The Global Interstate

System and
Contemporary Global
Governance
Jhanssen T. Tan, MBA, PCDEB, PSBE
 Political Science
Political Science is
the systematic study
of governance by
the application of
empirical and
generally scientific
methods of analysis.

It talks about and examines the theories,

practices, and the different systems of
governance in the local, state, national, and
international levels.
 Politics is much more than just simply voting
in an election or working in a government.

Studying political science will allow us to have a

deeper understanding of the political forces and
institutions that directly affect our lives.
Politics, states, and governments are key drivers
of global processes.

Politics is a living, breathing subject. The Political

landscape may change every single day.
 The Global
Interstate System
A system for international
relations, and global economy
with a global political system; it
includes all the cultural aspects
and interaction networks of the
human populations.
 The Global
Interstate System
As the international relations
between two states are dominated
by interstate relations, so
their relations are dominated by
coercion, threats, and force. It is
the complexity of the international
relations between these actors and
their group or personal attributes
which define the international field.
Internationalization
Refers to the different and
deepening interactions between
states, such as trade deals,
political, military, and diplomatic
engagements, and other facets
of international relations.
INTERNATIONALIZATION
≠
GLOBALIZATION
Although it is a major part of Globalization…
 There are International
independent organizations such
as the U.N.,
states facilitating
governing international
themselves. interactions.
TODAY’S
GLOBAL
SYSTEM
These
These states international
have organizations
diplomatic also take on
interactions. lives of their
own.
 SOVEREIGN NATION-
NATION
STATE STATE
A state with its own A large group of
institutions and
Is a socio-
people that cultural group
populations which has a
inhabit a
permanent population, (a nation) that
territory, and specific territory
is also a state.
government. It must and are
also have the right and connected by
capacity to make history, culture
treaties and other
or another
agreements with other
commonality.
states.
 Imagined Communities

BENEDICT ANDERSON

According to Benedict Anderson, a

nation is an “Imagined Community.”
The Treaty of Westphalia

The modern day political systems can be

traced back to the Westphalian system.
 The Thirty Years
War (1618-1648)
Religious wars were fought
leading to the Peace of
Westphalia.
• Fragmentation of the Holy
Roman Empire
• Religious Implications

After a bloody war between the Catholics and the Protestants,

signatories of the treaty recognized each others’ control over
their domestic affairs and swore not to meddle with each other’s
affairs.
Napoleon Bonaparte
The first major challenger to the
Westphalian System, he
believed in spreading the
French Revolution principles of
liberty, equality, and fraternity
to the rest of Europe. He
challenged the monarchies,
nobilities, and religions of
Europe. The Napoleonic Wars
lasted from 1803-1815.
 Napoleon Bonaparte
In every country they were able to
conquer, the French implemented
the Napoleonic Code. It was the
first consistent set of laws
concerning criminal and
commercial law, property, the
family, colonial affairs, and
individual rights, given by
Napoleon to his people living
in post-revolutionary France. It is a
set of organized laws, which is
considered as one of Napoleon’s
most important and lasting
legacies.
 The Battle of Waterloo

Bonaparte was defeated in 1815 during the Battle of

Waterloo, ending his mission of spreading the
Napoleonic Code across Europe.
 Concert of Europe
To prevent another war and to
keep their systems of privilege,
the great powers (UK, Austria,
Russia, Prussia), mainly headed
by Klemens Von Metternich,
established the Concert of
Europe. It sought to restore a
world of monarchical, hereditary,
and religious privileges.

The Concert of Europe eventually collapsed after the WW1.

 Internationalism
An ideology which speaks of
heightened interaction
between various sovereign
states, particularly the desire
for greater cooperation and
unity among states and
peoples.
• Liberal Internationalism
• Socialist Internationalism
 Liberal
Internationalism
Immanuel Kant, a German
philosopher, was the first major
thinker of liberal internationalism.
He likened states in a global
system to people living in a given
territory. He proposed that to
prevent a chaotic international
system, there must be a form of
a world government.
 Liberal
Internationalism
Jeremy Bentham coined the
term “international” and also
advocated for the creation of an
“international law” that would
govern inter-state relations.
 The Challenges to the Global
Government Concept

Supreme The watering Inequality

Leadership down of
Sovereignty

Improper or
Jurisdiction and
Poor Nationalism 22
Implementation
Representation
 Giuseppe Mazzini
A nationalist internationalist, was
the first thinker to reconcile
nationalism and liberal
internationalism, and was a critic
of the Metternich system. He
believed in a Republican
government free of the monarchy
and its hereditary succession.

Mazzini advocated for free, independent states because they

would be the basis of an equally free and cooperative
international system.
 Woodrow Wilson
The USA’s 28th President
(1913-1921), was influenced by
Mazzini’s ideology. Wilson saw
nationalism as a prerequisite to
internationalism and forwarded
the Principle of Self-
Determination. This can be
defined as a nation’s right to
choose its political destiny.
Wilson believed that free nations would result to democracies
and having a free system of international relations based on
international law and cooperation.
Wilson was a notable proponent to the creation of the
League of Nations. He pushed to transform the
League into a venue for conciliation and arbitration to
prevent another war. He was awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize in 1919 for his efforts.
 #sadth

Unfortunately and ironically, the US was not able to

join the league due to opposition from the Senate.
And the league was also helpless to prevent the onset
and intensification of the WW2.
 Mussolini Hitler Hirohito

The Axis Powers

They disdained internationalism and preferred
to violently impose their dominance over other
nations.
 YAY!!! :’>

Even if the League was dissolved, the principles

survived WW2, and actually gave birth to some task-
specific IOs like the World Health Organization (WHO)
and the International Labor Organization (ILO).
 Socialist
Internationalism
One of Mazzini’s critics was Karl
Marx, who was also an
internationalist but rejected the
concept of nationalism. He
believed that internationalism
should reject nationalism. Marx
put emphasis on economic
quality.
Marx divided the world not into countries but into classes:
• The Capitalist Class
• The Proletariat Class
 Socialist Internationalism

Marx Engels
Marx and his co-author, Friedrich Engels believed in a socialist
revolution, seeking to overthrow the state and alter the
economy, saying that the Proletariat “had no nation.”

“Workers of the world, unite! You have

nothing to lose but your chains!”
 Socialist
Internationalism
When Marx died in 1883, his
followers sought to concretize his
vision and established the
Socialist International (SI). It is
a European labor union
established in Paris in 1889. The
SI was short lived but had some
notable achievements:
• May 1 Labor Day
• International Women’s Day
• 8-hour workdays
 Socialist
Internationalism
The SI collapsed during WW1,
as the member parties refused or
were unable to join the
internationalist efforts to fight for
the war. Many of them ended up
fighting against each other and
confirmed Marx’s warning:
When workers take the side of
their countries instead of each
other, their long-term interests
are compromised.
 Socialist
Internationalism
When the SI collapsed, a more
radical version emerged. Czar
Nicholas II was overthrown and
replaced by the Bolsheviks,
headed by Vladimir Lenin. The
new state was called the Union
of Soviet Socialist Republics
(USSR).
They did not believe in obtaining power for the working class
through elections but through revolutions, with the use of terror
if necessary.
 Socialist
Internationalism
Lenin established the
Communist International
(Comintern) in 1919 to
encourage socialist revolutions
around the world. This was more
radical and less democratic: it
followed the Bolsheviks’ top-
down governance.
Many of the world’s states feared the Comintern because they
believed the Comintern was secretly stirring up revolutions in
their countries.
 I promise to help!
Let’s be friends
pretty please :’>

A problem arose when the Soviet Union decided to join

the Allied forces during the WW2 in the fight against
Hitler, but the US and the UK did not trust them.
 Socialist
Internationalism
After the war, Joseph Stalin re-
established the Comintern as the
Communist Information
Bureau (Cominform). The
Soviet Union, the UK and the US
divided Europe into their
respective spheres of influence.
But with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, whatever
thoughts about communism or socialist internationalism
practically disappeared.
For the post-war period, liberal internationalism
would once again be ascendant, with the United
Nations as the best evidence of global
governance.
 Global
Governance

Refers to the rule making

efforts to sustain cooperation
in order to address global
problems or concerns.

Although today, there is no one organization that various states

are accountable to and no organization can militarily compel a
state to obey predetermined global rules.
 International
Organizations
(IO)
Refer to international
intergovernmental
organizations or groups that
are primarily made up of
member states.

A FALLACY: IOs are mere amalgamations of various state

interests; they are just talk shops.
Barnett and Finnemore listed the following
powers of IOs:
CLASSIFICATION | FIX MEANINGS
DIFFUSE NORMS
The United Nations is the
most prominent IO today.
Its formation comes after
the collapse of the
League of Nations.
 The U.N. is divided into 5 active organs:
General Assembly | Security Council | Economic and
Social Council | International Court of Justice |
Secretariat
 General Assembly (GA)
The UN’s main deliberative policymaking and
representative organ.
 Security Council (SC)
Consists of 15 states: the P5 and the GA elects the
other 10 for a 2-year term. Takes the lead in determining
threats or acts of aggression. They call upon the
disputing parties to settle the act by peaceful means.
They may resort to imposing sanctions or authorizing
the use of force to maintain international peace and
security.
 Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC)
The UN’s “principal body for coordination, policy review,
policy dialogue, as well as the implementation of
internationally agreed development goals.” Currently the
central platform for discussions on sustainable
development.
 International Court of Justice
Settles legal disputes submitted by states in
accordance with international laws and gives advisory
opinions. Its decisions are only binding if states
explicitly agreed to place themselves before the court’s
authority.
 Secretariat
“Secretary-General and tens
of thousands of international
UN staff members who carry
out the day-today work as
mandated by the GA and the
organization’s other principal
organs.” The bureaucracy of
the UN, serving as a kind of
international civil service.
António Guterres
Current Secretary-General
 Some of the Major Challenges
of the UN

• THE NEED TO RESPECT SOVEREIGNTY

• The UN is not a world government and it functions

primarily because of voluntary cooperation from
states.

• SECURITY ISSUES
 Sources

Claudio, Lisandro E. & Abinales, Patricio N. (2018) A History of Global Politics: Creating an International Order.
Retrieved from: The Contemporary World, pgs. 26-37.

Claudio, Lisandro E. & Abinales, Patricio N. (2018) The United Nations and Contemporary Global Governance.
Retrieved from: The Contemporary World, pgs. 39-47.

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