Dilemmas of Brazilian Grand Strategy

Dilemmas of Brazilian Grand Strategy
Author: Hal Brands
Publisher: Lulu.com
Total Pages: 88
Release: 2012-07-31
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1300039159

This is a review of Brazilian grand strategy under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. During Lula's nearly 8 years in office, he has pursued a multi-tiered grand strategy aimed at hastening the transition from unipolarity to a multipolar order in which international rules, norms, and institutions are more favorable to Brazilian interests. Lula has done so by emphasizing three diplomatic strategies: soft-balancing, coalition-building, and seeking to position Brazil as the leader of a more united South America. This strategy has successfully raised Brazil's profile and increased its diplomatic flexibility, but it has also exposed the country to four potent strategic dilemmas that could complicate or undermine its ascent. These touch on issues ranging from anemic macroeconomic performance to rising tensions in Brazil's relationship with the USA. The efficacy of Brazilian grand strategy-and its implications-will be contingent on how Lula's successors address these dilemmas.

Comparative Grand Strategy

Comparative Grand Strategy
Author: Thierry Balzacq
Publisher:
Total Pages: 367
Release: 2019
Genre: History
ISBN: 0198840845

The essential introduction to the comparative analysis of national grand strategies.

Alignment, Alliance, and American Grand Strategy

Alignment, Alliance, and American Grand Strategy
Author: Zachary Alan Selden
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
Total Pages: 261
Release: 2016-07-27
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0472122126

Although US foreign policy was largely unpopular in the early 2000s, many nation-states, especially those bordering Russia and China, expanded their security cooperation with the United States. In Alignment, Alliance, and American Grand Strategy, Zachary Selden notes that the regional power of these two illiberal states prompt threatened neighboring states to align with the United States. Gestures of alignment include participation in major joint military exercises, involvement in US-led operations, the negotiation of agreements for US military bases, and efforts to join a US-led alliance. By contrast, Brazil is also a rising regional power, but as it is a democratic state, its neighbors have not sought greater alliance with the United States. Amid calls for retrenchment or restraint, Selden makes the case that a policy focused on maintaining American military preeminence and the demonstrated willingness to use force may be what sustains the cooperation of second-tier states, which in turn help to maintain US hegemony at a manageable cost.

The Oxford Handbook of Grand Strategy

The Oxford Handbook of Grand Strategy
Author: Thierry Balzacq
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 801
Release: 2021-09-13
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0192576623

A clearly articulated, well-defined, and relatively stable grand strategy is supposed to allow the ship of state to steer a steady course through the roiling seas of global politics. However, the obstacles to formulating and implementing grand strategy are, by all accounts, imposing. The Oxford Handbook of Grand Strategy addresses the conceptual and historical foundations, production, evolution, and future of grand strategy from a wide range of standpoints. The seven constituent sections present and critically examine the history of grand strategy, including beyond the West; six distinct theoretical approaches to the subject; the sources of grand strategy, ranging from geography and technology to domestic politics to individual psychology and culture; the instruments of grand strategy's implementation, from military to economic to covert action; political actors', including non-state actors', grand strategic choices; the debatable merits of grand strategy, relative to alternatives; and the future of grand strategy, in light of challenges ranging from political polarization to technological change to aging populations. The result is a field-defining, interdisciplinary, and comparative text that will be a key resource for years to come.

Brazil’s Africa Strategy

Brazil’s Africa Strategy
Author: C. Stolte
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 232
Release: 2015-04-16
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1137499575

The book analyzes Brazil's Africa engagement as a rising power's strategy to gain global recognition, linking it to Brazil's broader foreign policy objectives and shedding light on the mechanisms of Brazilian status-seeking in Africa.

Military Strategy of Middle Powers

Military Strategy of Middle Powers
Author: Håkan Edström
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 242
Release: 2020-10-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 1000204669

Military Strategy of Middle Powers explores to what degree twenty-first-century middle powers adjust their military strategies due to changes in the international order, such as the decline in US power. The overarching objective of the book is to explain continuity and change in the strategies of a group of middle powers during the twenty-first century. These strategies are described, compared, and explained through the lens of Realism. In order to find potential explanations for change or continuity within the cases, as well as for similarities and differences between the cases, the strategies of 11 ‘middle’ powers are analysed (Canada, Germany, Italy, Spain, Australia, Brazil, Indonesia, South Africa, India, Japan, and South Korea). This group of countries are considered similar in several important aspects, primarily regarding relative power capacity. When searching for potential explanations for different strategic behaviours among the middle powers, their unique regional characteristics are a key focus and, consequently, the impact of the structure and polarity, as well as the patterns of amity and enmity, of the regional context are analysed. The empirical investigation is focused on security strategies used since the terrorist attacks 9/11 2001, which was one of the first major challenges to US hegemony. This book will be of much interest to students of military and strategic studies, foreign policy, and International Relations in general.

Status in World Politics

Status in World Politics
Author: T. V. Paul
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 323
Release: 2014-04-07
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1107059275

A systematic study of why rising powers seek greater status in world politics and when dominant powers recognize their claims.

A Neoclassical Realist Approach to Turkey under JDP Rule

A Neoclassical Realist Approach to Turkey under JDP Rule
Author: Göktuğ Sönmez
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 296
Release: 2020-02-24
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 1527547523

This book addresses the shift in Turkish foreign policy in the post-Cold War era from a neoclassical realist point of view. In its analysis of Turkey’s pursuit of ‘an activist grand strategy’, it focuses on the interplay between international and domestic factors. It puts forth its argument through analysis of Turkey’s bilateral relations with Iran, Israel and the European Union. It offers comprehensive examinations of international relations theory and neoclassical realism (NCR). The book not only makes sense of Turkish foreign policy under the JDP rule, but also provides a comprehensive analysis of NCR’s explanatory power. It will primarily appeal to scholars on Turkey, international relations theory, realism, and Middle Eastern politics and students studying these areas, as well as think-tankers, journalists and researchers.

Laying the BRICS of a New Global Order

Laying the BRICS of a New Global Order
Author: Kornegay, Francis A.
Publisher: Africa Institute of South Africa
Total Pages: 482
Release: 2013-10-20
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0798304030

The contributions in this compilation on the emergence of a new global order through BRICS serve to illustrate the complexities inherent in the creation of such a coalition - alternatively referred to as a 'grouping', 'association' or 'forum' - with each country differently situated geo-politically as well as ideologically and culturally, and in some instances even in conflict with one another in matters of regional peace and security. The fact that there are important commonalities of converging interests, amongst others, the status of emerging economic powers and the furtherance of South-South cooperation as well as reforming global governance, cannot and should not hide complexities and contradictions. These are clearly apparent both within and between the BRICS countries. These diversities are also clear from the varied perspectives of the chapter authors in this compilation, which is why we have assembled this collection relatively loosely as a means of expressing our intellectual and analytic convergences and divergences within and across BRICS. Each chapter contributor writes from a different discipline, country and regional perspective, and it is this diversity that enriches the debate and conversation. As such, there remains enormous room for debate on the subject matter of this book and the diverse contributions open up the parameters of the debate even further. The aim is to ensure that scholars, commentators and practitioners continue to engage critically with theory and practice related to global multilateralism, and BRICS in particular.