Responses on the papers

Discussion #5 Chapter 18

In chapter 18 of Power & Choice: An Introduction to Political Science author Philips Shively discusses and describes international and global politics. Shively explains how the international political system has changed since the Cold War.

According to Shively the first major development that began to change our international system was during the 1970’s. This was a time when more non-state participants involved in international politics began to quickly grow. These non-state participants included the nongovernmental international organization (NGO’s) and the intergovernmental organizations (IGO’s) NGO’s represent any organization that was not set up and is run independently from the government. IGO’s are organizations founded through governmental treaties but have a separate governmental structure to insure that no one state has control over them (Shively 397). The way states now depend on each other, especially for trade, has also contributed to the formation of the modern international political structure. Between the years of 1970 to 1980 for example, Shively shows us how the United States trade with other countries nearly doubled (397). The end of the U.S.A and the U.S.S.R’s completion between each other also led to a power imbalance that effected many third world countries and led to many power shifts to countries such as China, France, Germany and Japan (Shively 398). Shively also mentions how there was a shift to the open market in many of the larger states around the world. This in turn made many of the world’s states more alike and indifferent from one another. Shively claims this change was possibly due to many collapsed communist systems as well as many new trade alliances being formed. Finally the fifth contribution towards the formation of the modern international political structure was the formation of international bodies that were able to enforce laws on many leaders of states. This in turn meant that this international body could theoretically directly control state actions.

In this chapter Shively also discusses two case studies that relate to the idea of international and global politics. The first one being “An Internal Failure: Rwanda”. Rwanda is a small and heavily populated country in Africa that is home to two groups of people: The Tutsis and the Hutu. The Tutsis were the minority only making up about 16 percent of the population yet they controlled all of the nation’s politics. The Hutu made up the remaining 84 percent of the population and they were simply farmers (Shively 416). After the country gained its independence in 1962 it suffered from a series of conflicts between the two tribes which ultimately led to the Hutu violently gaining control of the state. The Hutu were ferocious aggressors towards the Tutsis and killed them in extremely violent ways, such as cutting the feet off their enemies (Shively 417). This violence ultimately reached the level of genocide, which was against one of the United Nations international laws. However none of the major countries such as Britain or the United States bothered to step in and help save the Tutsis from annihilation. This is an example of how international law has no way of being enforced unless another country wants to volunteer their services. The second example Shively examines is “The United Nations”. The United Nations (UN) was created by the Ally powers after World War II in order to help keep world peace (Shively 418). The UN currently has 193 members and is set up like a democracy. Every member state is a member of the General Assembly and each gets one vote towards international policies and laws. This voting system is checked through a group called the Security Council, which is composed of the U.S, France, Britain, Russia and China. There are also 10 other states that circulate through the Security Council every two years. These Security Council members are each given the power to veto the UN’s decisions (Shively 419). The UN was primarily created to be a peacekeeper organization for the world, it would have the ability to deploy member state troops who were not currently at war as a sort of international police to areas that needed the help. Due to the Cold War however that became difficult being that the U.S and Russia would simply veto anything the other did, which severely reduced the role the UN could play on the international scene. The UN was further plagued by: A lack of power, finances, states like Japan and India who wanted permanent Security Council seats and of course the 2003 invasion of Iraq which all members of the Security Council, except the U.S, apposed (Shively 420). Currently the UN is going through some reforms and leadership changes, but it is still a vital player on the international field.