, power is defined in several different ways. Material definitions of state power emphasize economic and military power. Other definitions of power emphasize the ability to structure and constitute the nature of social relations between actors. Power is an attribute of particular actors in their interactions, as well as a social process that constitutes the social identities and capacities of actors.
A great power is a sovereign state that is recognized as having the ability and expertise to exert its influence on a global scale. Great powers characteristically possess military and economic strength, as well as diplomatic and soft power influence, which may cause middle or small powers to consider the great powers' opinions before taking actions of their own. International relations theorists have posited that great power status can be characterized into power capabilities, spatial aspects, and status dimensions.
In international relations, the liberal international order (LIO), also known as the rules-based international order (RBIO), or the rules-based order (RBO), describes a set of global, rule-based, structured relationships based on political liberalism, economic liberalism and liberal internationalism since the late 1940s. More specifically, it entails international cooperation through multilateral institutions and is constituted by human equality, open markets, security cooperation, promotion of liberal democracy, and monetary cooperation. The order was established in the aftermath of World War II, led in large part by the United States.
Power politics is a theory of power in international relations which contends that distributions of power and national interests, or changes to those distributions, are fundamental causes of war and of system stability.
In international relations, multilateralism refers to an alliance of multiple countries pursuing a common goal.
Hegemonic stability theory (HST) is a theory of international relations, rooted in research from the fields of political science, economics, and history. HST indicates that the international system is more likely to remain stable when a single state is the dominant world power, or hegemon. Thus, the end of hegemony diminishes the stability of the international system. As evidence for the stability of hegemony, proponents of HST frequently point to the Pax Britannica and Pax Americana, as well as the instability prior to World War I and the instability of the interwar period.
World-systems theory is a multidisciplinary approach to world history and social change which emphasizes the world-system as the primary unit of social analysis.
Social cycle theories are among the earliest social theories in sociology. Unlike the theory of social evolutionism, which views the evolution of society and human history as progressing in some new, unique direction(s), sociological cycle theory argues that events and stages of society and history generally repeat themselves in cycles. Such a theory does not necessarily imply that there cannot be any social progress. In the early theory of Sima Qian and the more recent theories of long-term ("secular") political-demographic cycles as well as in the Varnic theory of P.R. Sarkar, an explicit accounting is made of social progress.
Power transition theory is a theory about the nature of war, in relation to the power in international relations. The theory was first published in 1958 by its creator, A.F.K. Organski, in his textbook, World Politics (1958).
Robert Gilpin was an American political scientist. He was Professor of Politics and International Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University where he held the Eisenhower professorship.
George Modelski was Professor of political science in the University of Washington. Modelski was a professor there from 1967 to 1995.
Proto-globalization or early modern globalization is a period of the history of globalization roughly spanning the years between 1600 and 1800, following the period of archaic globalization. First introduced by historians A. G. Hopkins and Christopher Bayly, the term describes the phase of increasing trade links and cultural exchange that characterized the period immediately preceding the advent of so-called "modern globalization" in the 19th century.
Political globalization is the growth of the worldwide political system, both in size and complexity. That system includes national governments, their governmental and intergovernmental organizations as well as government-independent elements of global civil society such as international non-governmental organizations and social movement organizations. One of the key aspects of the political globalization is the declining importance of the nation-state and the rise of other actors on the political scene. The creation and existence of the United Nations is called one of the classic examples of political globalization.
David Shambaugh is the Gaston Sigur Professor of Asian Studies, Political Science & International Affairs, and director of the China Policy Program at the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University, Washington DC. He is also a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.
In international relations, international order refers to patterned or structured relationships between actors on the international level.
Joshua S. Goldstein is professor emeritus of international relations at American University. He graduated with a BA from Stanford University in 1981 and earned his doctorate at MIT 1986. He was appointed professor in 1993. He was on the faculty at the University of Southern California and American University and was a research scholar in political science at University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Global policeman is an informal term for a superpower which seeks or claims the right to intervene in other sovereign states. It has been used, firstly for the United Kingdom and, since 1945, for the United States, though it has been suggested that China has been seeking to take over the role in the 21st century.
