Managing great powers in the post-Cold War world: old rules new game? The case of the global war on terror

Abstract

This article investigates the impact of the Global War on Terror (GWoT) on the primary institution of great power management. To this end, it first identifies a misalignment between the new post-Cold War social reality and the capacity of some traditional norms of great power management to mediate this reality. Having established and described this environment of normative uncertainty, I then probe how the GWoT propels the consolidation of new identities and norms of great power management in interstate society. I argue that since the beginning of the GWoT the primary institution of great power management has institutionalized new norms to address transnational violence within its processes. At the same time, as hard balancing amongst great powers is becoming increasingly obsolete, two distinct social structures have been constructed with the GWoT: one that privileges an inequitable social structure of friends/rivals amongst states; and another that shapes a social structure of enemies with regard to terrorist–state relations. In this process, the capacity of managing transnational violence globally has increasingly become one of the central constitutive elements of being a great power. I conclude by demonstrating how the GWoT has acted as a subtle ‘bargaining bid’ in the process of organizing the current social meaning of polarity and great power management amongst states. State practices under the GWoT have delineated, in a clearer form, underlying expectations about the pattern of interactions between the superpower and great powers. Consequently, the GWoT has exerted a symbolic and psychological impact over international society by institutionalizing not only a specific meaning of unipolarity but also further raising the threshold of what is acceptable behaviour on the part of the superpower within an interstate social structure of friends/rivals.

Notes

¹ For an in-depth study of institutional change see Holsti (2004). The model applied in this article was inspired by Holsti's original treatment of this subject and therefore adopts his categories of change: change as novelty or replacement; change as addition or subtraction; change as increased or decreased complexity; change as transformation; change as reversion; and, finally, change as obsolescence (Holsti 2004, 12–18).

² In this article, the following definitions will be adopted to distinguish between various actors in interstate society: superpowers—states that are ‘capable of, and also exercise, global military, [economic], and political reach’ (Buzan 2004b, 69); great powers—states that ‘are responded to by others on the basis of system-level calculations, as well as regional ones’ (Buzan 2004b, 69–70); regional powers—states that ‘define the polarity of any given regional security complex’ (Buzan 2004b, 71). Note that to qualify as a superpower states ‘need to see themselves, and be accepted by others in rhetoric and behaviour, as having this rank’ (Buzan 2004b, 69). I will also use the term ‘hyperpower’ to theoretically and critically designate the pretension of a state to possess the capability of unilaterally dominating the whole system. See Buzan (2004b, 69) and Dunne (2003, 303–320).

³ See also Watson (1992).

⁴ It must be noted that the terrorist threat to the physical survival of states is much more a constructed discourse than a feasible reality. Even in the face of a non-state-perpetrated chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear (CBRN) attack the scale of damage inflicted upon a state would not be enough to threaten the overall physical existence of most states. See Robin M Frost (2005). Of course, the social, political and humanitarian consequences of such an attack would certainly be devastating and might even propel a political collapse of the state and/or a loss of legitimacy. Also, see President Bush's speech to the UN General Assembly immediately after the attacks of September 11.

⁵ It is interesting to note how the new political agenda introduced by the GWoT is a double-edged sword. Thus, on the one hand, while the US failure to tackle the transnational terrorist threat would deeply undermine its leadership role, on the other hand, the Salafi Jihadist threat also simultaneously presents states in international society with the unique opportunity to exert their leadership, enhance their role as security providers and reaffirm their status as great powers or superpowers.

⁶ A good example is the US National Defense Strategy (USNDS 2008, 4–5).

⁷ For multiple-level identities and identity policies in security issues see Booth (2007, 135–136, 139–140).

⁸ See Buzan (2004b)

⁹ Negative identities are those which are ‘formed against each other’ (Buzan 2004b, 19).

¹⁰ These threats do not, however, substitute traditional threats. Rather they tend to coexist. Thus Buzan's statement that ‘most political and military threats travel more easily over short distances than over long ones, [and thus] insecurity is often associated with proximity’ remains valid (Buzan et al 1998, 11).

¹¹ According to Bull, ‘we must distinguish the general balance of power that is the absence of a preponderant power in the international system as a whole, from a local or particular balance of power, in one area or segment of the system’ (Bull 1977, 98).

¹² Bull (1977). It may be noted that the general balance of power can be studied both as a primary institution of international society and as a norm. This article focuses upon balance of power as a norm within the primary institution of GPM.

¹³ It must be noted that the specific rules of the balance of power as applied by states have greatly varied over time. However, the general norm of a balance of power, understood as institutionalized patterns of behaviour in which states (mainly great powers) counterbalance each other in order to avoid the rise of a hegemon capable of dominating the international system alone, has persisted over time. It is the latter that is the focus of this article.

¹⁴ A notable exception is the hegemonic stability theory (HST). For early discussion on HST see Grunberg (1990), McKeown (1983), Milner and Snyder (1988), Snidel (1985) and Strange (1987; 1988).

¹⁵ For in-depth study of contrived balance of power, see Little (2007).

¹⁶ For a recent review of academic understandings of the role of balance of power within the English School, see Little (2007).

¹⁷ Buzan and Wæver define macro-securitisation as ‘securitisations that speak to referent objects higher than those at the middle level … and which aim to incorporate and coordinate multiple lower level securitisations’ (Buzan and Wæver 2009, 257).

¹⁸ It has been said, for example, that the recent credit crunch can represent an opportunity for the emergence of a rival/enemy structure with potential new leaders offering alternative economic and financial models/systems that would challenge values long established by the US. See US National Intelligence Council (USNIC 2008).

¹⁹ Similar statements can also be found in the US National Security Strategy (USNSS 2002, 29; 2006, 36).

²⁰ An interesting Chinese work on military balancing against the US is Liang and Xiangsui (1999).

²¹ For Paul, ‘soft-balancing behavior occurs under the following conditions: (1) the hegemon's power position and military behavior are of growing concern but do not yet pose a serious challenge to the sovereignty of second-tier powers; (2) the dominant state is a major source of public goods in both the economic and security areas that cannot simply be replaced; and (3) the dominant state cannot easily retaliate either because the balancing efforts of others are not overt or because they do not directly challenge its power position with military means’ (Paul 2005, 59).

²² As noted above, changes—including the decay of balance of power—can work towards the preservation of international society, though this does not seem to hold true in the case of Salafi Jihadi transnational terrorism.

²³ A key point to note is the existence of shifting goal-posts in the GWoT. When the US declared the war in 2001 the declared aim was to defeat and end all transnational terrorism. However, over time these aims have been progressively curtailed and localized and there is a growing acknowledgement in the rhetoric that even the sole superpower cannot defeat every transnational terrorist group that may exist. See for example the progressive shift in tone of the State of the Union Addresses from 2001 to 2009.

²⁴ See, for example, State of the Union Addresses, 2001–2009; Congressional Testimonies and Executive Speeches from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), 2001–2009; and The National Defense Strategy (USNDS 2005; 2008) and The National Security Strategy (USNSS 2002; 2006) from the White House.

²⁵ The absorption of change is a normal fact of social life. In fact, according to Kawaguchi, the ‘absorption of change by means of interpretations contributes to social stability at the same time as it maintains legal stability’ (Kawaguchi 2003, 79).

²⁶ Little, for example, notes how Bush's 2002 National Security Strategy establishes ‘a narrative that view[s] the present as a turning point, where the future is going to be different from the past’ and highlights that he does so in order to ‘show why the balance of power has to be reconstituted in the future’ (Little 2007, 79).

²⁷ The term ‘new world order’ used in this context refers to the post-Cold War order wrought in international society by, amongst other things, global economic integration and the spread of democracy. This new world order was informed by notions of liberal democracy, enduring peace, economic liberalisation and the protection of universal human rights. It was also specifically invoked by George HW Bush in 1990 to contextualize and justify a UN-supported intervention in Iraq. See Bush (1990, 1).

²⁸ See, for example, the 27 principles of the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development that were produced to guide future sustainable development around the globe. It is important to note, however, that there are contending interpretations regarding the true nature and significance of such state initiatives for GPM. This is because there is a lack of consensus amongst academics as to whether or not these initiatives and the order they were seeking to institutionalize were indeed positive. Some authors, for example, describe these initiatives as a new form of US imperialism (see Burbach and Tarbell 2004; Chomsky 1999; Colás and Saull 2006; Ignatieff 2003), while others see the 1990s as a missed opportunity for the US to affirm its status as the sole superpower (see Gurtov 2006, chapter 1; Halper and Clarke 2004, chapter 3; Krauthammer 1991; Reus-Smit 2004, chapter 1).

²⁹ For details regarding the symbolisation process see Kawaguchi (2003, 73); for a treatment of institutionalisation see Finnemore and Sikkink (1998).

³⁰ A similar point was made earlier by Schelling with regard to the analysis of military actions and the diplomacy of violence (1966, 16).

³¹ See Schelling (1956; 1960; 1966).

³² For Schelling, the deterrent threat is always passive (1966, 70).

³³ The other factor being ‘more extreme practices of liberalism’ (Buzan 2004b, 171–172).

³⁴ See, for example, National Defense Strategy (USNDS 2008), National Security Strategy (USNSS 2002; 2006) and US National Strategy for Combating Terrorism (USNSCT 2006).

³⁵ In Holsti's typology, transformation occurs when the institution's functions/goals change but its norms and principles remain the same, but this is a case where the goals/functions of the institution are kept the same but its normative content significantly changes (Holsti 2004, 16).

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Notes on contributors

Jorge Lasmar

Dr Jorge Lasmar is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of International Relations and the Head of Research of the Institute of Social Sciences at Pontifica Universidade Catolica de Minas Gerais, Brazil.