Major powers and geopolitical transformations in the Middle East: competing visions for managing international and regional balances

2019 ◽  
pp. 301
Author(s):  
Marwan Awni Kamil
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
International Relations ◽  
International System ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
New Realism ◽  
Major Powers

This study attempts to give a description and analysis derived from the new realism school in the international relations of the visions of the great powers of the geopolitical changes witnessed in the Middle East after 2011 and the corresponding effects at the level of the international system. It also examines the alliances of the major powers in the region and its policies, with a fixed and variable statement to produce a reading that is based on a certain degree of comprehensiveness and objectivity.

scholarly journals Climate governance in an international system under conservative hegemony: the role of major powers

2012 ◽  
Vol 55 (spe) ◽  
pp. 9-29 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eduardo Viola ◽  
Matías Franchini ◽  
Thaís Lemos Ribeiro
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
International System ◽  
Exploratory Research ◽  
Climate Governance ◽  
Major Powers ◽  
Common Character ◽  
Do So

In the last five years, climate change has been established as a central civilizational driver of our time. As a result of this development, the most diversified social processes - as well as the fields of science which study them - have had their dynamics altered. In International Relations, this double challenge could be explained as follows: 1) in empirical terms, climate change imposes a deepening of cooperation levels on the international community, considering the global common character of the atmosphere; and 2) to International Relations as a discipline, climate change demands from the scientific community a conceptual review of the categories designed to approach the development of global climate governance. The goal of this article is to discuss in both conceptual and empirical terms the structure of global climate change governance, through an exploratory research, aiming at identifying the key elements that allow understanding its dynamics. To do so, we rely on the concept of climate powers. This discussion is grounded in the following framework: we now live in an international system under conservative hegemony that is unable to properly respond to the problems of interdependence, among which - and mainly -, the climate issue.

scholarly journals A Energia e seu Controle Histórico: A Questão do Etanol como Recurso Energético Alternativo / The Energy and its Historical Control: The Question of the Ethanol such as Energetic Alternative Resource

2013 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 436-462
Author(s):  
José Alexandre Altahyde Hage
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
International Relations ◽  
International System ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Historical Control ◽  
Social Classes ◽  
Energy Resources ◽  
Renewable Fuels ◽  
Power Politics ◽  
Alternative Resource

Este artigo apresenta a análise como a energia foi historicamente controlada pelas classes sociais mais bem posicionadas politicamente e, na atualidade, pelos Estados industrializados. No aspecto conceitual, o artigo adota duas correntes teóricas de relações Internacionais de modo complementar: o marxismo aplicado às relações internacionais e o realismo (política do poder) e seus componentes mais modernos. O objetivo do texto é demonstrar que em algumas épocas as classes dominantes foram aquelas que controlaram recursos energéticos. No campo das relações internacionais há possível analogia ao verificar que grandes potências são os Estados que conseguem cadenciar fluxos de energia. Por fim, o artigo tenciona analisar em que condições países em desenvolvimento, como Brasil, conseguem alterar o sistema internacional por meio dos combustíveis renováveis, como o álcool combustível.  ABSTRACTThis article aims to analyze how energy resources are historically controlled by social classes in the higher political echelons and by industrialized States abroad. As concepts, the article embraces two complementary trends of thoughts: Marxism applied to international relations and Realism (power politics) with its most modern components. The goal of this paper is to show that in some moments, the ruling social classes were the ones over the energy resources. In the international relations sphere, there is a possible analogy in which we attest that the great powers are the States that can regulate the energy resources flow. To conclude, the paper aims to analyze in which conditions developing countries, Brazil, play a part in the international system with renewable fuels, such as ethanol. 

Great Power and Foreign Policy

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carla Martinez Machain ◽  
Rebecca Kaye ◽  
Jared Oestman
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Policy Analysis ◽  
International System ◽  
Geographic Region ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Great Power ◽  
Foreign Policy Analysis ◽  
Major Power ◽  
Major Powers ◽  
Minor Powers

Great powers have traditionally played a major role in the study of foreign policy. From a variety of work on foreign policy analysis, it is known that great powers are more active in their foreign policy than other states in the international system are. Whether the actions are disbursing foreign aid, creating alliances, conflict involvement, or others, studies will often control for great power status, with the underlying expectation being that major powers will be more likely to utilize these foreign policy tools. In fact, when considering relevant dyads in quantitative studies of foreign policy analysis, states have to be contiguous for the dyad to be considered relevant, but an exception is made for dyads containing at least one major power, given the ability of great powers to project their power beyond their borders. Key literature on the foreign policy behavior of great powers discusses different ways of defining great powers. In particular, the debate over defining great power status has focused on whether a great power should be defined solely on its physical capabilities, or also on intangible factors, such as its foreign policy interests or whether the state is recognized as a great power by others in the international system. Further, there are questions of whether great powers have to be military powers or whether economic superiority is enough to classify a state as a great power. There is also the issue of regional powers: states that are clearly military, economic, and political leaders within a limited geographic region, but not at the global level. Should these states be considered great powers, or should that classification be reserved for global powers? The literature on great-power foreign policy also discusses cooperative and conflictual behaviors of great powers in the international system. It addresses great power war, focusing on how they are more conflict prone than minor powers, and reviews the issues that drive great powers to engage in conflict, such as positional issues and the intent to shape the international system to their liking. It also discusses a variety of foreign policy actions, both coercive and cooperative, that major powers are more likely to engage in than their minor-power counterparts. In addition, there is much work done on the relationships between great powers and between great powers and minor powers, stressing the competitive nature of major-power interactions and the trade-off between economic and military security and policy concessions that defines major-minor power interactions.

Understanding the Anemic Global Response to COVID-19

2020 ◽  
Vol 45 (6) ◽  
pp. 1013-1021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua W. Busby
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Organizations ◽  
Global Financial Crisis ◽  
International System ◽  
The United States ◽  
West African ◽  
World Health ◽  
Global Response ◽  
Major Powers ◽  
Health Organization

Abstract The COVID-19 outbreak is the most serious test of the international system since the 2008 global financial crisis. Rather than cooperate to contain and respond to a common threat, the world's leading powers—the United States and China—have increasingly blamed each other through wildly speculative theories about the origins of the virus. The World Health Organization sought to coordinate a global response, but it has been hamstrung and has come under attack. Given past cooperation between major powers to mobilize and eradicate smallpox and previous US leadership to fight HIV/AIDS and the 2014 West African Ebola crisis, the limited cooperation and lack of leadership are puzzling. What explains the anemic global response to date? This article draws from structural international relations theory to suggest a partial but somewhat dissatisfying answer. International organizations are inherently weak and now face opposition by major powers. The international system simultaneously incentivizes states to cooperate and address common threats, but it also encourages countries to take care of themselves, potentially at the expense of others. Which of these motives dominates cannot be explained by structural theory, thus requiring us to look to other factors such as the attributes of states and leaders themselves.

Communism, fascism and counter-revolution in world politics

2001 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 683-686
Author(s):  
Michael Mann
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Karl Marx ◽  
International System ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Early Nineteenth Century ◽  
Religious Wars ◽  
The Social ◽  
Effects Of War

This is a rich, impressive and timely book. At a time when American and neoliberal triumphalism deny the significance of any revolution later than 1776, and when almost no-one in the social sciences is still studying either revolution or class, Fred Halliday has demonstrated that we have been living in a revolutionary age, dominated by the conjoined effects of war and class revolution. In case you find his sub-title mysterious, Karl Marx noted that the Europe of his time was dominated by five Great Powers, but Revolution, ‘the sixth Great Power’, would soon overcome them all. Halliday would suggest that Marx was only half-right. Revolution did not overcome all five Powers, but it did transform them all—and their successors. Hannah Arendt and Martin Wight also emphasized that couplings of war and revolution have dominated much of modernity. But Halliday adds that these are not to be seen as ‘disruptions’ of International Relations, they are International Relations, since they have set the overall parameters of the modern international system. They did so, he says, in three distinct revolutionary phases from the sixteenth century to the present-day: sixteenth-seventeenth century religious wars/revolutions, late eighteenth and early nineteenth century Atlanticist wars/revolutions, and twentieth century wars/revolutions which became increasingly dominated by communism.

The strategic importance of Iraq in the international system

2019 ◽  
pp. 558
Author(s):  
Raedi Irheim Mohammed Shebani
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Political System ◽  
International System ◽  
Focus Of Attention ◽  
The Political ◽  
Major Powers ◽  
Security Training ◽  
Strategic Location ◽  
The World ◽  
Ancient Times

Each country has a set of pillars that give the state its importance in the perceptions of other countries and Iraq has a geo-strategic location and cultural depth and symbolic civilization and its tremendous wealth is an important figure in the international calculations, the material and moral pillars affect the level of strategic importance regionally and internationally, and therefore Iraq has become the focus of attention and aspirations Major countries since ancient times, Iraq has the pillars of what makes it in the case of (international attractor) throughout the ages, therefore, Iraq has been the catalyst for competition between countries and influential in regional and international balances throughout history and after 2003 Lal American for Iraq, the perceptions of countries have changed the importance of Iraq regionally and internationally after the change of the political system in it and its exit from the war as a strategic vacuum that countries seek regionally and internationally to control and influence it, influencing it means influence and domination of the sources of its energy, which led to the growing importance in perceptions Most countries have found in changing the political system in Iraq a way to build new relations with him and get economic, military and strategic opportunities by achieving understanding with him, while others have had strong relations and alliances with the former Iraqi political system has lost this Alliances and relations with the emergence of the new political system and therefore began to employ internal crises and trying to restore relations and interests and alliances to the former with him and the competition of major powers in the world for the position of Iraq as a place for security training in the Middle East.

scholarly journals The Munich Crisis and Collapse of the Versailles System on the Eve of World War II

1970 ◽  
pp. 20-31
Author(s):  
V. Pavlenko
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
International Relations ◽  
International System ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
European Politics ◽  
World War ◽  
The World ◽  
Balance Of Forces ◽  
The Stability ◽  
Western Democracies

The article examines the development of the crisis manifestations of the Versailles system on the eve of World War II. Special attention is paid to how and under what circumstances the preparation and signing of the Munich Agreement took place. It is noted that the emergence of Nazi Germany’s European politics at the forefront undoubtedly stimulated a whole range of interstate contradictions. This led to a decrease in the stability of the Versailles system. The manifestations of the reaction of the great powers to the aggressive policy of Berlin are analyzed and attention is focused on the fact that the policy of appeasement was erroneous and led to the aggravation of the Versailles system crisis in the late 30s XX century. This study emphasizes that as a result of the policy of appeasement, the balance of forces on the continent changes dramatically, and the signing of the Munich Agreement in September 1938 was decisive in the development of the Versailles system crisis and determined the beginning of the collapse of this model of international relations. It was stated that the Western democracies did not understand the essence of dictatorial regimes, and such a misunderstanding led not only to the collapse of the international system, but also to the beginning of the World War II

scholarly journals African Agency in International Politics

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Fisher
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Politics ◽  
International System ◽  
Structural Constraints ◽  
Global Level ◽  
Advocacy Networks ◽  
Major Powers ◽  
Current State ◽  
And Migration

International Relations theory has tended to overlook the role of Africa and Africans in the international system. Traditionally, the discipline’s most influential theorists have focused instead on relationships between and perspectives of “major powers.” A growing body of work, however, has challenged these more limited efforts to conceptualize African agency in international politics. This scholarship has emphasized the significant space available to, and carved-out by, African states in molding the agendas of international institutions, and the role of African governments and advocacy networks in influencing the trajectory of major international debates around issues such as aid, development, trade, climate change, and migration. The study of African agency in international politics continues to wrestle with two key debates: the meanings of “agency” and “African.” Much of the literature focuses primarily on the role and influence of African states rather than that of African citizens and communities. This focus provides, at best, only a partial and qualified view of the ways in which African agency is secured and exercised at the global level, particularly given the significant structural constraints imposed on Africa by global economic and political inequalities. The extent to which contemporary analysis captures the breadth of African engagement with the international system is also compromised by current state-centric approaches. It is thus necessary to examine a range of approaches adopted by scholars to deepen and nuance the study of African agency in international politics, including work on agenda-setting, mesolevel dynamics and microlevel dynamics.

scholarly journals Development of International Relations at the Periphery: The Case of Bangladesh

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 247-255
Author(s):  
Lailufar Yasmin
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
Western Country ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Major Powers ◽  
Ir Studies ◽  
Significant Area ◽  
History Of ◽  
To Come ◽  
The University

International Relations (IR) is no longer considered as an academic discipline that analyzes the major powers or great powers’ activities only. From its Cold War content of emphasizing on traditional state-centric security, it has traversed a long way to expand its subject matter. Similarly, smaller nations and their imprints on international politics are also emerging as a significant area of inquiry in IR. This article seeks to contribute to this inquiry by discussing Bangladesh’s rising significance and how academic IR addresses this issue. It traces the history of IR in Bangladesh as well as its gradual expansion. It discusses the growth of IR as an academic discipline at the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh, that gradually led to the development of IR studies in other parts of the country. The article documents this growth, which is the first of its kind to trace the rise and development of IR in Bangladesh. It therefore fulfils the lacuna in understanding how and where the growth of IR took place in a non-western country. One might contend what is the relevance of studying IR in Bangladesh. The article argues that despite being physically small , academic IR has generated interest in Bangladesh due to the changing geostrategic significance of the country. The article outlines the rising geopolitical significance of Bangladesh where great powers are interested to come and be a part of Bangladesh’s development. It is in this context, the study of IR becomes more pertinent in Bangladesh.

scholarly journals Territorial Contenders in World Politics

2019 ◽  
Vol 64 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 518-544 ◽  
Author(s):  
Douglas Lemke ◽  
Charles Crabtree
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Middle East ◽  
International Relations ◽  
International System ◽  
World Politics ◽  
State Failure ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
Nonstate Actors ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Diplomatic Recognition

Territorial contenders are political entities that control territory but differ from sovereign states in that they lack diplomatic recognition as legal members of the international system. One consequence of this difference is that international relations data sets have historically excluded information about them. And yet, as evidenced by the Islamic State’s impact on politics in the Middle East and beyond, territorial contenders are important actors in the international system. In this article, we introduce a new data set of territorial contenders, compare territorial contenders to other categories of territorial nonstate actors, explore how the presence of territorial contenders affects the probabilities of civil war and state failure, illustrate the conditions under which territorial contenders are more likely to emerge, and discuss a series of studies now possible given the existence of this new data set.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document