Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
Course Assessment
1. Group or individual presentation with a written paper of 2000-3000 words.
(Soft copies of all the assignments and presentations must be emailed to the
instructor on the day they are due or before) [20%]
2. Weekly Assignments: Students will be asked to collect five international
and five national news headlines from newspapers or magazines.
3. Monthlies [40%]
4. Comprehensive Exam [40%]
NOTE: There will be penalties for any assignments submitted after the
deadline or on retake quizzes. It should also be noted that late
assignments and retake are acceptable only on the three consecutive days
after the original deadline.
Readings
As the course is interdisciplinary, therefore, there is no single textbook for the
course. Some of the books that contain a wide verity of topics have been put in the
recommended books list. In addition to referring to books, the students are advised
to consult a wide range of newspapers, magazines and e-journals that may be of
use to students in preparation for their assignments. The students are highly
advised to read newspapers and magazines on daily basis.
Recommended Books:
Rouke T. John and Boyer A. Mark (latest edition), International Politics on the
World Stage. Dushkin/McGraw-Hill.
Smith Steve and Baylis John (2001), The Globalization of World Politics-An
Introduction to International Relations. Oxford University Press Inc. New York.
Allen, T and Thomas, A. (2000). Poverty and Development into the 21st
Century. Oxford University Press.
SUGGESTIONS
1.
Teaching
weeks
1&2
VIDEOS:
1. Iron Curtain: (Divided at the end of World War II,
Europe was a potential flashpoint for 40 years as the
superpowers maintained an uneasy peace built on
deterrence.
2. Oriental Communism: (From the withdrawal of the
old colonial powers to the conflict in Korea, instability,
regional conflicts, and the boiling over of Cold War
tensions marked much of the 20th century in Asia.
3. Wars in Peace: (The perennial problems of civil war,
terrorism, and bilateral wars took on a new urgency in
the years since the end of the Cold War, and the
international community struggled to deal with them.
3. International Security:
National Power/ Power Politics (5)
VIDEOS:
1. War to End All War? (The entry of the United
States helped bring World War I to a close, but
the harsh conditions of the Versailles Treaty
paved the way for a greater conflict to come).
2. Enter The Dictators (The years between the
World Wars were marked by the rise of
totalitarian states in Europe and a growing
militancy in the Far East).
4. International Organizations: (6)
Regional
Global
5&6
5.
International Issues:
Nuclear Proliferation
Humanitarian Intervention and World Politics
Poverty, Development, and Hunger.
Gender Issues
International Law (Human rights)
Environment.
The Concept of Jihad.
7&8
9 & 10
6.
Foreign Policy:
Determinants of American Foreign Policy
Determinants of Pakistan Foreign Policy
Determinants of Chinese Foreign Policy
11
7. Diplomacy:
8.
12 & 13
9. Case Studies:
Middle East, Afghanistan or South Asia.
VIDEO:
14 & 15
IR-a fascinating and challenging subject. There is always more to learn. This
course is only the beginning of the story.
Meaning and definition of IR: the term International was used for the
first time by Jermy Bentham in the later part of the 18 th century with regard to
the law of nations. Consequently, the term international relations were used
to define the official relations between the sovereign states. Nevertheless,
these relationships cannot be understood only on state level, there are also
non-state actors, which influences the course of these relationships. IR is not
confined with one field such that only politics among nations it includes other
social structures e.g. economic, culture, and domestic politics. Therefore, IR is
a large subject that overlaps several other fields.
This picture was shot by Eddie Adams who won the Pulitzer Prize with it. The picture shows Nguyen
Ngoc Loan, South Vietnam's national police chief executing a prisoner who was said to be a Viet Cong
captain. Once again the public opinion was turned against the war.
to
be
interested
in
more
abstract,
general,
and
longer-term
Real world politics mixes these three perspectives in various ways. No theory
or scholar in IR is purely conservative, liberal or revolutionary.
Che Guevara
In international security, a conservative worldview strongly influences the
contours of realism or power politics. The liberal counterpoint to realism,
originally called idealism, has been less influential in IR scholarship and
policy making regarding international security (e.g. International Law)
and
often
policy.
More
conservative
approach
such
as
mercantilism has been less influential than those based on liberal free
market economics.
ACTORS AND INFLUENCES:
All the world is a stage, and all the men and women merely players. William
Shakespeare.
10
Stalin
LEVELS OF ANALYSIS:
A level of analysis is a perspective on IR based on a set of similar actors or
process that suggests possible explanations to why questions. The lowest
levels focus on small, disaggregated units such as individual people, whereas
the highest levels focus on macro processes such as global trends. Generally,
most of the scholars use three widely accepted levels of generalization or
influences to help better understand the highly complex problems in world
politics. They are: the individual, state (or society) and international
system.
11
GLOBAL LEVEL
North-South gap
Technological Change
World regions
Information Revolution
European imperialism
Global
telecommunication
Worldwide scientific and business communities
World environment
INTERSTATE LEVEL
Power
IGOs
Balance of Power
Alliance
formation
and
dissolution
Wars
Treaties
Trade agreements
Diplomacy
Summit meetings
Bargaining
Reciprocity
DOMESTIC LEVEL
Nationalism
Ethnic Conflict
12
Type of Government
Gender
Democracy
Dictatorship
Domestic Coalitions
Foreign
Policy
Bureaucracies
INDIVIDUAL LEVEL
Great Leaders
Crazy Leaders
Learning
Assassinations, Accidents of History
13
North and South Poles or West and East poles. The South is often called the
Third World. The North contains only 20 percent of the worlds people but 60
percent of its goods and services. IR scholars have no single explanation of
the tremendous North-South gap and in wealth and poverty.
HISTORY:
Of special interest in IR are the past 500 years, known as the modern age.
This has been the age of the international system that we know (sovereign
states).
With so much change occurring, one might wonder whether history is still
relevant to understanding the world. It is. The basic structures and principles
of international relations, even in the current era, are deeply rooted in
historical developments (particularly of European history).
WORLD CIVILIZATION TO 2000
centered
in
Europe.
Ethnocentrism:
Eurocentrism,
American-
Renaissance (1500 A.D) the decline of papal authority and the increase in
royal power were reinforced by a period of culture and intellectual rebirth and
reform called the Renaissance (about 1350-1650). Educated people looked to
14
the classical Hellenic (of ancient Greece) and Roman cultures and models and
developed a concept of personal freedom that ran counter to the authority of
the Church. Protestant Reformation.
Ultimately the European conquest of the world brought about a single world
civilization, albeit with regional variants and subcultures.
15
Nationalism proved a stronger force than socialism and many other isms. E.g.
Arab- Nationalism, Soviet resistance to German invasion, German, Italian and
Japanese
Fascism
(an
extreme
authoritarianism
bound
by
national
chauvinism.
The Industrial Revolution started in Britain notably with the inventions of Steam engine
(1769), thread-spinner (1770), and the cotton gin in America (1769), coal-powered iron
steamships (1880), railway, colonialism, slave trade, and free trade.
The United States led the world in converting from coal to oil and from horsedrawn transportation to motor vehicles.
Standing apart from the world capitalist economy in the years after WWII
were the economies of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, organized on
communist principles of central planning and state ownershipthe Soviet
bloc economies stagnated under the weight of bureaucracy, ideological
16
17
PERESTROIKA
restructuring)
&
GLASNOST
(economic
and
(openness
bureaucratic
in
political
reform
or
discussions,
demokratizatsiva)
18
NATIONAL INTERESTS:
Self-interest is not only a legitimate, but a fundamental cause for national policy; one
which needs no cloak of hypocrisy. As a principle it does not require justification in
general statement.
The term national interest gained currency only with the emergence of the
national state system, increase in popular political control and the great
expansion of economic relations.
19
20
NATIONAL POWER:
The concept of nation state has made the acquisition of power more
relevant and in demand.
Might may not make right, but might frequently determines the winner.
Just as money is the currency of economic life, one scholar wrote so power
can be thought of as the currency of politics.
POWER AS AN ASSET:
One of the confusions about power is whether it is an asset (an end, a goal)
that you try to acquire and maintain or a tool (a means, an instrument) that
you use? The answer is both.
There are many theories about the lure of amassing power. Realists, for
instance, contend that the quasi-anarchistic nature of the international
system makes it prudent for a country to amass power to protect itself in a
dangerous world. one psychological theory argues that at least some people
21
have a need to dominate their environment and seek power to do so. Yet
another idea is that power-seeking is a particularly male psychosexual
impulse. Whatever the cause, it can be argued that it is prudent to acquire
power because the international system that exists emphasizes sovereign
interests and self-help (action outside legal system)
1.
2.
Vietnam was
never be sure, but it is certain that it is hard to shoot someone if you do not own a
gun.
3.
$3.5 billion, including its 85 aircraft and its carrier battle group of supporting ships
all these escalate the cost of about $15 billion. WHO estimate that $2.5 billion can
save 7.5 million children annually.
In The Rise and Fall of Great Powers (1988) Paul Kennedy concluded that wealth is
usually needed to acquire military power, which, in turn, is usually used to achieve
and
protect
even
greater
wealth
(imperial
overstretch).
This
imperial
overstretch, in the end, leads towards declinism. The declinists hold responsible
both
military
and
non-military
budgets.
The
focus
of
declinists
is
on
overconsumption (spending that depletes assets faster than the economy can
replace them) at the expense of reinvestment (spending that creates assets).
22
The illusory status of power is another aspect of power that makes it difficult
to assess. Real power and Perceived power.
The
relatively
isolationist
U.S
stand
before
WWI
led
others
to
underestimate American power. When asked for his evaluation of the U.S
military in 1917, a German admiral replied, Zero, Zero, Zero. Based on this
perception of U.S. power, Germany resumed the submarine warfare against U.S.
merchant shipping, a move that soon ked to war with the U.S.
MEASURING POWER:
CHARACTERISTICS OF POWER:
1. Power is dynamic: There are scholars who contend that some power factors
(such as military force, population size, raw materials, and geography) are
declining in their importance as part of the power equation, while other
factors (such as technological excellence, education, and economic growth)
are becoming more important. Joseph Nye, for example, contends that
coercive hard power is declining in importance and that soft power is
increasing.
2. Power is relative: calculating power is of limited use except to measure it
against the power of the other side. When assessing capabilities, then,
relative power, or the comparative power of the national actors, must be
considered. We cannot say that China is powerful unless we specify in
comparison to whom. For example, whatever Chinas power resources may
23
1. The
National
Core:
geopolitics:
it
focuses
the
interrelationship
of
24
classified Europe, Asia, and Africa as the world island with Eurasian
heartland at its center. Mackinder held that:
population:
Morale:
during the darkest days of the war, that for the British people Death and
25
Transportation System:
26
manufactured globally, with the three biggest producers (Germany, Japan and
the United States) making 61.4% of the global total.
Agricultural Output: United States, with less than 5 percent of the worlds
population, it produces about 16 percent of the worlds cereal grains, 8 percent
of its beef and chicken, and 7 percent of its pork.
4. The Military: Like the other categories it has tangible aspects, such as
spending and weapons levels, and intangible aspects, such as leadership and
moral.
ENDING REMARKS: To reiterate a point made in the beginning, what you should
draw, in part, from this extended discussion of power is that it is a highly complex,
very dynamic phenomenon. Moreover, it should be acquired and used prudently.
Power is expensive, and its misapplication can bring immediate or future difficulties.
27
INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION
The sovereign state has been the primary actor in world politics for the past several
centuries
State power is the basis for states to achieve their goals, yet there are
alternative to this self-help system
Three main root systems have nourished the current growth of International
Organization.
1. Belief in a Community of Humankind: the universal concern for the
condition of humanity. The first example of an organization based on
these principles was The Hague system, named for the 1899 and
1907 peace conferences held at that city in the Netherlands.
Organizationally, the Hague system included a rudimentary general
assembly and a judicial system. WWI destroyed the plans for a third
Hague conference in 1915, but the move toward universal organization
was under way.
The next step was creation of the League of Nations after WWI.
28
29
and
Islamic
fundamentalism.
Sixth,
the
30
1. LIMITED
GOALS
AND
ACTIVITIES
OF
INTERNATIONAL
ORGANIZATIONS
1. Interactive Arena: the most common use of international organizations
is to provide an interactive arena in which members-states pursue their
individual national interests. The arena itself is technically neutral, but
members or coalitions of members often try to use it to further their goals.
This negative factor sometimes transforms these organizations into
another
scene
of
struggle
rather
than
utilizing
them
to
further
Cooperation:
There
are
many
supporters
of
31
international
organization
to
make
and
enforce
rules:
32
they
would
allow
for
greater
cultural
diversity
and
political
33
34
EU as a supranational organization
Nationalist China, or Taiwan, was, in effect, expelled from the UN when the
China seat in the UN was transferred to the mainland China. And South
Africa membership was suspended for many years until it ended its system of
apartheid.
organization is
36
offer two different examples. The most common voting formula used in
IGOs is majoritarianism. This system has two main components: (1)
each member casts one equal vote, and (2) the issue is carried by
either a simple majority (50 percent plus one vote) or, in some cases,
an extraordinary majority (commonly two-thirds). In the assembly,
decisions on routine matters are taken by a simple majority of
members voting; a two-thirds majority is required for matters of
importance, such as the admission of new members, the revision of the
charter, and budgetary and trusteeship questions.
The problem with the idea of equality among states is that it does not reflect
some standards of realityit might be noted, for example, that in the UNGA,
states with less than 15 % of the worlds population account for two-thirds of the
vote. By contrast, the 10 countries which combine for about 60 % of the worlds
population have less than 6% of the votes in the GA. A second voting option is
the big power vetoVeto right is highly criticized by many small countries.
ADMINISTRATION:
FINANCING: All IGOs face the problem of obtaining sufficient funds to conduct
their operationsIGOs have very little authority to compel member countries to
support them. The UN is no exception, and it is beset by severe and controversial
financial problems.
There are three elements to the extended UN budget. The first is the core or
regular budget for headquarters operations and the regular programs of the
major UN organs. Second, there is the peacekeeping budget to meet the
expenses of operations being conducted by the Security Council. The third
budget element is called the voluntary contributions budget, which funds
agencies such as the World Health Organizations (WHO), United Nations
Childrens Fund (UNICEF), and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP);
it also includes voluntary contributions to peacekeeping expenses.
37
The UN raises only a tiny percent of its funds from its own operations.
Therefore, the organization is almost entirely dependent on the assessment it
levies on member countries. This assessment is fixed by the UNGA based on a
complicated formula that reflects the ability to pay. According to the 1993
budget assessment: the U.S (25%), Japan (12.5%), Germany (8.9%), Russia
(6.7%), France (6.0%), Great Britain (5.0%), Italy (4.3%) and Canada (3.1%). For
peacekeeping, the P5 members of the UNSC have a somewhat higher
assessment based on their special privileges in the organ. The voluntary budget
has no formal assessment, as the name implies, but the regular budget
percentages are used as a rule of thumb.
UN facing financial challenges: the worlds leaders are coming here to tell
us to work harder, but will they remember their checkbooks.
The opposition to what some countries believe to be an unwarranted
expansion of the UNs bureaucratic structure has also harmed funding.
Yet another cause of resentment stems from the differing assessments.
Eight countries collectively pay 71.5% of the UN budget; they cast less than
4.4% of the votes in the UNGA. The countries with a 0.01 % assessment account
for less than 1 % of the UN budget, but collectively command 47.3% of the votes
in the GA.
38
personnel resources are necessary to that end. Fourth, a UN armed force will be
formed to defeat aggressors and restore the peace.
Although an intuitively appealing idea, collective security has not been a
success on the international scene. The more important reason that collective
security fails is the willingness of countries to subordinate their sovereign
interests to collective action.
Peacekeeping: in contrast to the limited success of collective security the UN
has been able to use peacekeeping operations more effectivelyto prevent
fighting the UN act as a buffer between combatants. The international force is
neutral between the combatants and must have been invited to be a present by
at least one of them.
UN Military Intervention in Practice: since its establishment in 1945 through
mid-1994, the UN has mounted 34 missions utilizing a substantial number of
troops or police forces from more than 75 countries. There have also been more
than a dozen UN observer missions that involved unarmed or very lightly armed
UN personnel. Never before have international forces been so active as they are
now. By the end of 1994, 17 different armed UN forces of varying size were in
the field at locations throughout the world. These forces totaled almost 70,000
soldiers drawn from 70 countries.
HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTION AND WORLD POLITICS
39
Humanitarian intervention was not a legitimate practice during the cold war,
but there has been a significant shift of attitudes since the early 1990s.
40
41
42
lawyers
argue
that
whatever
the
legality
of
humanitarian
43
intervention reflected fears about setting precedents which could erode the
non-intervention principle.
The response of international society: The international response that
greeted the two interventions was radically different: Vietnams use of force
was almost universally condemned whereas Tanzanias intervention that
breached the same rules as Vietnams was treated much more leniently.
What, then, explains this divergence of response? The international response
was to a large degree conditioned by the political and strategic imperatives of
the cold war.
human
suffering.
However,
if
post-cold
war
international
44
key point to note is that none of these interventions have been legitimated by
the UN Security Council solely on humanitarian grounds. Chapter VII of the
Charter enables the Security Council to authorize military enforcement action
only in cases where it finds a threat to international peace and security.
or
non-consensual.
E.g.:
Medecins
Sans
Frontieres
(non-
45
46
INTERNATIONAL LAW:
enough, their behavior may become generally accepted practice with the
status of law.
3. General principles of law (such as equity):
assault recognized in most national legal system as crimes tend to have the
same meaning in an international context.
4. Legal scholarship (including past judicial decisions): The fourth source
is recognized by the World Court as subsidiary to the others, is legal
47
HUMAN RIGHTS
The idea that human rights should be internationally protected is
gaining currency and seems a prime example of globalization. However,
states seem unwilling to give international action in support of human rights
a high priority. Moreover there are serious conceptual problems involved in
widening the notion of rights to incorporate economic and collective rights.
The Western origin of the doctrine of rights has also come to be seen as
problematic in the postcolonial era, as the proponents of Asian Values
have stressed. It may be that in the next century only a limited notion of
human rights will be defensible-or perhaps human rights will have to be
defended in explicitly cultural terms.
The case that rights were almost always associated with domestic legal and
political systems, in the last half century a complex network of international
law and practice has grown up around the idea that individuals possess rights
simply by virtue of being human, of sharing in a common humanity.
Bills Of Rights of 1791: U.S. human rights law: the first ten amendments
to the U.S. Constitution, which protect peoples basic human rights.
Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. 1789: Any law
which violates the indefeasible rights of man is essentially unjust and
tyrannical; it is not a law at all.
One
major
set of
contemporary
problems
concerns
compliance
and
enforcement.
Post 1945: Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948: This was the first
time in history that the international community had attempted to define a
comprehensive code for the internal government of its members. Eight states
abstained, for interestingly different reasons: South Africa abstained because
of
its
Apartheid policy, the Soviet Union and five Soviet Bloc countries abstained,
because of their authoritarian style policies (objected on the absence of
sufficient attention to social and economic right by comparison to the
detailed elaboration of bourgeois freedoms and property rights). Saudi
Arabia abstained and its objection was on religious (or cultural) grounds.
Article 18 specifies the freedom to change and practice the religion of ones
choice.
49
INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT:
What
is
(Economic)
Development?
Economic
development
Income Distribution:
Capitalists perspective: capitalists tend to favor the concentration of capital as a
way to spur investment rather than consumption. In line with liberalism, capitalists
favor development paths that tie third world states closely to the world economy
and international trade. They argue that although they defer equity, such
development strategies maximize efficiency. The same concept applies broadly to
the worlds development as a whole. From a capitalist perspective, the North-South
gap is a stage of world development in which capital accumulation is concentrated
in the North. This unequal concentration creates faster economic growth, which
50
ultimately will bring more wealth to the South as well (a trickle down
approach). There is no practical way, in this view, to shift wealth from the North to
the South without undermining the free market economies responsible for global
economic growth.
Socialists perspective: socialists by contrast argue that meaningful third world
development should improve the position of the whole population and of the poorsooner rather than later. Thus, socialists tend to advocate a more equitable
distribution of wealth; they dispute the idea that greater equity will impede
efficiency or slow down economic growth. Rather, by raising incomes among the
poorer people, a strategy based on equity will speed up the demographic transition
and lead more quickly to sustained accumulation. Such a strategy seeks to
develop a states economy from the bottom up instead of the top down.
51
The Chinese Experience: After Mao died in 1976, China under Deng Xiaoping
instituted economic reforms and transformed its southern coastal provinces (near
Hong Kong and Taiwan) into free economic zones open to foreign investment and
run on capitalist principles. Peasants work their own fields, instead of collective
farms, and get rich (by Chinese standards) if they do well. China is also recreating
some of the features of capitalism that Maos revolutionaries had overturned. MNCs
continue to shift production to China year by year because Chinas labor force is
vast, low paid, and disciplined (strikes not allowed). Of the $700 billion in foreign
direct investment in Asia in 1990-2000, nearly half was in mainland China.
52
prices fell from $3,000 to $1,300 per ton in 1974, income fell accordingly in Zambia,
which got 94 percent of export earnings from copper. It had to cut back imports of
needed goods drastically and suffered a 15 percent decline in its already low GDP.
Concentrating Capital for Manufacturing
Manufacturing emerges as a key factor in both export-led growth and self-sustaining
industrialization. The third world states want to increase their own manufacturing
base and change the global division of labor based on manufacturing in the core
and resources extraction in the periphery. One great difficulty in getting
manufacturing started is that capital is required to build factories. Capital for
manufacturing can come from foreign investment or foreign loans, for instance. This
strategy reduces short-term pain, but it also reduces the amount of surplus (profit)
available to the state in the long term. Another way to minimize the capital needs of
manufacturing is to state out in low capital industries, for example textile
industry. Textile industry is fairly labor-intensive, giving an advantage to countries
with cheap labor, and does not require huge investments of capital to get started.
Microcredit: A related approach to capitalization in very poor countries is growing in
popularity. Microcredit is the opposite of a trickle-down approach, instead injecting
capital at the bottom of the economic hierarchy.
North-South Business:
Foreign Investment:
53
Technology Transfer:
A third world state may allow an MNC to produce certain goods in the country
under favorable conditions, provided the MNC shares knowledge of the technology
and design behind the productbut MNCs are sometimes reluctant to share
proprietary technology. Technology transfer sometimes encounters difficulty when
the technological style of the source country does not fit the needs of the recipient
country. A good fit has been called appropriate technology.
54
the citizens (and hence for national politicians). The IMF demands that inflation be
brought under control, which requires reducing state spending and closing budget
deficits. These measures often spur unemployment and require that subsidies of
food and basic goods be reduced or eliminated. Short-term consumption is curtailed
in favor of longer-term investment. Surplus must be concentrated to service debt
and invest in new capital accumulation. The International Monetary Fund (IMF)
wants to ensure that money lent to a country is not spent for politically popular but
economically unprofitable purpose (such as subsidizing food). It wants to ensure
that inflation does not eat away all progress and that the economy is stable enough
to attract investment.
55