Politics
Politics, in its broadest sense, refers to the activity through which people make, preserve and amend the general rules under which they live. Politics is inextricably linked to the phenomena of conflict
and cooperation. On the one hand, the existence of rival opinions, different wants, competing needs
and opposing interests guarantees disagreement about the rules under which people live. On the
other hand, people recognize that, in order to influence these rules or ensure their enforcement,
they must work with others. However, politics is an ‘essentially contested’ concept (Gallie 1955/56). It has been defined, variously, as the art of government, as public affairs generally, as the non-violent
resolution of disputes, and as power and the distribution of resources.
Now what is the meaning of global politics???Why ‘global politics’? What does it mean to suggest that politics has ‘goneglobal’? And how does ‘global’ politics differ from ‘international’ politics? Theterm ‘global’ has two meanings, and these have quite different implications as far
as global politics is concerned. In the first, global means worldwide, having planetary (not merely regional or national) significance. The globe is, in effect, the world. Global politics, in this sense, refers to politics that is conducted at a global rather than a national or regional level. There is no doubt that the global or worldwide dimension of politics has, in recent decades, become more signifi-
cant. There has been a growth of international organizations, some of which, like the United Nations , come close to having a universal membership. A growing number of political issues have also acquired a ‘global’ character, in that they affect, actually or potentially, all parts of the world and so all people on the planet. This particularly applies in the case of the environment, often seen as the
paradigm example of a ‘global’ issue, because nature operates as an interconnected whole, in which everything affects everything else. The same, we are often told, applies to the economy, where it is commonplace to refer to the ‘global economy’ or ‘global capitalism’, in that fewer and fewer countries now remain outside the international trading system and are unaffected by external invest-
ment and the integration of financial markets. For theorists of globalization, this trend towards global interconnectedness is not only perhaps the defining feature of modern existence, but also requires that traditional approaches to learning need to be rethought, in this case by adopting a ‘borderless’ or ‘transplanetary’ approach to politics.
However, the notion that politics and, for that matter, everything else has been caught up in a swirl of interconnectedness that effectively absorbs all of its parts, or ‘units’, into an indivisible, global whole, is very difficult to sustain. The claim that we live in a ‘borderless world’, or the assertion that the state is dead and sovereignty is irrelevant (Ohmae 1990, 1996), remain distinctly fanciful
ideas. In no meaningful sense has politics at the global level transcended politics at the national, local or, for that matter, any other level. This is why the notion of global politics, as used in this book, draws on the second meaning of ‘global’. In this view, global means comprehensive; it refers to all elements within a system,not just to the system as a whole. Global politics thus takes place not just at aglobal level, but at and, crucially, across, all levels – worldwide, regional, national,
sub-national and so on . From this perspective, the advent of global politics does not imply that international politics should be consigned to the dustbin of history. Rather, ‘the global’ and ‘the international’ coexist: they complement one another and should not be seen as rival or incompatible modes of understanding.
The approach we take in this book acknowledges that it is as absurd to dismiss states and national governments as irrelevant as it is to deny that, over a significant range of issues, states now operate in a context of global interdependence. The choice of Global Politics as its title reflects the fact both that what goes on within states and what goes on between states impact on one another to a greater degree than ever before, and that an increased proportion of politics no longer takes place simply in and through the state. As such, it moves beyond the confines of what has traditionally been studied under International Relations and allows for the adoption of an interdisciplinary approach that takes account of issues and themes from across the social sciences, in the process bringing a wider range of debates and perspectives into focus. At the same time, however,
particular attention is given to International Relations, as this is the field in which most of the relevant research and theorizing has been done, especially in view of theoretical developments in the discipline in recent decades.
Pic Credit: pixabay.com
Politics, in its broadest sense, refers to the activity through which people make, preserve and amend the general rules under which they live. Politics is inextricably linked to the phenomena of conflictand cooperation. On the one hand, the existence of rival opinions, different wants, competing needs
and opposing interests guarantees disagreement about the rules under which people live. On the
other hand, people recognize that, in order to influence these rules or ensure their enforcement,
they must work with others. However, politics is an ‘essentially contested’ concept (Gallie 1955/56). It has been defined, variously, as the art of government, as public affairs generally, as the non-violent
resolution of disputes, and as power and the distribution of resources.
Now what is the meaning of global politics???Why ‘global politics’? What does it mean to suggest that politics has ‘goneglobal’? And how does ‘global’ politics differ from ‘international’ politics? Theterm ‘global’ has two meanings, and these have quite different implications as far
as global politics is concerned. In the first, global means worldwide, having planetary (not merely regional or national) significance. The globe is, in effect, the world. Global politics, in this sense, refers to politics that is conducted at a global rather than a national or regional level. There is no doubt that the global or worldwide dimension of politics has, in recent decades, become more signifi-
cant. There has been a growth of international organizations, some of which, like the United Nations , come close to having a universal membership. A growing number of political issues have also acquired a ‘global’ character, in that they affect, actually or potentially, all parts of the world and so all people on the planet. This particularly applies in the case of the environment, often seen as the
paradigm example of a ‘global’ issue, because nature operates as an interconnected whole, in which everything affects everything else. The same, we are often told, applies to the economy, where it is commonplace to refer to the ‘global economy’ or ‘global capitalism’, in that fewer and fewer countries now remain outside the international trading system and are unaffected by external invest-
ment and the integration of financial markets. For theorists of globalization, this trend towards global interconnectedness is not only perhaps the defining feature of modern existence, but also requires that traditional approaches to learning need to be rethought, in this case by adopting a ‘borderless’ or ‘transplanetary’ approach to politics.
However, the notion that politics and, for that matter, everything else has been caught up in a swirl of interconnectedness that effectively absorbs all of its parts, or ‘units’, into an indivisible, global whole, is very difficult to sustain. The claim that we live in a ‘borderless world’, or the assertion that the state is dead and sovereignty is irrelevant (Ohmae 1990, 1996), remain distinctly fanciful
ideas. In no meaningful sense has politics at the global level transcended politics at the national, local or, for that matter, any other level. This is why the notion of global politics, as used in this book, draws on the second meaning of ‘global’. In this view, global means comprehensive; it refers to all elements within a system,not just to the system as a whole. Global politics thus takes place not just at aglobal level, but at and, crucially, across, all levels – worldwide, regional, national,
sub-national and so on . From this perspective, the advent of global politics does not imply that international politics should be consigned to the dustbin of history. Rather, ‘the global’ and ‘the international’ coexist: they complement one another and should not be seen as rival or incompatible modes of understanding.
The approach we take in this book acknowledges that it is as absurd to dismiss states and national governments as irrelevant as it is to deny that, over a significant range of issues, states now operate in a context of global interdependence. The choice of Global Politics as its title reflects the fact both that what goes on within states and what goes on between states impact on one another to a greater degree than ever before, and that an increased proportion of politics no longer takes place simply in and through the state. As such, it moves beyond the confines of what has traditionally been studied under International Relations and allows for the adoption of an interdisciplinary approach that takes account of issues and themes from across the social sciences, in the process bringing a wider range of debates and perspectives into focus. At the same time, however,particular attention is given to International Relations, as this is the field in which most of the relevant research and theorizing has been done, especially in view of theoretical developments in the discipline in recent decades.
Pic Credit: pixabay.com
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