Great Power Conduct and Credibility in World Politics

Great Power Conduct and Credibility in World Politics
Author: Sergey Smolnikov
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 316
Release: 2018-05-04
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 3319718851

This book seeks to answer one main question: what is the core concern of great powers that streamlines their behavior in the contemporary system of international relations? Building on the examples of the United States, China, Russia, France, and Britain, it tracks both consistency and fluctuations in global power dynamics and great power behavior. The author examines the genesis, causality, and policy implications of decision makers’ fixation with retaining a credible image of power in world politics, while exploring how the dynamics of power distribution in international systems modify perceptions of primacy. Drawing on findings from disciplines such as history, economics, social and political psychology, communication theory, philosophy, political science, strategic studies, and above all, from International Relations theory and practice, the volume proposes a novel theory of power credibility, which offers an original explanation of great powers’ behavior at the stage of their relative decline.

Great Power Politics in Greater Eurasia

Great Power Politics in Greater Eurasia
Author: Rahman Dag
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2022
Genre: Asia
ISBN: 1666914126

It seems that every single issue in Eurasia and the world becomes a battleground among the great powers. This book's initiative is to categorize the battlegrounds as three aspects: national/regional/international conflicts, institutions/alliances, and projects.

Soft Power

Soft Power
Author: Joseph S Nye Jr
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Total Pages: 216
Release: 2009-04-28
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0786738960

Joseph Nye coined the term "soft power" in the late 1980s. It is now used frequently—and often incorrectly—by political leaders, editorial writers, and academics around the world. So what is soft power? Soft power lies in the ability to attract and persuade. Whereas hard power—the ability to coerce—grows out of a country's military or economic might, soft power arises from the attractiveness of a country's culture, political ideals, and policies. Hard power remains crucial in a world of states trying to guard their independence and of non-state groups willing to turn to violence. It forms the core of the Bush administration's new national security strategy. But according to Nye, the neo-conservatives who advise the president are making a major miscalculation: They focus too heavily on using America's military power to force other nations to do our will, and they pay too little heed to our soft power. It is soft power that will help prevent terrorists from recruiting supporters from among the moderate majority. And it is soft power that will help us deal with critical global issues that require multilateral cooperation among states. That is why it is so essential that America better understands and applies our soft power. This book is our guide.

Leadership and the Rise of Great Powers

Leadership and the Rise of Great Powers
Author: Yan Xuetong
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 278
Release: 2020-12-22
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0691210225

A leading foreign policy thinker uses Chinese political theory to explain why some powers rise as others decline and what this means for the international order Why has China grown increasingly important in the world arena while lagging behind the United States and its allies across certain sectors? Using the lens of classical Chinese political theory, Leadership and the Rise of Great Powers explains China’s expanding influence by presenting a moral-realist theory that attributes the rise and fall of great powers to political leadership. Yan Xuetong shows that the stronger a rising state’s political leadership, the more likely it is to displace a prevailing state in the international system. Yan shows how rising states like China transform the international order by reshaping power distribution and norms, and he considers America’s relative decline in international stature even as its economy, education system, military, political institutions, and technology hold steady. Leadership and the Rise of Great Powers offers a provocative, alternative perspective on the changing dominance of states.

Global Public Governance: Toward World Government?

Global Public Governance: Toward World Government?
Author: Sorpong Peou
Publisher: World Scientific
Total Pages: 504
Release: 2022-08-16
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9811257884

Global Public Governance is a text written for students, scholars and lay people interested in learning about this global system, which emerged and has evolved in response to global challenges that no one actor can effectively address. Drawing on what has been published over the last several decades, this text highlights the importance of states and nonstate actors seeking to provide global public goods through collective action. Covering conceptual, theoretical, and empirical issues, as well as eight main themes — global security, human rights, global criminal justice, global health, global education, global finance, global trade, and the global environment — this text offers a comprehensive treatment of global public governance. It concludes that the current system remains far from effective, but world government is not a better alternative. In short, this text proposes a regional approach to global public governance.

Political Power and Corporate Control

Political Power and Corporate Control
Author: Peter A. Gourevitch
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 365
Release: 2010-06-20
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1400837014

Why does corporate governance--front page news with the collapse of Enron, WorldCom, and Parmalat--vary so dramatically around the world? This book explains how politics shapes corporate governance--how managers, shareholders, and workers jockey for advantage in setting the rules by which companies are run, and for whom they are run. It combines a clear theoretical model on this political interaction, with statistical evidence from thirty-nine countries of Europe, Asia, Africa, and North and South America and detailed narratives of country cases. This book differs sharply from most treatments by explaining differences in minority shareholder protections and ownership concentration among countries in terms of the interaction of economic preferences and political institutions. It explores in particular the crucial role of pension plans and financial intermediaries in shaping political preferences for different rules of corporate governance. The countries examined sort into two distinct groups: diffuse shareholding by external investors who pick a board that monitors the managers, and concentrated blockholding by insiders who monitor managers directly. Examining the political coalitions that form among or across management, owners, and workers, the authors find that certain coalitions encourage policies that promote diffuse shareholding, while other coalitions yield blockholding-oriented policies. Political institutions influence the probability of one coalition defeating another.

NATO and the Greater Maghreb

NATO and the Greater Maghreb
Author: David Garcia Cantalapiedra
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 173
Release: 2022-09-01
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 166691133X

NATO and the Greater Maghreb offers a distinctive focus and study of NATO’s future policy in North Africa and the Sahel after the new 2022 Strategic Concept, expected to be published during the next NATO Summit in Madrid. The book will use three main axes to frame the contributors’ analysis, which are not usually used together for analyzing NATO policy: Geopolitics, Great Power Competition, and Threats. These lenses create a distinctive approach to reviewing a Greater Mahgreb Regional Security Complex confronted with the necessities of a distinctive approach by NATO. The idea of MENA (Middle East and North Africa), still used by the EU and NATO is already obsolete for several reasons: first, it is no more possible to split West Africa geopolitically from North Africa and Sahel. Second, the action of terrorist groups such as Al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, ISIS, and Boko Haram are not related to Middle East problems, nor strategies and policies necessaries to tackle them. Second, the difficulties in cooperation between these countries, the corruption fed by organized crime (above all cocaine trafficking) and the impact of desertization, makes it very difficult to establish sound strategies and policies for the area. Third, there is an increasing presence of Great Powers in the area, including Russia and China, Turkey, and some Gulf states with different goals and policies.

The 48 Laws of Power

The 48 Laws of Power
Author: Robert Greene
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 481
Release: 2023-10-31
Genre: Self-Help
ISBN: 0670881465

Amoral, cunning, ruthless, and instructive, this multi-million-copy New York Times bestseller is the definitive manual for anyone interested in gaining, observing, or defending against ultimate control – from the author of The Laws of Human Nature. In the book that People magazine proclaimed “beguiling” and “fascinating,” Robert Greene and Joost Elffers have distilled three thousand years of the history of power into 48 essential laws by drawing from the philosophies of Machiavelli, Sun Tzu, and Carl Von Clausewitz and also from the lives of figures ranging from Henry Kissinger to P.T. Barnum. Some laws teach the need for prudence (“Law 1: Never Outshine the Master”), others teach the value of confidence (“Law 28: Enter Action with Boldness”), and many recommend absolute self-preservation (“Law 15: Crush Your Enemy Totally”). Every law, though, has one thing in common: an interest in total domination. In a bold and arresting two-color package, The 48 Laws of Power is ideal whether your aim is conquest, self-defense, or simply to understand the rules of the game.

Peace and Security in Indo-Pacific Asia

Peace and Security in Indo-Pacific Asia
Author: Sorpong Peou
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 251
Release: 2021-11-21
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1000462609

Peace and Security in Indo-Pacific Asia is for the informed, the interested, and the engaged. Sorpong Peou brings together the skills of the pedagogue with the knowledge of the scholar. -Dr. David Dewitt, University Professor Emeritus, Senior Scholar, York University, Toronto, Canada. Peou’s excellent book provides both the lay reader and the specialist with six important theoretical frameworks which should provide the basis for better appreciation of what a security community in Indo-Pacific Asia means in our world today. There are very few scholars who understand the region like Peou. -Dr. W. Andy Knight, Professor of Political Science, the University of Alberta, Canada. Sorpong Peou’s extraordinary breadth of knowledge, of both International Relations theory and the key trends in Indo-Pacific Asia, shines through in this authoritative analysis. -Dr. Richard Stubbs, Professor of Political Science, McMaster University, Canada. A pedagogical approach of the textbook that is appreciated is how the author respectfully engages with the theories of IR and is not pushing an agenda of denouncing some theories and trying to persuade the reader of others. We live in such polarizing times that it is truly refreshing to read scholarly work that avoids sensationalistic attacks on theories that have been debated for decades. Each theory in this manuscript is explored on its own terms, and the reader is encouraged to figure out where they stand on these enduring debates in the context of Indo-Pacific security. The approach will lead to compelling classroom discussions of the theories and the politics of the region. This book is a must-read for any student or observer of security trends in the region. -Dr. Mark Williams, Chair and Professor of Political Studies, Vancouver Island University, B.C., Canada.

Soft Power

Soft Power
Author: Hendrik W. Ohnesorge
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 323
Release: 2019-11-22
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 3030299228

This book explores the phenomenon of soft power in international relations. In the context of current discourses on power and global power shift s, it puts forward a comprehensive taxonomy of soft power and outlines a methodological roadmap for its empirical study. To that end, the book classifies soft power into distinct components - resources, instruments, reception, and outcomes - and identifies relevant indicators for each of these categories. Moreover, the book integrates previously neglected aspects into the concept of soft power, including the significance of (political) personalities. A broad range of historical examples is drawn upon to illustrate the effects of soft power in international relations in an innovative and analytically differentiated way. A central methodological contribution of this book consists in highlighting the value of comparative-historical analysis (CHA) as a promising approach for empirical analyses of the soft power of different actors on the international stage. By introducing a comprehensive taxonomy of soft power, the book offers an innovative and substantiated perspective on a pivotal phenomenon in today’s international relations. As the forces of attraction in world politics continue to gain in importance, it provides a valuable asset for a broad readership. This book was the winner of the 2021 ifa (German Institute for Foreign Cultural Relations) Research Award on Foreign Cultural Policy. “In this important and thoughtful book, Hendrik Ohnesorge explains and advances our knowledge of the ways that soft power, public diplomacy, and charismatic personal diplomacy are shaping the international relations of our global information age.” Joseph S. Nye, Jr., Harvard University and author of The Future of Power