Unipolarity and World Politics

by Birthe Hansen

• ISBN13: 9780203832301
• ISBN10: 0203832302
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 2010-12-16
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Summary

Unipolarity is usually described either as a 'brief moment' or as something historically insignificant. However, we have already seen nearly twenty years of virtual unipolarity (from 21 September 1989), and this period has indeed been of significance for world politics.This volume provides a theoretical framework for analysis of the current world order and identifies the patterns of outcomes and systematic variations to be expected. While particularistic or hermeneutic approaches may provide us with solid and comprehensive knowledge about individual incidents, the advantage of systemic-structural theory is that it brings some sort of order into the otherwise messy empirical world. Terrorism and attempts by small states to achieve a nuclear capability are not new phenomena or exclusive to the current world order, but in the case of unipolarity these have become attached to the fear of marginalization and the struggle against a powerful centre without the possibility of allying with an alternative superpower.This book supplies a coherent theoretical model for unipolarity, which can provide explanations of trends and patterns in the turbulent post-Cold War era. The book will be of interest to students of IR theory, international security and foreign policy.