1.3 A History of Global Politics Creating an International Order PDF

**1.3 - A History of Global Politics: Creating an International Order** The world is composed of many countries or states, all of them having different forms of government. Some scholars of politics are interested in individual states and examine the internal politics of these countries. For exampl...

**1.3 - A History of Global Politics: Creating an International Order** The world is composed of many countries or states, all of them having different forms of government. Some scholars of politics are interested in individual states and examine the internal politics of these countries. For example, a scholar studying the politics of japan may write about the history of its bureaucracy. Other scholars are more interested in the interaction between states rather than their internal politics. These scholars look at trade deals between states. They also study political, military, and other diplomatic engagement between two or more countries. These scholars are studying *[international relations]*. Moreover, when they explore the deepening of interactions between states, they refer to the phenomenon of *[internationalization.]* Internationalization does not equal globalization, although it is a major part of globalization. As we explained in lesson 1, globalization encompasses a multitude of connections and interactions that cannot be reduced to the ties between governments. Nevertheless, it is important to study international relations as a facet of globalization, because states/governments are key drivers of global processes. In this lesson, we will examine internationalization as one window to view the globalization of politics. Although this course is about the contemporary world, we cannot avoid history. What international relations are today is largely defined by events that occurred as far back as 400 years ago. Don\'t worry; we will eventually discuss contemporary world politics. But to do that, we need first to work backward. This lesson will begin with identifying the major attributes of contemporary global politics and then proceed to ask: How did this system emerge? In doing so, you will have a solid foundation to understand the major issues of global governance in the next lesson. **The Attributes of Today\'s Global System** World politics today has four key attributes. First, there are countries of states that are independent and govern themselves. Second, these countries interact with each other through diplomatic. Third, there are international organizations, like the United Nations (UN), that facilitate these interactions. Fourth, beyond simply facilitating meetings between states, international organization also take on lives of their own. The UN, for example, apart from being a meeting ground for presidents and other heads of state, also has task-specific agencies like the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Labour Organization (ILO). What are the origins of this system? A good start is by unpacking what one means when he/she says a \"country\", or what academics also call the *nation-state*. This concept is not as simple as it seems. The nation-state is a relatively modern phenomenon in human history, and people did not always organize themselves as countries. At different parts in the history of humanity, people in various regions of the world have identified exclusively with unit as small as their village or their tribe, and at other times, they see themselves as members of larger political categories like \"Christendom\" (the entire Christian world). The nation-state is composed of two non-interchangeable terms. Not all states are nations and not all nations are states. The nation of Scotland, for example, has its own flag and national culture, but still belongs to a state called the United Kingdom. Closer to home, many commentators believe that the Bangsamoro is a separate nation existing within the Philippines but, through their elites, recognized the authority of the Philippine state. Meanwhile, if there are states with multiple nations, there are also single nations with multiple states. The nation of Korea is divided into North and South Korea, whereas the \"Chinese nation\" may refer to both the People\'s Republic of China (the mainland) and Taiwan. **What then is the different between nation and state?** In layman\'s terms, state refers to a country and its government, i.e., the government of the Philippines. A state has four attributes. First, it exercises his authority over a specific population, called its *citizens*. Second, governs a specific territory. Third, a state has a structure of *government* that crafts various rules that people (society) follow. Fourth and the most crucial, the state has *sovereignty* over its territory. Sovereignty here refers to internal and external authority. Internally, no individuals or groups can operate in a given national territory by ignoring the state. This means that groups like the churches, civil society organizations, corporations, and other entities have to follow the laws of the state where they establish their parishes, offices, or headquarters. Externally, sovereignty means that a state\'s policies and procedures are independent of the interventions of other states. Russia or China, for example cannot pass laws for the Philippines and vice versa. On the other hand, the nation, according to Benedict Anderson, is an \"imagined community\". It is limited because it does not go beyond a given \"official boundary\", and because rights and responsibilities are mainly the privilege and concern of the citizens of that nation. Being limited means that the nation has its boundaries. This characteristic is in stark contrast to many religious imagined communities. Anyone, for example, can become a Catholic if one chooses to. In fact, Catholics want more people to join their community; they refer to it is the call to discipleship. But not everyone can simply become a Filipino. An American cannot simply go to the Philippine Embassy and \"convert\" into the Philippine citizen. Nations often limit themselves to people who have imbibed a particular culture, spoke a common language, and live in a specific territory. Calling it \"imagined\" does not mean that the nation is made up. Rather, the nation allows one to feel a connection with a community of people even if he/she will never meet all of them in his /her lifetime. When you cheer for a Filipino at athlete in the Olympics, for example, it is not because you personally know that athlete. Rather you imagine your connection as both members of the same Filipino community. In a given national territory like the Philippine archipelago, you rest in the comfort that the majority of people living in it are also Filipinos. Finally, most nations strive to become states. Nation-builders can only feel a sense of fulfillment when that national ideal assumes an organizational form whose authority and power are recognized and accepted by \"the people\". Moreover, if there are communities that are not states, they often seek some form of autonomy within their \"mother states\". This is why, for example, the nation of Quebec, though belonging to the state of Canada, has different laws about language (they are French-speaking and require French language competencies for their citizens). It is also for this reason that Scotland, though part of the United Kingdom, has a strong independence movement led by the Scottish Nationalist Party. Nation and state are closely related because it is nationalism that facilitates state formation. In the modern and contemporary era, it has been the nationalist movements that have allowed for the creation of nation-states. States become independent and sovereign because if nationalist sentiment that clamors for this independence. Sovereignty is, thus, one of the fundamental principles of modern state politics. Understanding how this became the case entails going back as far as 400 years ago. **The Interstate System** The origins of the present-day concept of sovereignty can be traced back to the Treaty of Westphalia, which was a set of agreements signed in 1648 to end the Thirty Years' War between the major continental powers of Europe. After a brutal religious war between Catholics and Protestants, the Holy Roman Empire, Spain, France, Sweden, and the Dutch Republic designed a system that would avert wars in the future by recognizing that the treaty signers exercise complete control over their domestic affairs and swear not to meddle in each other\'s affairs. The Westphalian system provided stability for the nations of Europe, until it faced its first major challenge by Napoleon Bonaparte. Bonaparte believed in spreading the principles of the French Revolution-liberty, equality, and fraternity-to the rest of Europe and thus challenged the power of kings, nobility, and religion in Europe. The Napoleonic Wars lasted from 1803-1815 with Napoleon and his armies marching all over much of Europe. In every country they conquered, the French implemented the Napoleonic Code that forbade birth privileges, encouraged freedom or religion, and promoted meritocracy in government service. This system shocked the monarchies and the hereditary elites (dukes, duchesses, etc.) of Europe, and they mustered their armies to push back against the French emperor. Anglo and Prussian armies finally defeated Napoleon in the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, ending the latter's mission to spread his liberal code across Europe. To prevent another war and to keep their systems of privilege, the royal powers created a new system that, in effect, restored the Westphalian system. The Concert of Europe was an alliance of great powers the United Kingdom, Austria, Russia, and Prussia-that sought to restore the world of monarchical, hereditary, and religious privileges of the time before the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars. More importantly, it was an alliance that sought to restore the sovereignty of states. Under this Metternich system (named after the Austrian diplomat, Klemens von Metternich, who was the system\'s main architect), the Concert\'s power and authority lasted from 1815 to 1914, at the dawn of World War I. Despite the challenge of Napoleon to the Westphalian system and the eventual collapse of the Concert of Europe after World War 1, present-day international system still has traces of this history. Until now, states are considered sovereign, and Napoleonic attempts to violently impose systems of government in other countries are frowned upon. Moreover, like the Concert system, "great powers" still hold significant influence over world politics. For example, the most powerful grouping in the UN, the Security Council has a core of five permanent members, all having veto powers over the council\'s decision-making process. **Internationalism** The Westphalian and Concert systems divided the world into separate, sovereign entities. Since the existence of this interstate system, there have been attempts to transcend it. Some, like Bonaparte, directly challenged the system by infringing on other states' sovereignty, while others sought to imagine other systems of governance that go beyond, but do not necessarily challenge, sovereignty. Still, others imagine a system of heightened interaction between various sovereign states, particularly the desire for greater cooperation and unity among states and peoples. This desire is called *[internationalism]*. Internationalism comes in different forms, but the principle may be divided into two broad categories: *[liberal internationalism]* and *[socialist internationalism]*. The first major thinker of liberal internationalism was the late 18th century German philosopher Immanuel Kant. Kant likened states in a global system to people living in a given territory. If people living together require a government to prevent lawlessness, shouldn\'t that same principle be applied to states? Without a form of world government, he argued, the international system would be chaotic. Therefore, states, like citizens of countries, must give up some freedoms and "establish a continuously growing state consisting of various nations which will ultimately include the nations of the world.\" In short, Kant imagined a form of global government. Writing in the late 18th century as well, British philosopher Jeremy Bentham (who coined the word \"international" in 1780), advocated the creation of *[\"international law"]* that would govern the inter-state relations. Bentham believed that objective global legislators should aim to propose legislation that would create \"the greatest happiness of all nations taken together.\" To many, these proposals for global government and international law seemed to represent challenges to states. Would not a world government, in effect, become supreme? And would not its laws overwhelm the sovereignty of individual states? The first thinker to reconcile nationalism with liberal internationalism was the 19th century Italian patriot Giuseppe Mazzini. Mazzini was both an advocate of the unification of the various Italian-speaking mini-states and a major critic of the Metternich system. He believed in a Republican government (without kings, queens, and hereditary succession) and proposed a system of free nations that cooperated with each other to create an international system. For Mazzini, free, independent states would be the basis of an equally free, cooperative international system. He argued that if the various Italian mini-states could unity, one could scale up the system to create, for example, a United States of Europe. Mazzini was a nationalist internationalist, who believes that free, unified nation-states should be the basis of global cooperation. Mazzini influenced the thinking of United States president (1913-1921) Woodrow Wilson, who became one of the 20^th^ century\'s most prominent internationalist. Like Mazzini, Wilson saw nationalism as a prerequisite for internationalism. Because of his faith in nationalism, he forwarded the *principle of self-determination*-the belief that the world's nations had a right to a free, and sovereign government. He hoped that these free nations would become democracies, because only by being such would they be able to build a free system of international relations based on international law and cooperation. Wilson, in short, became the most notable advocate for the creation of the League of Nations At the end of World War I in 1918, he pushed to transform the League into a venue for conciliation and arbitration to prevent another war. For his efforts, Wilson was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1919. The League came into being that same year. Ironically and unfortunately for Wilson, the United States was not able to join the organization due to strong opposition from the Senate. The League was also unable to hinder another war from breaking out. It was practically helpless to prevent the onset and intensification of World War II. On one side of the war were the Axis Powers Hitler\'s Germany, Mussolini\'s Italy, and Hirohito\'s Japan- who were ultra-nationalists that had an instinctive disdain for internationalism and preferred to violently impose their dominance over other nations. It was in the midst of this war between the Axis Powers and the Allied Powers (composed of the United States, United Kingdom, France, Holland, and Belgium) that internationalism would be eclipsed. Despite its failure, the League gave birth to some of the more task-specific international organizations that are still around until today, the most popular of which are the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Labour Organization (ILO). More importantly, it would serve as the blueprint for future forms of international cooperation. In this respect, despite its organizational dissolution, the League of Nations principles survived World War II. The League was the concretization of the concepts of liberal internationalism. From Kant, it emphasized the need to form common international principles. From Mazzini, it enshrined the principles of cooperation and respect among nation-states. From Wilson, it called for democracy and self-determination. These ideas would re-assert themselves in the creation of the United Nations in 1946 (see next lesson). One of Mazzini\'s biggest critics was German socialist philosopher Karl Marx who was also an internationalist, but who differed from the former because he did not believe in nationalism, He believed that any true form of internationalism should deliberately reject nationalism, which rooted people in domestic concerns instead of global ones. Instead, Marx placed a premium on economic equality; he did not divide the world into countries but into classes. The capitalist class referred to the owners of factories, companies, and other "means of production". In contrast, the proletariat class included those who did not own the means of production, but instead, worked for the capitalists. Marx and his co-author, Friedrich Engels, believed that in a socialist revolution seeking to overthrow the state and alter the economy, the proletariat "had no nation." Hence, their now- famous battle cry, \"Workers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains." They opposed nationalism because they believed it prevented the unification of the world\'s workers. Instead of identifying with other workers, nationalism could make workers in individual countries identify with the capitalists of their countries. Marx died in 1883, but his followers soon sought to make his vision concrete by establishing their international organization. The *[Socialist International]* (SI) was a union of European socialist and labor parties established in Paris in 1889. Although short- lived, the SI\'s achievements included the declaration of May 1 as *[Labor Day]* and the creation of an *[International Women's] Day*. Most importantly, it initiated the successful campaign for an 8-hour workday. The SI collapsed during World War I as the member parties refused or were unable to join the internationalist efforts to fight for the war. Many of these sister parties even ended up fighting each other. It was a confirmation of Marx's warning: when workers and their organizations take the side of their countries instead of each other, their long-term interests are compromised. As the SI collapsed, a more radical version emerged. N the so-called Russian Revolution of 1917, Czar Nicholas II was overthrown and replaced by a revolutionary government led by the Bolshevik Party and its leader, Vladimir Lenin. This new state was called the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, or USSR. Unlike the majority of the member parties of the SI, the Bolsheviks did not believe in obtaining power for the working class through elections. Rather, they exhorted the revolutionary \"vanguard\" parties to lead the revolutions across the world, using methods of terror if necessary. Today, parties like this are referred to as Communist parties. To encourage these socialist revolutions across the world, Lenin established the [*Communist International*] (Comintern) in 1919. The Comintern served as the central body for directing Communist parties all over the world. This International was not only more radical than the Socialist International; it was also less democratic because it followed closely the top-down governance of the Bolsheviks. Many of the world\'s states feared the Comintern, believing that it was working in secret to stir up revolutions in their countries (which was true). A problem arose during World War II when the Soviet Union joined the Allied Powers in 1941. The United States and the United Kingdom would, of course, not trust the Soviet Union in their fight against Hitler's Germany. These countries wondered if the Soviet Union was trying to promote revolutions in their backyards. To appease his allies, Lenin\'s successor, Joseph Stalin, dissolved the Comintern in 1943 After the war, however, Stalin re-established the Comintern as the *Communist information Bureau* (Cominform) The Soviet Union took over the countries in Eastern Europe when the United States, the Soviet Union, and Great Britain divided the war-torn Europe into their respective spheres of influence. The Cominiform, like the Comintern before it, helped direct the various communist parties that had taken power in Eastern Europe. With the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, whatever existing thoughts about communist internationalism also practically disappeared. The SI managed to re-establish itself in 1951, but its influence remained primarily confined to Europe, and has never been considered a major player in international relations to this very day. For the postwar period, however, liberal internationalism would once again be ascendant. And the best evidence of this is the rise of the United Nations as the center of global governance. **Conclusion** This lesson examined the roots of the international system in tracing these roots, a short history of internationalism was provided. Moreover, internationalism is but one window into the broader phenomenon of globalization. Nevertheless, it is a very crucial aspect of globalization since global interactions are heightened by the increased interdependence of states. This increased interdependence manifests itself not just through state-to-state relations. Increasingly, international relations are also facilitated by international organizations that promote global norms and policies. The most prominent example of this organization, of course, is the United Nations.