[PINR] Oct. 20, 2004: Instability in World Politics

[nosmokes]

http://www.pinr.com
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October 20, 2004:



Past PINR analyses that cover a similar issue of today's analysis can be found at the following URLs:

"Readjustment to American Weakness: Signs of a Power Vacuum"
http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=185

"The New Regionalism: Drifting Toward Multipolarity"
http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=178

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"An Era of Instability in World Politics"

Drafted by Dr. Michael A. Weinstein on October 20, 2004
http://www.pinr.com

For the past generation, the major political actors in the world have been trying to find their ways to a new formula of stability in the wake of the collapse of the bipolar framework set up by the opposition between the United States and the Soviet Union.
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- Globalization, Empire and Multipolarity

Through the 1990s, a new paradigm of world order seemed to be emerging that was encapsulated in the term "globalization." For its advocates and prophets, globalization signaled a comprehensive transformation of social organization in which peaceful economic competition conducted through the mediation of market democracies and inter-governmental organizations -- dominated by the United States -- would supplant military conflict. As forwarded by the two Clinton administrations, the globalization paradigm made the United States -- as Secretary of State Madeleine Albright famously put it -- the "indispensable nation" for keeping the peace and furthering the system of market democracies.
~snip~
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- An Era of Instability

The most important and least noted consequence of the revelation of American military limitations is the opening up of a partial power vacuum in world politics. The suspicion that the United States will find it difficult to undertake another preemptive war and will be hesitant to play its military card in regional trouble spots -- yet might still do so -- creates a general climate of uncertainty across the globe. Each great and regional power is constrained to reassess its geostrategy to accord with the perceived opportunities and threats that have arisen in the new definition of the situation. Those reassessments are conducted within a general horizon of uncertainty, because there is no paradigm of world order to which policymakers can refer.
~snip~
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- An Era of Danger

As great and regional powers test their own and one another's limits, they will do so in an environment fraught with danger. All of the issues that were present before 9/11 and the Iraq intervention are still open and there are also new ones.
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- Conclusion

The scenario of instability sketched above is only one possibility present in the current world situation, but it needs to be considered because it is based on a widespread and well grounded perception that American power has been diminished and that there is no international or single-power replacement for it. The utopian decade of the 1990s has given way to a period of uncertainty and testing with increased possibilities for miscalculation.
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complete article at http://www.pinr.com

- The Power and Interest News Report (PINR) is an analysis-based publication that seeks to, as objectively as possible, provide insight into various conflicts, regions and points of interest around the globe. PINR approaches a subject based upon the powers and interests involved, leaving the moral judgments to the reader. This report may not be reproduced, reprinted or broadcast without the written permission of [email protected]. All comments should be directed to [email protected].