Transcript Alternatives to Realism and Idealism

Traditional Actors and Other
Actors
Lsns 7, 8, and 9
Agenda
• Classical International System (16481789)
• Transitional International System (17891945)
• Post- World War II International System
(1946-1991)
• Post- Cold War International System
(1992-present)
Classical International System
(1648-1789)
• Zealous efforts of the
Catholic Church to stamp
out Protestantism led to
bitter religious wars in the
late 16th and early 17th
Centuries
• The growing tensions
erupted in the Thirty Years
War (1618-1648) which
eventually involved every
major European power and
expanded from a religious to
a political character
Ferdinand II, emperor of
the Holy Roman Empire
Classical International System
(1648-1789)
• The war was the most destructive
European conflict prior to the 20th Century
– Undisciplined soldiers committed acts of
violence and brutality
– Economic and social life was disrupted
– One-third of the German population was killed
• In an effort to avoid tearing their societies
apart, the European powers ended the war
with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648
Classical International System
(1648-1789)
• The Peace of Westphalia:
– Laid the foundations for a system of
independent, competing states
– European states would henceforth regard
each other as sovereign and equal
– Each state had the right to organize its own
domestic and religious affairs
– Political and diplomatic affairs would be
conducted by states acting in their own
interests
Classical International System
(1648-1789)
• Sovereignty does not
necessarily mean that
the state is able to
control all the actions of
its members at all times
• It does mean the state
internally can claim a
monopoly on the
legitimate use of physical
force as a possible tool
in seeking to compel
obedience and externally
can claim a monopoly
right to act vis-à-vis other
states
Max Weber famously defined
the state as that organization
that claims a monopoly over the
legitimate use of violence
Classical International System
(1648-1789)
• With the Peace of Westphalia,
nation-states emerged as the
world’s primary political
organizations
• Nation-states have a single
central government exercising
sovereignty over a relatively fixed
population within a relatively
defined territory
– A “nation” refers to a a cultural or
social entity whose members have
some sense of a shared historical
experience as well as shared destiny
– “State” and “nation-state” have come
to be used interchangeably
The former state of
Yugoslavia has
divided into several
new states that reflect
the national identities
of their members
Classical International System
(1648-1789)
• During the classical
era of international
relations there were a
relatively small
number of actors
involved in
international politics
– Royal families of the
European nationstates along with their
aristocratic elites
King Louis XIV is credited
with saying, “L'État, c'est
moi” (“I am the State”).
Classical International System
(1648-1789)
• While other nation-states existed, international
politics was essentially European politics
– Power distributed among England, France, Austria,
Sweden, Spain, Turkey, and later Prussia and Russia
– Aggressively minded states were deterred from
seeking hegemony by the “balance of power”
represented by the prospect of coming up against a
coalition of states having equal or superior power
– France was often perceived as the major threat to the
system’s stability with England serving as the chief
“balancer”
Classical International System
(1648-1789)
• The first half of the 17th Century ushered in the
age of absolutism in which ultimate authority
rested in the hands of a monarch who claimed to
rule by divine right and was therefore
responsible only to God
• The fact that decision-making rested in the
hands of a few rulers who did not have any vast
ideological cleavages (all were conservative and
many were related by marriage) helped maintain
stability
– A “minimum number of minimally different nationstates”
Classical International System
(1648-1789)
• The combination of multiple power
systems and flexibility of alignments made
for a multipolar environment
• The classical era was not an era of peace,
but one in which the violent international
conflicts that did occur were relatively
small affairs between monarchs rather
than the total wars between societies that
would follow in subsequent eras
Case Study
Seven Years’ War
Seven Years’ War: Causes
• After the explorations of the 15th, 16th, and 17th
Centuries, the European powers protected their interests
by building a series of fortified trading posts throughout
the maritime regions
• Boundaries in the new colonies were disputed
• Commercial competition ultimately generated violence
– In 1746 French forces seized the English trading post at Madras,
India
– In the Caribbean English pirates attacked Spanish vessels and
French and English forces fought over the sugar islands
• The violence culminated in the Seven Years’ War (17561763)
Seven Years’ War: Causes
• A global war
– In Europe, Britain and Prussia
fought against France, Austria,
and Russia
– In India, British and French allied
with local rulers and fought each
other
– In the Caribbean, the Spanish
and French fought the British
– In North America, the Seven
Years’ War merged with the ongoing French and Indian War
(1754-1763) which pitted the
British and French against each
other
Seven Years’ War: Frederick the
Great
• Became king of Prussia in 1740 when he was 28
• Had spent much of his life training as a soldier, visiting
battlefields, and studying political history and politics
• Believed every man had an obligation to serve his state
and that it was the king’s particular duty to develop
policies that increased the power and standing of the
state
• Strong lust for military glory
• His success lay in his purposeful use of authority and
unwavering determination to make Prussia a European
power
Seven Years’ War: Frederick the
Great
• Frederick used the period of peace after the War
of Austrian Succession to prepare his country
and army for another war
• In August 1756, Frederick launched a
preemptive attack against Saxony and Austria,
hoping to force them to sue for peace before
another country could intervene
• Was unable to achieve a quick, decisive victory
and was now faced with fighting a coalition of
powerful states
– French, Russian, and Austria forces began
converging on Prussia
Seven Years’ War: Frederick the
Great
• Frederick used his central
position to defeat French,
German, and Austrian
armies in his Nov-Dec 1757
Rossbach-Leuthen
campaign, secure Prussia’s
boundaries of 1756, and
gain a satisfactory
negotiated peace
• In the process, he benefited
greatly from Britain’s ability
to support Prussia by
defeating the French at sea
and overseas
Seven Years’ War: British Navy
• The British had the most powerful fleet
and expeditionary forces of any of the
combatants
• Furthermore, the British could rely on the
Prussian army to do most of the fighting
on the continent
• This allowed the British to bring
overwhelming pressure against the French
at sea
Seven Years’ War: British Navy
• The British Navy blockaded the
French ports to contain
commerce raiders, intercept
forces bound for the colonies,
and forestall an invasion of
England
• They raided the French Atlantic
coast to destroy shipping and
stores and to divert French
forces from Germany
• They defeated the French Navy
at Quiberon Bay which freed
the British Navy to turn its
attention to the French colonies
The Battle of Quiberon
Bay by Nicholas Pocock
Seven Years’ War: French and
Indian War
• The British, French, and Spanish all had
colonial interests in North America and this
competition led to war in 1754
• The French and Indian War merged with the
Seven Years’ War
Seven Years’ War: French and
Indian War
• The French came to place greater emphasis on
the war in Europe than in the colonies and the
British developed a numerical advantage
– The British Navy played an important role in
blockading New France which was never a selfsufficient colony and could not survive without a
steady stream of support from France
• In September 1760, the British finally conquered
all of Canada when the combined AngloAmerican force overwhelmed the French at
Montreal
Seven Years’ War: Results
• The victory in Canada allowed the British
to divert thousands of troops elsewhere
and ultimately win the Seven Years’ War
• Britain was now in a position to dominate
world trade for the foreseeable future
• The Seven Years’ War paved the way for
the establishment of the British Empire of
the 19th Century
Seven Years’ War
• How does the Seven Years’ War represent
the era of the classical international
system in terms of:
– States acting according to self-interest
– European dominance
– Absolute authority
– Limited war
– Balance of power
– Multipolar
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• The American and French
Revolutions ushered in a
period of nationalism that
gave the masses a greater
voice in the political life of
their country
• Mass democracy meant that
the government had to be
more sensitive to public
opinion in formulating
foreign policy, but also that
the government could count
on the total military and
economic capabilities of
their societies in pursuing
that policy
During the French Revolution,
the levee en masse was used to
mobilize the French population
and resources
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• Nationalism led to the
appearance of new states
– Freedom gained from colonial
masters
– Political unification of culturally
similar groups
• At the same time,
nationalistic impulses
touched off a new wave of
European imperialism that
subjugated people in Africa
and elsewhere
Simon Bolivar was one of the chief
heroes in Latin America’s struggle
for independence from Spain
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• Imperialism was effected not
just through the force of arms,
but also through trade,
investment, and business
activities that enabled the
imperial powers to profit from
subject societies and
influence their affairs without
going to the trouble of
exercising direct political
control
• Conflict could be avoided only
as long as there was enough
colonial territory to go around
Colonial disputes in Africa
was one of the causes of
World War I
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• After World War I there were additional
pressures for national “self-determination”
and by the end of the transitional period
there were over 50 nation-states
• In addition to increased nation-states,
there were increasing numbers of people
during this period
– In 1830 the world population reached 1 billion
– Just 100 years later it reached 2 billion
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• The increased industrialization
that occurred in Europe and
America during the 19th and
early 20th Centuries contributed
to a growing disparity in wealth
between societies in the
Northern and Southern
Hemispheres
• The transitional era marked
increasing interdependence,
especially in the economic
By the end of the 19th Century,
sphere
– The Global Depression of the
1920s and 1930s showed the
dangers of this interdependence
the factory had become the
predominant site of industrial
production in Europe and
America
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• The Industrial Revolution largely bypassed the
Southern Hemisphere, creating an
unprecedented “rich-poor gap”
• The Industrial Revolution skewed not just the
distribution of wealth in favor of certain states,
but also the distribution of power
– Economic advantage was easily converted to military
advantage
• Several states dominated the rest of the system,
but Britain was considered “first among equals”
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• Two non-European states
rose to power during this
transitional era
– The United States with its
victory in the SpanishAmerican War (1898)
– Japan with its victory in the
Russo-Japanese War
(1905)
• The transitional era marked
both the peak of the
European-centered world and
the beginning of its decline
Retreat of Russian
soldiers during the
Russo-Japanese War
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• On Oct 24-25, 1917,
the Bolsheviks
stormed the Winter
Palace, seized
control of Russia, and
transitioned the
country to a socialist
government
• After that Russia took
on special
significance in the
international system
as a communist
power
Vladimir Lenin headed the
Bolsheviks, the radical wing of
the Russian Social Democratic
Party
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• Additional components of
growing ideological conflict
emerged during the
transitional era with the rise
of national socialism and
fascism
• The transitional era marked
the first time competition
between rival political
philosophies would be
injected into international
relations and would
foreshadow the extreme
polarization of the post-World
War II era
In May 1939, Mussolini
and Hitler signed a tenyear Pact of Steel
between Italy and
Germany
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• Still the international
system of the transitional
era was flexible enough
to remain multipolar in
that countries reached
across ideological
philosophies to form
alliances
– The British and American
democracies joined forces
with the communist
Soviets against the fascist
Germans and Italians in
World War II
Churchill, Roosevelt,
and Stalin
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• The transitional era was marked by increases in
total war
• Total war describes a war in which nations use
all of their resources to destroy another nation’s
ability to engage in war.
– French Revolution’s levee en masse
– US Civil War and Sherman’s March to the Sea
– World War I and the increased lethality that resulted
from diverting advances in industrialization to military
applications
– World War II and the atomic bomb
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• Traditional nation-states have
difficulties handling problems
of a global magnitude
• Nonstate actors began to
appear
– The first intergovernmental
international organization, The
Central Committee for the
Navigation of the Rhine, was
created in 1815
– The International Committee of
the Red Cross was founded in
1863
– The League of Nations was
formed in 1919
1919 British cartoon
criticizing the failure of the
United States to join the
League of Nations
Transitional International System
(1789-1945)
• Intergovernmental organizations (IGOs)
– Established on a regional or global basis by
member governments in response to
problems that transcend national boundaries
and seem to call for institutional responses
• Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs)
– Formed among private groups of individuals
sharing specialized interests across national
borders
Case Study
Global Depression
Global Depression
• In the 1920s, the world economy was
beginning to return to normal after World
War I
• Beneath the surface however there were
some serious flaws
– Tangled financial system
– Second order effects of technological
advances
– Weakened agricultural base
Tangled Financial System
• The Treaty of Versailles imposed
heavy reparation payments on
Germany and Austria to France
and Britain
• Germany and Austria relied on
US loans and investment capital
to finance these reparations
• The French and British, in turn,
relied on these reparations to
repay loans to the US taken out
during World War I
• By the summer of 1928, US
lenders and investors started to
withdraw capital from Europe
which placed an intolerable strain
on the system
Britain
and
France
Reparations
required by
Versailles
Germany
Austria
Repayment of
war loans
US
Loans
Second Order Effects of
Technological Advances
• Improvements in industrial processes reduced
demand for some raw resources, causing an
increase in supplies and a drop in demand
– Tires could now be made with reclaimed rubber which
crippled the economies of the Dutch East Indies,
Ceylon, and Malaysia which relied on exports of
rubber
– Increased use of oil reduced demand for coal
– Synthetics reduced demand for cotton
– Artificial nitrogen reduced demand for nitrates from
Chile
Weakened Agricultural Base
• Agricultural production in Europe declined
significantly during World War I, so farmers in
the US, Canada, Argentina, and Australia
increased their production
• After World War I, European farmers restored
their production which created worldwide
surpluses
• The situation was exacerbated by above
average global harvests between 1925 and
1929
• By 1929 the price of a bushel of wheat was its
lowest in 400 years
Crash of 1929
• The US had enjoyed an
economic boom after World
War I
• Many people began buying
stock on margin (paying as
little as 3% of the stock’s
price in cash and borrowing
the remainder)
• By October 1929,
indications of a worldwide
economic slowdown and
overvalued stock prices
prompted investors to pull
out of the market
Black Thursday (October 24)
• Panic selling on the New
York Stock Exchange
caused stock prices to
plummet
• Thousands lost their
lifesavings
• By the end of the day,
eleven financiers had
committed suicide
• When lenders called in
their loans, investors
were forced to sell their
securities at any price
Economic Contraction Spreads
• There was no longer consumer demand for all
the goods businesses produced
• Businesses cut back on production and laid off
workers
• A vicious downward spiral of business failures
and unemployment followed
• By 1932, industrial production was half of its
1929 level
– National income was down approximately 50%
– 44% of US banks had closed
Global Effects
• Much of the world
depended on the
export of US capital
and the strength of
US imports, so the
US economic
contraction had
worldwide impact
– Germany and
Japan were
especially hard hit
Toronto Stock Market after the
day after the New York Stock
Market crashes
Economic Nationalism
• The Great Depression
destroyed international
economic cooperation
and governments began
practicing economic
nationalism
– Trade barriers, import
quotas, import prohibitions
– US passed the SmootHawley Tariff in 1930
raising duties on most
manufactured products to
prohibitive levels
– Governments of other
nations retaliated with their
own tariffs on US products
Congressman Willis Hawley
Economic Nationalism
• The world economy
was too
interdependent for
protectionism to work
– Between 1929 and
1932, world production
went down 38% and
trade dropped over
66%
– By 1933,
unemployment in
industrialized nations
was five times higher
than in 1929
Unemployed men vying for
jobs at the American Legion
Employment Bureau in Los
Angeles during the Great
Depression.
Global Depression
• How does the Global Depression
represent the era of the transitional
international system in terms of:
– Impact of industrialization
– Increased interdependence
– Shifting away from European dominance
– Growth of nonstate actors
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• Following World War II, the
international system became
bipolar as the United States and
the Soviet Union matched
competing ideologies in the Cold
War
• The Cold War was a state of
political tension and military
rivalry that stopped short of fullscale war, but involved everything
from the Olympics to the space
race to indirect fighting through
surrogates
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• The US and the USSR
led two collective security
organizations, NATO and
the Warsaw Pact, that
reflected the bipolar world
• Because a direct
superpower confrontation
was potentially
catastrophic, the
superpowers fought
through surrogates in
places like Korea,
Vietnam, and Afghanistan
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• Still there were
several tense
moments of
brinkmanship where
the US and the USSR
came close to
confrontation such as
the construction of the
Berlin Wall and the
Cuban Missile Crisis
1962 British cartoon showing
Kennedy and Khrushchev arm
wrestling on top of nuclear
weapons
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• After the US-USSR arms
race reached the point of
Mutual Assured
Destruction (MAD), the
superpowers resigned
themselves to maintain a
“peaceful coexistence”
• A gradual loosening of
bloc unity ensued with
France exercising
increased independence
in the West and Romania
and China in the East
French President Charles de
Gaulle declared, “France has no
permanent friends, only
permanent interests.”
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• One organization that offered an alternative to the postWorld War II global reconstruction independent of the
Cold War was the United Nations
– Charter finalized by delegates from 50 nations in
1945
• Dedicated to maintaining international peace and
security and promoting friendly relations among the
world’s nations
• Still the ideological differences of the Cold War
dominated the post-World War II international system
and largely marginalized UN effectiveness
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• Because of widespread
aversion to foreign rule,
the two superpowers
sought to gain influence
over Third World nations
rather than physically
occupy them
– “Third World” countries
were the newly independent
nation-states, usually in the
Southern Hemisphere, that
were often underdeveloped
or just developing
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• After World War II,
many colonial powers
granted
independence to their
former colonies
• The decolonization
process doubled the
number of nationstates from roughly
60 in 1945 to over
130 in 1973
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• In 1945 almost a quarter of
the world’s people and its
land were under colonial rule
• By 1973 less than 1% of the
world’s population and
territory still lacked selfgovernments
• However many of the newly
independent states lacked
the experience and
institutions necessary to
smoothly transition to selfgovernment and in many
cases civil war, corruption,
and dictatorships followed
independence
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• During the1980s, Cold War
tensions increased as Ronald
Reagan pursued a vigorous antiSoviet policy
• While the US was spending at
levels the USSR was finding
difficult to match, the Soviets
were having their own problems
with their economy and the war in
Afghanistan
• Soviet premier Mikhail Gorbachev
tried to correct the situation with a
series of reforms, but by the
summer of 1990 the reforms had
spent themselves
Reagan delivering his
“Mr. Gorbachev, Tear
Down This Wall!”
speech in 1987
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• Revolutions broke out
throughout eastern
Europe as people
overthrow communist
dictators in places like
Poland, Bulgaria, and
Romania and
countries such as
Czechoslovakia and
Yugoslavia broke apart
• The Berlin Wall came
down on November 9,
1989 and East and
West Germany united
in 1990
The 1989 Romanian Revolution
was a violent overthrow of the
communist regime of Nicolae
Ceauşescu
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• In August 1991,
Soviet republics
began declaring their
independence from
the USSR
• By the end of 1991,
the USSR had
ceased to exist
• The demise of the
Soviet Union left the
US as the world’s
sole superpower
Division of the former USSR
into 15 independent states
Post- World War II International
System (1946-1991)
• On Aug 2, 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait
• The United Nations adopted resolutions
condemning Iraq and authorizing the use of
force
• Thirty-six countries (as well as Kuwait)
contributed forces
• The end of the Cold War and Russia’s
willingness to join the US in opposing Iraq
created an unprecedented level of international
cooperation and hopes for a more favorable
“new world order”
Case Study
The Truman Doctrine and the
Greek Civil War
George Kennan and Containment
• Kennan was a Soviet expert and director of the
State Department’s Policy Planning Staff
• In the July 1947 issue of Foreign Affairs he
wrote an article under the pen name “Mr. X”
titled “The Sources of Soviet Conduct.”
• He described the USSR as being driven by an
aggressive and uncompromising ideology that
would stop “only when it meets some
unanswerable force.”
George Kennan and Containment
• Kennan wrote that the
US must adopt a
“policy of firm
containment
designed to confront
the Russians with
unalterable
counterforce at every
point where they show
signs of encroaching
upon the interests of a
peaceful and stable
world.”
Greek Civil War
• During the German
occupation of Greece
during WWII, the
Communists and other
parts of the Greek Left
formed a resistance army
called the National
People's Liberation Army
(ELAS)
• By 1944, ELAS controlled
large areas of the country
and continued to have
success against the British
liberation force after the
war.
Truman Doctrine
• On Feb 21, 1947, the British
informed the US that they were
pulling out of Greece.
• On March 3, the Greek
government requested US aid.
• On March 12, President Truman
announced the Truman
Doctrine:
– “I believe that it must be the policy
of the United States to support free
peoples who are resisting
attempted subjugation by armed
minorities or by outside pressures.”
Harry Truman
JUSMAPG
• On 22 May, Truman
signed a bill authorizing
$400 million in aid to
Greece and Turkey.
• By 1952, Greek forces
would receive $500
million in US aid.
• Even more important
was LTG James Van
Fleet and his 350-man
Joint US Military
Advisory and Planning
Group.
Grumman Avengers and Curtis
Helldivers aboard the USS
Leyte preparing for operations
over Greece in 1948
Success
• Van Fleet set out to
retrain and reorganize the
Greek Army and cut off
the flow of supplies
reaching guerrillas from
Yugoslavia, Albania, and
Bulgaria
• On Oct 16, 1949,
Greece’s Communist
leaders announced a
cease-fire
“As in Greece, the enemy strikes from sanctuary”
UN Special Committee on the
Balkans
• In addition to the US effort, Greek Civil War involved the
United Nations Special Committee on the Balkans
(UNSCOB)
– First attempt by the UN to deploy an observation
mission in the midst of an armed conflict
• In Aug 1946 the USSR vetoed a proposal to establish an
investigative commission to look into the violence along
the Greek-Albania border
• In December, Greece brought the complaint before the
Security Council and the US repeated the earlier
proposal
• This time the USSR acquiesced to the commission but
proceeded to repeatedly veto resolutions based on its
findings of Albanian, Yugoslav, and Bulgarian support to
the Greek guerrillas
UN Special Committee on the
Balkans
• The US was able to move the matter from the Security
Council to the General Assembly to avoid a Soviet veto
and on October 21, 1947, the UN created the eleven
member Special Committee on the Balkans (UNSCOB)
– Two of the nations appointed to UNSCOB, Poland and the
USSR, refused to participate
• UNSCOB functioned until December 7, 1951, when it
was dissolved by the General Assembly and replaced on
January 23, 1952 by a Balkan Sub-Commission of the
standing Peace Observation Commission
• In each of its annual reports, UNSCOB had found
continuing aid to the guerilla forces in Greece
UN Special Committee on the
Balkans
• The UNSCOB was the first UN mission created
directly as a result of Cold War competition
• It was plagued by a lack of cooperation from the
communist governments who refused to allow it
to operate in their territories
• While UNSCOB had no great impact on the
Greek Civil War, it did teach the UN valuable
lessons about the importance of obtaining
consent from all local parties before deploying
on a peacekeeping mission and the necessity of
political impartiality once deployed
The Truman Doctrine and the
Greek Civil War
• How does the Truman Doctrine and the
Greek Civil War represent the Post- World
War II international system in terms of:
– Competing ideologies
– The bipolar world
– Superpowers militarily confronting each other
through surrogates
– The role of the UN
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• The collapse of the Soviet
Union and the end of the Cold
War abruptly opened up
possibilities for trans-global
connections that had
previously been limited
• “Globalization” is the
increasing interconnectedness
of all parts of the world in all
areas, most notably
communication, commerce,
culture, and politics
• It is welcomed by some and
vilified by others
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• “We stand today at a unique and extraordinary
moment. The crisis in the Persian Gulf, as grave
as it is, also offers a rare opportunity to move
toward an historic period of cooperation. Out of
these troubled times, …. a new world order can
emerge: a new era -- freer from the threat of
terror, stronger in the pursuit of justice, and more
secure in the quest for peace. An era in which
the nations of the world, East and West, North
and South, can prosper and live in harmony.…
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• ….A hundred generations have searched for this
elusive path to peace, while a thousand wars
raged across the span of human endeavor.
Today that new world is struggling to be born, a
world quite different from the one we’ve known.
A world where the rule of law supplants the rule
of the jungle. A world in which nations recognize
the shared responsibility for freedom and justice.
A world where the strong respect the rights of
the weak.”
– President George H. W. Bush Sept 11, 1990
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• Cold War threats were
potentially catastrophic but
they were also measurable
and somewhat predictable
• The bipolar structure and
the desire to avoid
superpower confrontation
had provided a certain
degree of order and
stability
• The post Cold War period
was much more
ambiguous and uncertain
and many new threats
emerged
CIA Director James Woolsey
described the post-Cold War
environment by saying, “We have
slain a large dragon (the U.S.S.R.) —
but we now live in a jungle filled with a
bewildering variety of poisonous
snakes. In many ways, the dragon
was easier to keep track of.”
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• The Cold War structure had kept in check ethnic
divisions in many countries and limited military
interventions
• The end of the Cold War changed all that
– UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali
advocated the “legitimate involvement” of the UN in
“peace enforcement” and “peacemaking” operations
• After the Cold War, the United Nations went from
an average of three or four peacekeeping
operations a year to 13 in December 1992
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Bosnia
Somalia
Rwanda
East Timor
Kosovo
Liberia
Sudan
Rwandan children in the refugee
camp at Ndosha, Zaire
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• “In a globalized war, bad things that happen in
other countries spread more quickly to our
shores. Genocides spawn refugees, who
destabilize their neighbors. Corruption sparks
financial meltdowns, which rock the world
economy. Pandemics hopscotch across the
globe.”
– Peter Beinart in explaining why the US intervened in
Kosovo where there was “no direct threat to the US”
(Time, 23 Apr 2007, 28)
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• The United Nations Charter proclaims one of the
UN’s principle purposes as being “to maintain
international peace and security”
• Sometimes the UN effectively intervened in
these crises, sometimes it didn’t
– Same for the United States
• The US found that its status as world economic
and military superpower would not necessarily
equate to unchallenged world leadership
– The US would meet a host of challenges within the
UN and from non-governmental organizations as well
as from new enemies
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• UN Charter Chapter VI
– “Pacific Settlement of Disputes”
– Security Council can investigate any dispute, or any situation
which might lead to international friction or give rise to a dispute
– Council can recommend action but the recommendations are not
binding on its members
• UN Charter Chapter VII
– Council is not limited to recommendations
– Can take action, including the use of armed force, to maintain or
restore international peace and security
• Peacekeeping operations often are called “Chapter VI
and a half”
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• Limitations of the UN
– No army of its own
• Reliant on ad hoc
contributions from its
members
– Can never divorce itself
from the political
agendas of its members
– Inadequately trained staff
of military professionals
and managers
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• The post-Cold War era included an everwidening gap between rich industrialized nations
(mostly in the Northern Hemisphere) and poor
agricultural ones (mostly in the Southern
Hemisphere)
• The goal of all poor nations is economic growth,
but most lack the requirements for industrial
development
– Trapped in a cycle of poverty: lack of capital resulting
from low production leads to low savings which in turn
means little or no available capital for future
development projects
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• The collapse of communism in
the USSR and Eastern Europe
opened up huge economic
markets
– On the other hand West
Germany’s previously booming
economy struggled as it tried to
integrate the much poorer former
East Germany
• In 2004, the EU swelled to 25
members including the former
Soviet republics of Latvia,
Lithuania, and Estonia
As Germany moved its
capital from Bonn to
Berlin, construction
projects were rampant
Post- Cold War International
System (1992-present)
• Failed states became fertile ground for terrorist safe
havens, black market activities, humanitarian crises,
and general chaos
• “Lack of state capacity in poor countries has come to
haunt the developed world much more directly…..
Suddenly the ability to shore up or to create from
whole cloth missing state capabilities and institutions
has risen to the top of the global agenda and seems
likely to be a major condition for security in important
parts of the world. Thus state weakness is both a
national and an international issue of the first order.”
– Francis Fukuyama, State-Building, x-xi
Case Study
September 11
Islamism
• As globalization spread, many
Muslims became skeptical about
European and American models of
economic development and political
and cultural norms
• Blamed the Western models for their
own economic and political problems
as well as for secularization and its
attendant breakdown of traditional
social and religious values
• Saw the Muslim world as slipping into
a state of decline brought about by the
abandonment of Islamic traditions and
many blamed the US
The Saudi Arabian
Mutaween, or
religious police,
enforce the Islamic
dress code
Islamist Reaction
• Many saw the solution to
the problems faced by
Muslim societies as being
a revival of Islamic identity,
values, and power
• Most sought to bring about
change through peaceful
means, but an extremist
minority has claimed a
mandate from God that
calls for violent
transformations
Supporters of Hizbut Tahrir, a
hardline Muslim group,
protesting in front of the US
Embassy in Jakarta, Indonesia
Jihad
• Convinced that the Muslim
world is under siege, extremists
used the concept of the jihad to
rationalize and legitimize
terrorism and revolution
– Jihad is sometimes called
the Sixth Pillar of Islam and
is an exertion or struggle in
achieving the ways of Allah
– It invokes the right and duty
to defend Islam and the
Islamic community from
unjust attack
Members of the Islamic
Jihad’s military wing,
the Al-Quds Brigade, in
Gaza
Extremist Rhetoric
• “God has blessed a group of vanguard Muslims,
the forefront of Islam, to destroy America."
– Osama bin Laden in a videotaped statement
broadcast by Al Jazeera, October 7, 2001
• “We issue the following fatwa to all Muslims: The
ruling to kill the Americans and their allies -civilians and military -- is an individual duty for
every Muslim who can do it in any country in
which it is possible to do it....We -- with God's
help -- call on every Muslim who believes in God
and wishes to be rewarded to comply with God's
order to kill the Americans and plunder their
money wherever and whenever they find it.”
– World Islamic Front Statement, February 23, 1998
Clash of Civilizations
• “On both sides the interaction between Islam and the
West is seen as a clash of civilizations.”
– Samuel Huntington
Huntington’s Civilizations
Western
Slavic- Orthodox Japanese
Latin American
Islamic
African
Sinic
Hindu
Osama bin Laden
• Osama bin Laden began his
militancy in response to the
1979 Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan
• He helped found the Maktab alKhadamāt (MAK) which
recruited and funded
mujahideen to fight the Soviets
– Ironically, the US also
supported the mujahideen
based on the Cold War
philosophy that “the enemy
of my enemy is my friend”
al-Qaeda
Part of the postDesert Storm US
military presence
at Prince Sultan
Air Base, 80 km
south of Riyadh
• In 1988, bin Laden split from the MAK and formed a new
group comprised of some of the most militant mujahideen
that would become the al-Qaeda terrorist group
• With the US involvement in Desert Storm and its
subsequent continued presence in Saudi Arabia, home of
the Muslim holy sites of Mecca and Medina, bin Laden
became irreconcilably infuriated by the Western influence
September 11, 2001
• On Sept 11, 2001, 19
men affiliated with alQaeda hijacked four
planes and crashed two
into the World Trade
Towers in New York City
and one into the
Pentagon
• The fourth plane
crashed in
Pennsylvania after
passengers attacked
the terrorists
Terrorism
• The deliberate and systematic use of violence
against civilians with the aim of advancing
political, religious, or ideological cause
• Terrorism is not a new phenomenon, but its
impact has been magnified in a globalized world
distinguished by rapid technological advances in
transportation, communications, and weapons
development
– Worldwide television coverage has transformed
terrorism by expanding its visibility and impact
al-Qaeda’s International Presence at
the Time of the Sept 11 Attack
Global War on Terrorism
• On Sept 20, President Bush addressed the
nation and declared “Our war on terror begins
with al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will
not end until every terrorist group of global
reach has been found, stopped and defeated…
Our response involves far more than instant
retaliation and isolated strikes. Americans
should not expect one battle, but a lengthy
campaign, unlike any other we have ever
seen. It may include dramatic strikes, visible
on TV, and covert operations, secret even in
success….
Global War on Terrorism
• … We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them
one against another, drive them from place to
place, until there is no refuge or no rest. And we
will pursue nations that provide aid or safe
haven to terrorism. Every nation, in every
region, now has a decision to make. Either you
are with us, or you are with the terrorists. From
this day forward, any nation that continues to
harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by
the United States as a hostile regime.”
Operation Enduring Freedom
• The Sept 11 attack was quickly
traced to Osama bin Laden who
had been operating from
Afghanistan since his 1996
expulsion from Saudi Arabia
• On Oct 7, 2001, the US led a
coalition attack into Afghanistan to
destroy terrorist training camps and
infrastructure, capture al-Qaeda
leaders, and eliminate terrorist
activities in Afghanistan
• By mid-March 2002, the Taliban
government had been removed
from power and the al-Qaeda
network in Afghanistan had been
severely crippled
CENTCOM Commander
General Tommy Franks
explains Operation Enduring
Freedom
September 11
• How does the terrorist attack of September 11
and the Global War on Terrorism represent PostCold War International System international
system in terms of:
–
–
–
–
–
–
Globalization
Changing threats
The “New World Order”
Clashes of civilizations
The role of the UN
The role of the US
Nontraditional Actors
• Global media
• Nongovernmental organizations
• Global corporations
Media Coverage: The Old Way
• 1938: the first regular
broadcast of daily news began
on radio, with the World Today
program on CBS for 15
minutes every evening,
• 1948: the “CBS TV News”
began
• 1963: CBS Evening News
expanded from 15 to 30
minutes, followed shortly by
NBC, and then by ABC in 1967
• 1968: CBS began the 60
Minutes news
magazine/documentary weekly
show
CBS News
correspondent Eric
Sevareid, 1955
24/7 News
• 1980: Cable News Network
(CNN) became the world's
first 24-hour cable television
news channel
• 1996: MSNBC and Fox
News Channel began 24hour news
• Collectively, expanded
television news coverage
creates “the CNN effect”
which affects political,
diplomatic, and military
decision making on a global
level
al Jazeera
• Founded in 1996 and based in Qatar
• Fastest growing network among Arab communities
and Arabic speaking people around the world
• Focuses primarily on news coverage and analysis
with a markedly anti-Western slant
bin Laden and al Jazeera
• “For someone who scorned
modernity and globalization,
and who took refuge in an
Islamic state that banned
television, bin Laden proved
remarkably adept at public
diplomacy. In the wake of the
September 11 attacks, bin
Laden turned to al Jazeera to
reach the two audiences that
were essential to his plans–
the Western news media and
the Arab masses.”
– David Hoffman, Beyond
Public Diplomacy
Influence of the Media
• Agenda setting
• Shaping public
opinion
• Policy-makers
Tiananmen
Square,
June 4, 1989
Agenda Setting
• “The mass media may not be successful in
telling people what to think, but the media
are stunningly successful in telling their
audience what to think about.”
• “If a tree falls in the woods and CNN
doesn’t cover it, did it really fall?”
– Bruce W. Jentleson, American Foreign
Policy: The Dynamics of Choice in the 21st
Century
Shaping Public Opinion
• “Framing”
– How the media casts an
issue affects the
sustentative judgments
people make about the
issue.
• “Priming”
– The priority the media
gives to an issue affects
the priority people give
to the issue.
Donald Rumsfeld on the Media
Coverage of OIF
• “And interestingly… we have seen mood swings in the media from
highs to lows to highs and back again, sometimes in a single 24hour period.”
• “For some, the massive volume of television - and it is massive and the breathless reports can seem to be somewhat disorienting.
Fortunately, my sense is that the American people have a very good
center of gravity and can absorb and balance what they see and
hear.”
Policy-makers
• Policy-makers
often ask
themselves “What
will the media
think?” as they
formulate a
course of action
• Political “spin”
becomes
extremely
important
Case Study
Somalia
Somalia
• Drought, famine, clan violence, corruption, and inefficient
government had created a humanitarian crisis in Somalia
in the 1990s.
• One of the main sources of power had been the control
of food supplies.
– Hijacked food was used to secure the loyalty of clan
leaders, and food was routinely exchanged with other
countries for weapons.
– In the early 1990’s up to 80% of internationally
provided food was stolen.
• Between 1991 and 1992 over 300,000 Somalis were
estimated to have died of starvation.
– UN relief efforts were unsuccessful, largely due to
looting.
• The U.N. asked its member nations for assistance.
Somalia
• In December 1992,
President George
Bush proposed to
the U.N. that United
States combat
troops lead the
intervention force.
– The U.N.
accepted this
offer and 25,000
U.S. troops were
deployed to
Somalia.
Somalia: Entry
• Stark images from
Somalia, transmitted to
the world via satellite,
helped shape public
opinion and pressured
the United Nations to take
action
• One famous picture was
this one of Aabiba Nuur,
who weighed only 46
pounds
Somalia: Entry
• President Bush said that as he and
his wife, Barbara, watched
television and saw “those starving
kids … in quest of a little pitiful cup
of rice,” he called Secretary of
Defense Dick Cheney and
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff General Colin Powell and told
them “Please come over to the
White House…. I – we – can’t
watch this anymore. You’ve got to
do something.”
– Craig Hines in a Houston
Chronicle article titled “Pity, not
U. S. Security, Motivated Use of
GIs in Somalia”
Somalia: Exit
• Two Black Hawk
helicopters were shot
down in the battle of
Mogadishu in Oct
1993
• Pictures included a
US soldier being
dragged through the
streets of Mogadishu
Somalia: Perception
• Nineteen US soldiers
were killed and over 70
were wounded
• Conservative estimates
say more than 500
Somalians were killed
and over 1,000 injured
• "The perception of an
operation can be as
important to success as
the execution of that
operation."
– MG Charles McClain
Somalia
• “We went into Somalia
because of horrible television
images; we will leave
Somalia because of horrible
television images.”
– Marianne Means
• “We had been drawn to this
place by television images;
now we were being repelled
by them. The President
immediately conducted a
policy review that resulted in
a plan for withdrawal over the
next six months.”
– Colin Powell
Sudan and Somalia
• “As the contrasting
responses to the
seemingly similar
Somalia and Sudan
cases suggest,
media coverage
can have a
significant impact.”
– Arnold Kanter,
Intervention
Decisionmaking in
the Bush
Administration
Refugees in Sudan
Why?…
• “Why should international institutions exist
at all in a world dominated by sovereign
states?”
– Rhetorical question posed by Robert Keohane
Because….
• “Global problems require global solutions.
We fall together or we succeed together.”
– Joseph Deiss, Minister of Economic Affairs of
Switzerland
Air pollution
obscures the
ground in this
aerial photo of
China
Diseases such as bird flu
threaten to become pandemics
Tension of Globalization
• Traditional nation-states have difficulties
handling problems of a global magnitude
• A plethora of nongovernmental
international organizations that do not
respect territorial boundaries and are
beyond the reach of national governments
have sprung up to try to tackle the problem
– Usually focus on a largely singular agenda
Some NGOs and their Agendas
• Red Cross
– Relieve suffering to
wounded soldiers
and prisoners of
war
• Greenpeace
– Preserve the
earth’s natural
resources and
animal and plant
life
• Amnesty International
– Ensure human
rights
Some IGOs and their Agendas
• An organization of
sovereign nations
devoted to a
agenda of
international
scope or
character
• United Nations
– Maintain
international
peace and
security
• World Trade
Organization
– Foster free trade
The Reduction of Sovereignty
• “Under the WTO, member
countries cannot tax or limit
imports made under unfair or
unsafe labor conditions. The
same can be said for those
imports that significantly
harm the global environment
during production. National
sovereignty is what is at
stake, since countries do not
retain the ability to choose
for themselves.”
– David Carstens, “Bringing
Environmental and Economic
Internationalism into US
Strategy”
Pro-democracy protests
in China in 1989 resulted
in the massive
government crackdown
at Tiananmen Square
Corporations
• International corporations sought to
extend business activities across borders
in pursuit of specific activities such as
importation, exportation, and the extraction
of raw materials
• Multinational corporations conducted
business in several countries but had to
operate within the confines of specific laws
and customs of a given society
Corporations
• Global corporations rely on a small
headquarters staff while dispersing all
other corporate functions across the globe
in search of the lowest possible operating
costs
– Treat the world as a single market and act as
if the nation-state no longer exists
– Some 50,000 global corporations exist,
including General Motors, Siemens AG, and
Nestle
Case Study
United Fruit Company
Latin American Dependence
• Latin America in the 19th Century was plagued by
division, rebellion, caudillo rule, civil war, instability, and
conflict
• Add that to colonial legacies that lacked economic
development and local industry in Latin America and the
pattern was set for foreign dependence
• Because its economy required foreign investment to
survive, Latin America became subject to decisions
made in the interests of foreign investors
• Latin American governments were controlled by the
elites who profited from foreign involvement at the
expense of the citizenry, so the governments actually
encouraged Latin America’s economic dependence
Case Study: United Fruit Company
• From 1899 to 1970,
UFCO was prominent in
the trade of bananas and
other fruit from Latin
America to Europe and
the US
• An archetypal example of
multinational influence
extending deeply into the
internal politics
– “Banana republics”
and neocolonialism
The Peten, one of many
ships in UFCO’s “Great
White Fleet”
Case Study: United Fruit Company
• In addition to owning vast tracts of land, the
UFCO dominated regional transportation
networks and owned a major railroad
corporation
• In 1913, UFCO extended its reach by creating
the Tropical Radio and Telegraph Company
• By the end of the decade there would be virtually
no aspect of the economic infrastructure of Latin
American banana production untouched by the
UFCO
Case Study: United Fruit Company
• One of the company’s primary tactics for maintaining
market dominance was to control the distribution of
banana lands.
– UFCO claimed that hurricanes, blight and other
natural threats required them to hold extra land or
reserve land.
– In practice that meant UFCO was able to prevent the
government from distributing banana lands to
peasants who wanted a share of the banana trade.
• For UFCO to maintain its unequal land holdings, it had to
have government concessions.
• This in turn meant that UFCO had to be politically
involved in the region even though it was an American
company.
Case Study: United Fruit Company
• When Guatemalan
President Jacobo Arbenz
Guzman tried to seize
thousands of acres of
uncultivated land owned
by the UFCO in 1953,
President Eisenhower
empowered the CIA to
engineer the overthrow of
Arbenz’s government
• A US-supported coup
toppled Arbenz’s
government in 1954 and
returned the land to the
UFCO
Castillo Armas established a
military government after the
ouster of the democratically
elected Arbenz, who the US
feared had communist leanings
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