Dominant theories of international political economy leave little room for the influence of individuals. They also never anticipated that the United States might seek to completely upend the global economic order.
Everyone agrees China is a rising power. Some people think it can rise indefinitely; some people think its rise will decelerate; and some think that its rise is illusory. But it's hard to put even...
Photo credit: lhgszch on Flickr.Back in December 2009, I wrote a post for the Duck called "Wal-mart Isn't Green." Jared Diamond had written a provocative op-ed about various green business...
Why would anyone even suggest such a thing?THE [Irish] GOVERNMENT has complained to the European Commission over the release in Germany of a document disclosing confidential details about new taxes...
Yesterday, my class on U.S. Foreign Policy considered Walter Russell Mead's Hamiltonian School -- ostensibly an American realism grounded in the aligned interests of the state and business. The Hamiltonians have their roots in Alexander Hamilton. They have always believed that the American national strategy should be modeled on the British system: use your trade to make money through commerce; government should support large business; your trade policy should be an instrument of your economic development, however that benefits you most; and then, the revenues from your international trade...
I just re-read Susan Strange's article, "The Westfailure System" in the Review of International Studies 25, 3 (July 1999). In either early 1999 or late 1998 (depending on the editorial schedule of RIS), she wrote:"I have put the financial failures of the state-based system first because my current research has convinced me that it is the most acute and urgent of the current threats-without-enemies. If we do not find ways to safeguard the world economy before a succession of stockmarket collapses and bank failures eventually lands us all in a 20-year economic recession -- as the history of...
Here's an interesting factoid: For the first time since the Great Depression, the migration of people from the less-developed to developed countries may have reversed. Remittances are expected to be dropping next year by 8 percent. On the other hand, many of the returnees have skills and capital, and that may help back home.
Via sitemeter I recently found my way to IPE at UNC. Which leads me to wonder: I know there's a fairly robust subculture of security blogs--and camps within that subculture, such as COIN and nG Warfare* blog communities--but what about IPE?*With n equaling a value between four and six, inclusive.
Joshua Kurlantzick recently argued that the global economic downturn might spell doom for a number of autocratic governments around the world. Most, he argues, have staked their legitimacy on economic performance. Dramaticaly reduced world demand for consumer goods and energy threatens states like China, Russia, and Venezuela (and perhaps also Iran and other OPEC states): Modern autocracies are very different from those of the past. Rather than ruling by strict ideology, ruthless internal police, and tight control of information, authoritarian regimes like Beijing and Moscow have remained in...
The G-20 is wrapping up in London, and they seem to have successfully issued a communique that is actually more than straight boilerplate non-commitment.My hope is that the reforms discussed for the IMF begin a re-fastening of the embedded-liberalism that has served as the foundation of the international order and an institutionalization of this new compact.The global economic turmoil is revealing two key structural facets of the international order. First, the US remains the Hegemon. In the end, the world is looking to the US for leadership, and its clear that only the US can provide the...
A friend writes,* "What the end of hegemony looks like..."In another indication that China is growing increasingly concerned about holding huge dollar reserves, the head of its central bank has called for the eventual creation of a new international currency reserve to replace the dollar.In a paper released Monday, Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of the People’s Bank of China, said a new currency reserve system controlled by the International Monetary Fund could prove more stable and economically viable.A new system is necessary, he said, because the global economic crisis has revealed the...
Get thee over to The Monkey Cage. Once there, read Henry's summary of the debate in the current issue of the Review of International Political Economy concerning US IPE monoculture. The thematic issue, which has been in the works for quite some time, could not have come at a better moment. With the discipline of Economics shaken by the irrelevance of much of their work to recent events, I have to wonder if, and when, those who have designed IPE with the goal of emulating the dismal science will make more of an effort to open their subfield to the benefits of intellectual heterodoxy.