- •The Globalization of World Politics: An Introduction to International Relations Edited by John Baylis and Steve Smith
- •Editor's Preface
- •Key Features of the Book
- •Contents
- •Detailed Contents
- •13. Diplomacy
- •14. The United Nations and International Organization
- •List of Figures
- •List of Boxes
- •List of Tables
- •About the Contributors
- •Introduction
- •From International Politics to World Politics
- •Theories of World Politics
- •Realism and World Politics
- •Liberalism and World Politics
- •World-System Theory and World Politics
- •The Three Theories and Globalization
- •Globalization and its Precursors
- •Globalization: Myth or Reality?
- •Chapter 1. The Globalization of World Politics
- •Reader's guide
- •Introduction: a Globalizing World
- •Globalization: a Definition
- •Aspects of Globalization
- •Historical Origins
- •Qualifications
- •Key Points
- •Globalization and the States-System
- •The Westphalian Order
- •The End of History
- •The End of Sovereignty
- •The Persistence of the State
- •Key Points
- •Post-Sovereign Governance
- •Substate Global Governance
- •Suprastate Global Governance
- •Marketized Global Governance
- •Global Social Movements
- •Key Points
- •The Challenge of Global Democracy
- •Globalization and the Democratic State
- •Global Governance Agencies and Democracy
- •Global Market Democracy?
- •Global Social Movements and Democracy
- •Key Points
- •Conclusion
- •Questions
- •Guide to further reading
- •Chapter 2. The Evolution of International Society
- •Reader's guide
- •Origins and Definitions
- •Key Points
- •Ancient Greece and Renaissance Italy
- •Key Points
- •European International Society
- •Key Points
- •The Globalization of International Society
- •Key Points
- •Problems of Global International Society
- •Key Points
- •Questions
- •Guide to further reading
- •Chapter 3. International history 1900-1945
- •Reader's guide
- •Introduction
- •The origins of World War One
- •Germany's bid for world power status
- •The 'Eastern Question'
- •Key points
- •Peace-making, 1919: the Versailles settlement Post-war problems
- •President Wilson's 'Fourteen Points'
- •Self-determination: the creation of new states
- •The future of Germany
- •'War guilt' and reparations
- •Key points
- •The global economic slump, 1929-1933
- •Key points
- •The origins of World War Two in Asia and the Pacific
- •Japan and the 'Meiji Restoration'
- •Japanese expansion in China
- •The Manchurian crisis and after
- •Key points
- •The path to war in Europe
- •The controversy over the origins of the Second World War
- •The rise of fascism and Nazism in Europe
- •From appeasement to war
- •Key points
- •Conclusion
- •Questions
- •Guide to further reading General
- •World War I and after
- •World War II
- •Chapter 4. International history 1945-1990
- •Introduction
- •End of empire
- •Key points
- •The cold war
- •1945-1953: Onset of the cold war
- •1953-1969: Conflict, confrontation, and compromise
- •1969-1979: The rise and fall of detente
- •1979-86: 'The second cold war'
- •The bomb
- •Conclusion
- •General
- •The cold war
- •The bomb
- •Decolonization
- •Richard Crockatt
- •Introduction
- •Key points
- •Internal factors: the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union Structural problems in the Soviet system
- •The collapse of the Soviet empire
- •Economic restructuring
- •Key points
- •The collapse of communism in Eastern Europe
- •The legacy of protest in Eastern Europe
- •Gorbachev and the end of the Brezhnev doctrine
- •Key points
- •External factors: relations with the United States Debate about us policy and the end of the cold war
- •Key points
- •The interaction between internal and external environments
- •Isolation of the communist system from the global capitalist system
- •Key points
- •Conclusion
- •Key points
- •Chapter 6. Realism
- •Introduction: the timeless wisdom of Realism
- •Reader's guide
- •Introduction: the timeless wisdom of Realism
- •Key points
- •One Realism, or many?
- •Key points
- •The essential Realism
- •Statism
- •Survival
- •Self-help
- •Key points
- •Conclusion: Realism and the globalization of world politics
- •Questions
- •Guide to further reading
- •Chapter 7. World-System Theory
- •Introduction
- •Reader's guide
- •Introduction
- •Key Points
- •The Origins of World-System Theory
- •Key Points
- •Wallerstein and World-System Theory
- •Key Points
- •The Modern World-System in Space and Time
- •Key Points
- •Politics in the Modern World-System: The Sources of Stability
- •States and the Interstate System
- •Core-States—Hegemonic Leadership and Military Force
- •Semi-peripheral States—Making the World Safe for Capitalism
- •Peripheral States—At home with the Comprador Class
- •Geoculture
- •Key Points
- •Crisis in the Modern World-System
- •The Economic Sources of Crisis
- •The Political Sources of Crisis
- •The Geocultural Sources of Crisis
- •The Crisis and the Future: Socialism or Barbarism?
- •Key Points
- •World-System Theory and Globalization
- •Key Points
- •Questions
- •A guide to further reading
- •Chapter 8. Liberalism
- •Introduction
- •Varieties of Liberalism
- •Reader's guide
- •Introduction
- •Key points
- •Varieties of Liberalism
- •Liberal internationalism
- •Idealism
- •Liberal institutionalism
- •Key points
- •Three liberal responses to globalization
- •Key points
- •Conclusion and postscript: the crisis of Liberalism
- •Questions
- •Guide to further reading
- •Chapter 9. New Approaches to International Theory
- •Reader's guide
- •Introduction
- •Key Points
- •Explanatory/Constitutive Theories and Foundational/Anti-Foundational Theories
- •Key Points
- •Rationalist Theories: The Neo-Realist/Neo-Liberal Debate
- •Key Points
- •Reflectivist Theories
- •Normative Theory
- •Key Points
- •Feminist Theory
- •Key Points
- •Critical Theory
- •Key Points
- •Historical Sociology
- •Key Points
- •Post-Modernism
- •Key Points
- •Bridging the Gap: Social Constructivism
- •Key Points
- •Conclusion
- •Questions
- •Guide to further reading
- •Chapter 10.International Security in the Post-Cold War Era
- •Introduction
- •What is meant by the concept of security?
- •The traditional approach to national security
- •The 'security dilemma'
- •The difficulties of co-operation between states
- •The problem of cheating
- •The problem of relative-gains
- •The opportunities for co-operation between states 'Contingent realism'
- •Key points
- •Mature anarchy
- •Key points
- •Liberal institutionalism
- •Key points
- •Democratic peace theory
- •Key points
- •Ideas of collective security
- •Key points
- •Alternative views on international and global security 'Social constructivist' theory
- •Key points
- •'Critical security' theorists and 'feminist' approaches
- •Key points
- •Post-modernist views
- •Key points
- •Globalist views of international security
- •Key points
- •The continuing tensions between national, international, and global security
- •Conclusions
- •Questions
- •Guide to further reading
- •Web links
- •Chapter 11. International Political Economy in an Age of Globalization
- •Reader's guide
- •Introduction: The Significance of ipe for Globalized International Relations
- •What is ipe? Terms, Labels, and Interpretations
- •Ipe and the issues of ir
- •Key Points
- •Words and Politics
- •Key Points
- •Thinking about ipe, ir, and Globalization States and the International Economy
- •The Core Question
- •What is 'International' and what is 'Global'
- •Key Points
- •What Kind of World have We made? 'International' or 'Global'?
- •Global Capital Flows
- •International Production and the Transnational Corporation
- •'Domestic' and 'International'
- •The Ideological Basis of the World Economy
- •Key Points
- •Conclusions: 'So what?'
- •Questions
- •Guide to further reading
- •Chapter 12. International Regimes
- •Introduction
- •Reader's guide
- •Introduction
- •Key Points
- •The Nature of Regimes
- •Conceptualizing Regimes
- •Defining Regimes
- •Classifying Regimes
- •Globalization and International Regimes
- •Security Regimes
- •Environmental Regimes
- •Communication Regimes
- •Economic Regimes
- •Key Points
- •Competing Theories: 1. The Liberal Institutional Approach
- •Impediments to Regime Formation
- •The Facilitation of Regime Formation
- •Competing Theories: 2. The Realist Approach
- •Power and Regimes
- •Regimes and Co-ordination
- •Key Points
- •Conclusion
- •Questions
- •Guide to further reading
Key Points
• World-system theory has its origins in Marxist thought, with the critique of imperialism being especially influential.
• Lenin's analysis of imperialism argued that the world economy was divided into a core and periphery, and that capitalists in the core used profits derived from the exploitation of the periphery to pacify their own workers.
• Lenin's theory of imperialism was especially influential in the 1917-39 period when the great Depression of the 1920s and 1930s appeared to confirm that capitalism was going through its final crisis.
• Theories of international relations derived from the Marxist critique of imperialism became much less influential in the West following the end of the Second World War.
Wallerstein and World-System Theory
There can be little doubt that it was developments in the real world of world politics that led to a resurgence of interest in Marxist-influenced analyses. The oil shocks and deep global recession of the 1970s, combined with the parallel process of detente between East and West, served to push economic issues centre-stage. What had previously been rather dismissively referred to as 'low polities', that is questions pertaining to global economic relations, were now at the centre of the political agenda. Analyses which stressed the indissoluble linkage between the economic and the political realms, appeared far better placed to make sense of 'really existing' world politics than the theoretical lenses worn by most scholars of international politics. In these circumstances, Marxist-influenced approaches received a huge fillip and were developed with renewed vigour.
Without doubt, the outstanding figure to emerge from this intellectual ferment is. Immanuel Wallerstein. The rest of this chapter will concentrate on his work. But before proceeding any further, two caveats are in order. First, it must be stressed that Wallerstein's work is only one of many approaches which can loosely be described as Marxist-influenced. In Box 7.2 we briefly summarize a number of others, many of whom were key influences on Wallerstein. Secondly, Wallerstein's project is still evolving. He remains an impressively prolific author and thus in the following, we can do no more than offer a snapshot of what is still 'work in progress'.
Wallerstein's first works were studies of African states in the pre- and post-colonial era. As his work progressed, Wallerstein became increasingly dissatisfied with the kind of approach that only looked at one country at a time. There was much that could not be explained about the continued poverty of many African countries if they were only studied individually. Thus, in order to understand their development, or, more correctly, lack of development, it would be necessary to analyse specific countries within one social whole: an entity that he was to label the modern world-system.
Box 7.2. Other Theorists of Global Capitalism |
This chapter has concentrated on the work of Immanuel Wallerstein as a key example of someone who has developed a radical approach to understanding international relations. However this should not detract from the fact that numerous other writers have contributed to the development of a radical perspective on the nature of global capitalism. The Dependency (or dependencia) School is the name given to a group of scholars who have studied the nature of economic relations between Latin America and the developed world. The key figures in this group include: Frank, Cardoso, and Prebisch. Andre Gunder Frank is a key figure in the dependency school and is largely responsible for generating an interest in the approach in North America. Frank has been criticized from within the dependency school for providing a rather crude version of the theory. More recently Frank has become deeply involved in the world-system approach. Key Work: Dependent Accumulation and Underdevelopment (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1979). Raul Prebisch was the first Executive Director of the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America. Together with a team of Latin American economists he was responsible for the development of concepts which became central for the Dependency school. These included developing Lenin's notion of centre-periphery relations, and the idea that countries in the developing world were on the losing side of the declining terms of trade: namely that year by year the earnings from the sale of primary products (the main export of developing countries) could purchase less in the way of manufactured goods (the main export of developed countries). Key Work: Towards a New Trade Policy for Development (New York: United Nations, 1964). The Annales School is the name given to a group of scholars associated with the French journal Annales d'histoire economique et sociale. The Annales school comprised a marked change from traditional historical approaches. In contrast to conventional historical approaches which concentrate on the very detailed description of specific events, and life histories of individuals (usually kings, politicians, and soldiers), the Annalistes sought a rather different approach which focused on long-term social change. Key writers include Fernand Braudel, Marc Bloch, and Lucien Febvre. Fernand Braudel is a key influence on Wallerstein, primarily due to his analysis of historical time. In his major works Braudel employs a three-way approach based on different conceptions of time. The 'long term' (or la longue duree) concerns how environmental factors, such as climate change, affect human development. The 'middle term' is concerned with tracing the effects of human structures such as capitalism, racism, and patriarchy. The 'short term' is the level of more conventional history and relates events. Key work: The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II (London: Fontana, 1975). Paul Baran developed Lenin's views on monopoly capitalism in the post-World War II period. Baran stressed the absolute (rather than relative) losses that were involved in trade between developed and underdeveloped countries. Essentially countries of the developing world became underdeveloped as a result of their trading relations with the rest of the world. Furthermore the extraction of wealth was not used for investment purposes in the developed world, but was instead squandered through advertising, and more importantly arms expenditure. Key Work: The Political Economy of Growth (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1957). Christopher Chase-Dunn lays much more emphasis on the role of the inter-state system than does Wallerstein. He argues that the capitalist mode of production has a single logic in which both politico-military and exploitative economic relations play key roles. Key Work: Global Formation: Structures of the World-Economy (Oxford: Blackwell, 1989). Janet Abu-Lughod has challenged Wallerstein's account of the emergence of the modern world-system in the sixteenth century. She argues that during the medieval period Europe comprised a peripheral area to a world-economy centred on the Middle Fast. Key Work: Before European Hegemony: The World System AD 1250-1350 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989). Henrique Fernando Cardoso is now president of Brazil! He was also a contributor to, and critic of, the Dependency School. Most famous for his work with Enzo Faletto on Brazil. They argued that rather than there being one situation of dependency between core and periphery, situations of dependency would vary depending on the different relationships of domestic classes, transnational capital, and core state Governments. Key Work: with Enzo Faletto, Dependency and Development in Latin America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979). Walter Rodney extended a structuralist approach to the study of Africa, concentrating on the impact of slavery and colonialism in Undermining the dynamism of African societies. Key Work: How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (London: Bogle-L'Ouverture, 1972). Johan Galtung stressed the importance of considering a wide range of factors in the analysis of imperialism. He " argued that Lenin and Hobson had concentrated too much on an economic analysis. It was also necessary to consider other factors of dominance such as political, military, cultural, and communications. Galtung also emphasized the importance of examining the relationships and coinciding interests between elites in the core and in the centre (i.e. comprador class). Key work: 'A Structural Theory of Imperialism', journal of Peace Research, 8: 1 (1971), 81-117. |
The world-system is the central feature of Wallerstein's work. He contends that 'the appropriate "unit of analysis" for the study of social or societal behaviour is a "world-system".' (1991a: 267) One should note that this is a claim which, if true, has very far-reaching implications. For what Wallerstein is in effect arguing is that all social phenomena, from poverty in West African villages to ethnic conflict in the Balkans, and from international relations to the nature of family life, have to be understood in the context of this larger entity. To understand what he means by world-system, it is useful to unpack the term itself.
For Wallerstein system has two defining characteristics. First,, all the elements within a system are interlinked. They exist in a dynamic relationship with each other and if one is to understand the attributes, the functions or the behaviour of one element, one must understand its position within the whole. Accordingly, Wallerstein argues that attempts to distinguish and differentiate between. for example, economic phenomena and political and socio-cultural phenomena are misleading. Nothing in the system can be understood in isolation: a holistic approach is the only valid one.
Second, life within the system is more or less self-contained. This means that if the system were cut off from all external influences the outcomes within that system would be identical. Thus any-one seeking to explain changes within the system must seek to focus upon those internal dynamics responsible for change rather than search tor external (exogenous) factors.
When attached to the term world-system, the prefix world is not meant to imply that any particular system necessarily encompasses the whole globe. Rather 'world' is used here to refer to a discrete, self-contain realm For example, Wallerstein would consider that the Roman empire was a world-system even though its boundaries did not incorporate the whole globe. Thus world-system refers to a particular geographical ягря governed by the logic of single system. That said, it should be noted that one of the novel features of the world-system that we inhabit—the modern world-system—is that it has grown to incorporate the whole globe.
Wallerstein argues that history has witnessed two types of world-system: world-empires, and world- II economies. The main distinction between a world-ll 'empire and a world-economy relates to how decisions about resource distribution—crudely, who gets what—are made. In a world-empire a centralized political system uses its power to redistribute resources from peripheral areas to the central core area. In the Roman empire this took the form' of the payment of 'tributes' by the outlying provinces back to the Roman heartland. By contrast, in a world-economy_there is no single centre of political authority, but rather we find multiple ( competing centres of power. Resources are there-fore not distributed according to central political decree, but rather through the medium of a market. However, although the mechanism for -resource distribution is different, as we shall see, the net effect in both a world-economy and a world-empire is similar, and that is the transfer of resources from the peripheral areas to the core.
The modern world-system is an example of a world-economy. According to Wallerstein this system emerged in Europe at around the turn of the 'sixteenth century. It subsequently expanded to bring about the current situation where there is no corner of the globe which is not thoroughly implicated within it. The driving force behind this seemingly relentless process of expansion and incorporation has been the 'ceaseless accumulation of capital': or, in a nutshell, capitalism. Thus the modern world-system is above all else a capitalist system—it is this which provides its central dynamic.
Wallerstein defines capitalism as 'a system of production for sale in a market for profit and appropriation of this profit on the basis of individual or collective ownership' (1979: 66). Note that this is a description of a relationship rather than a particular set of institutions. Indeed, Wallerstein is adamant that within the context of this broader relationship, institutions are continually being created and recreated. This state of flux not only extends to what are normally considered to be narrowly economic institutions such as particular companies or even industries. It is equally true for what are often thought to be permanent, even primordial institutions, such as the family unit, ethnic groups, and states. According to Wallerstein, none of these are timeless—none remain the same. To claim otherwise is to adopt an ahistoric attitude, that is, to fail to understand that the characteristics of social institutions are historically specific. For Wallerstein and his colleagues, all social institutions, large and small, are continually adapting and changing within the context of a dynamic world-system.
Furthermore, and crucially, it is not only the elements within the system which change. Wallerstein argues that the system itself is historically bounded. It had a beginning and, as we shall see, Wallerstein argues that it is nearing its end. To understand the nature of the system we shall now turn to the more formal description of its characteristics and attributes.