IB Global Politics SHL

Mr. Matthew Wong

What is power?
What is power?
Different types of powers What is power?
The ability to direct another’s
actions or a country’s economy
• Wolf: Structural power – the people, power and politics
that feature in global politics
• Nye: Hard power – use of force and threats of force to influence the decision
making of those in charge; Soft power – negotiation, promises of aid,
cooperation and other non-military means of influencing change.
• Smart power – combination of hard and soft power, the ability to use both
when called for, or one or the other when necessary
• Military power, economic power, political power, social power,
individual vs collective power, and universal vs multilateral power.....
Factors affecting power
Why do some people still live in poverty while others live in luxury?
• Geographical considerations
• Race, ethnicity and religion
Example!
• Segregation and hierarchy (on a global scale)
• Countries fight over oil and fuel
• Unequal distribution of resources while some still struggle to survive
with basic resources...
• Dams provide stable water source
yet blocks the access to water
several miles away...
• Pollution produced by food factories
are polluting the quality of crops...
Sovereignty in the contemporary world
“States” becoming outdated?
• Boundaries are no longer legitimate?
• Sovereignty is questioned by trade agreements and large MNCs?
• Migration?
• Stability of a government? Sovereignty
a state’s independence, its
control over territory and its
ability to govern itself
Enforcement of Sovereignty Sovereignty
a state’s independence, its
control over territory and its
• possession and use of force ability to govern itself
• international law and norms
• recognition by other states due to economic and balance of power
considerations
• consent (or lack thereof) of the governed through political participation
Challenges to Sovereignty Sovereignty
a state’s independence, its
control over territory and its
• Globalization ability to govern itself
• Supranationalism
• Humanitarian intervention
• Indigenous rights
Nation state?
What is the difference between nation and state?
• “Nation” implies that there is a common ethnicity and cultural
characteristics, such as language, while “state” most often refers to the
sovereign nature of the area in which a state has been formed.

Antonio Gramsci 1891–1937, coined the term hegemony: the goal of

harmony through the agreement of the peoples under state control.
• How have governments/political systems tried to reach hegemony even if it
was unwilling for the people?
Hegemony
 Alliance / Trade Organization

Community with
common interest Military control
Centralized authority Nation State
Democracy

Change in method Coup Nation State

of control Democratic Vote
Warfare or Nation State
Alliance

Nation State
Justification? Ideology!
Nation State
 An independent sovereign political area that functions as
A State one, self contained unit.

A federal state
A state where some key decisions of society are the responsibility of regional
government despite there still being a central, national government.

A unitary state
When a central, national government is responsible for most policy and decisions
for the country.
A nation
A distinct group of people who share common ethnicity, culture and
language.

A nation-state
An independent political entity that is based on the cultural identity and
heritage of a particular nation.

A state-less nation
A distinct group of people who share common ethnicity,
culture and language that has no nation-state of its own.
 Sovereignty
When the state and government has authority over a given territory.

The bureaucracy and

The state infrastructure that carries out
government decision

Autonomy Capacity
The ability of the state to
carry out the decisions of The ability of the state to
government regardless of carry out the decisions of
public opinion. government.
Institutionalization
The degree to which something has become imbedded in the system. The extent to
which something in the system is changeable.

Regime
The rules and norms of politics within a society.

Efficacy
The degree to which the members of a state trust and believe in the
government as well as feeling that they can influence its decisions
Legitimacy
The broad recognition that a leader or party should be in power

Traditional Legitimacy
•Legitimacy that comes from heritage and history. It is accepted because it
has been established for a long time and is interwoven into the culture and
traditions of the society.

Charismatic Legitimacy
When a leader is such because of the power of his or her personality and
ideas.

Rational-Legal Legitimacy
Where political legitimacy is based on laws and procedures that are highly
institutionalized.
Why are they effective?
They take positions on the debates around the local, regional,
international and global actions and policies of the day, and are
often more useful in the struggle to change long-held positions
than states themselves.
The United Nations
• As a medium of exchange and debate
• (Most likely) neutral and has no opinion

Intergovernmental
organizations (IGOs)
• World Trade Organization (WTO)
• International Monetary Fund (IMF)
• European Union (EU)
• African Union
• Arab League
Non-governmental organizations
(NGOs), multinational corporations
(MNCs) and trade unions
• NGOs, e.g. International Red Cross
and Red Crescent Movement,
Amnesty International (AI), Human
Rights Watch (HRW), Greenpeace,
BRAC
• MNCs, e.g. Unilever, Philips, IKEA,
Lenovo, Tata

• Association of Southeast Asian • Trade unions, e.g. International

Nations (ASEAN) Trade Union Confederation (ITUC)
• BRICS
Political parties Informal forums
• USA’s Republican and Democratic • G20
parties
• The Group of Seven (G7)
• Germany’s Christian Democratic
Union (CDU) • The Group of Eight (G8)

• Social Democratic Party (SPD) • G2

• Communist Party of China (CPC) • World Economic Forum (WEF)

• World Social Forum (WSF)
Discussion:
• What is the current world order? Who wants to control what? Is
there a balance of power?
• Power for what? What makes power count?
• What's the difference between "power over" and "power to"?
• Can power be measured? How powerful is powerful?
• Is world domination possible?
Case Study: Kosovo
The Balkans and the Kosovo Crises
• "Nations... as an inherent political destiny, are a myth. Nationalism, which
sometimes takes preexisting cultures and turns them into nations, sometimes
invents them, and often obliterates preexisting cultures: that is a reality." -- E.
Gellner, political theorist and author of Nations and Nationalism (1983)

• "Ignorance and indifference, not the great power rivalries and proxy conflicts of
the Cold War, killed the victims of the collapse of the former Yugoslavia." --
Jean-Marie Guéhenno, Crisis Group’s President & CEO
Border Issues
Read the article “Independence for
Kosovo” and watch these videos:
War in Europe, The Road to War series
• Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kt7XIv32SRE
• Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10r5SP8goXk
• Part 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=haGHwW8wV6M
• Part 4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=haGHwW8wV6M

• Complete the tasks in the article “1999 Kosovo Crisis”.

What might be the purpose of this speech?
Put your skills to the test:
Summit
Kosovo Case Study
Producing a white paper
• A White Paper is a report that presents the issuing body's position of
philosophy about a subject.

• Your White Paper is a two-page report presenting your theoretical philosophy

on the four themes pertaining to the Kosovo Crisis.

• 1. Analyze-- Break down in order to bring out the essential elements

Analyze the Kosovo crisis according to your theory.

• 2. Examine-- Consider a concept in a way the uncovers the assumptions and

interrelationships of the issue.
Examine the four themes through your theoretical lens.
Nature and extent of
interactions in global politics
Global governance:
How are they effective and why are they in place?
• UN Security Council resolutions
• Climate change agenda
• Basel accords on financial regulation
• WTO trade agreements
• Regional decision-making
Alliance and Cooperation:
Why do countries need cooperation and are they useful?
• Treaties, eg Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), Montreal Protocol
• Collective security, eg North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO),
Organization of American States (OAS)
• Strategic alliances, eg China’s alliances in Latin America and Africa, USA–
Taiwan, USA–Israel, India– Afghanistan
• Economic cooperation, eg bilateral and multilateral trade agreements,
regional economic integration, facilitation and regulation of international
production
• Informal cooperation, eg extraordinary rendition, technology harmonization,
cultural exchange
Warfare and Conflict:
What is the purpose of conflict, and does it resolve problems?
• Interstate war, e.g. Iraq, Afghanistan, Sudan, South Sudan
• Intrastate war, e.g. Syria, Ukraine, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC),
Central African Republic
• Terrorism, e.g. Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), Euskadi Ta Askatasuna
(ETA), Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), Boko Haram
• Strikes and demonstrations: local examples (e.g. HK 2019)
Case Study: Ukraine
Ukraine
• Finish the Ukraine country profile.
• who is the current Ukrainian president?

Task
List out all the warfare or conflict between Ukraine and surrounding ex-Soviet
Union countries and Russia.
Think: why does Russia do this? Are their actions doing them any good?
 Ukraine, in the eyes of Richard Sakwa
• Read the extract and complete the summary of the contents presented to
you in the text.
Monists
•assert that Ukraine is an indigenous cultural
and political entity unto its own.
•argue that building a modern independent
Ukrainian state requires 3 things:
1.strengthen the Ukrainian language and
reduce the political weight of Russian-speakers
2.reject the tsarist and Soviet imperial legacies
3.and move the country away from Russia
towards Europe
Pluralists
•emphasize the different historical and cultural
experiences of Ukraine’s various regions
•argue that building a modern democratic post-Soviet
Ukrainian state requires 3 things
1.an acceptance of bilingualism
2.mutual tolerance of different traditions
3.and decentralization– transferring power to the
regions.
Varying Perspectives
Split in groups to find out different international perspectives on the Ukraine
Crisis.
• National perspective – Ukrainian perspective
• US perspective
• International Organization (NATO) perspective
• Russian perspective
• Supranational perspective
• Gas battle perspective
The Donbass Crisis
Concepts for Analysis
• Concept: Coercive Diplomacy

• Concept: Statecraft vs. Strategy (See attached Milevski article)

21st Century Statecraft (U.S. Department of State)

• Concept: Types of Political Power

• Concept: Soft Power-- leveraging political, economic, and technologic capital
over their military capital to co-opt states into doing what the actor wants
Foreign Policy Tools
How are these used in the Russo-Ukrainian War and the Crimean Crisis?
• diplomatic tools, such as bilateral or multilateral consultations and negotiations, treaties,
defense and security agreements, resolutions in global and regional bodies such as the
United Nations (UN), and public diplomacy to promote U.S. views and culture;
• economic tools, such as trade and investment agreements, tariffs, sanctions, embargoes
and boycotts, bilateral and multilateral development assistance, loans for the purchase of
U.S. exports, and sales of arms, equipment, and technology;
• military tools, such as missile strikes by manned or unmanned vehicles, nuclear
deterrence, ground force deployments, ship and submarine patrols, blockades, unilateral
or partnered military exercises, foreign military training, and special operations forces;
• unconventional tools, which are actions, sometimes secret, taken by the U.S.
government and its proxies, such as training and assisting foreign intelligence services,
supporting armed nonstate actors, private security contracting, and cyberwarfare.
Quick Revision on Paper 1 Knowledge
• Question 1 “Identifying” +3 5 min.
• Question 2 “Explaining” +4 10 min.
• Question 3 “Comparative Analysis” +8 20-25 min.
• Question 4 “To what extent” +10 35-40 min.

• Total 25 marks, 1 hr 15 mins

• 30% of your grade.