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can equally be argued that the diplomacy of France and Germany was
defective (Rubin 2003). The US needs to understand that, however it
defines its responsibilities towards the rest of the world, they will be incred-
ibly expensive to maintain unless it takes some note of the values, interests
and desires of those it wishes to lead and on whose behalf it claims to act.
The Europeans, on the other hand, need to understand that US power is
a reality, and it is not something that is there for them to turn on and off as
they wish (on, eventually, in Bosnia, Kosovo and Liberia; off in Iraq); they
cannot successfully claim a veto on the use of American power, however
well such a claim goes down with their domestic public opinion. Given the
disparity in capabilities between the US and the rest, managing the conse-
quences of US hyperpower is inevitably going to create difficulties, and
these difficulties need to be addressed both in the US and by America’s leading
potential partners in Europe.
Fourth, perhaps the biggest unknown in a world of unknowns is the rela-
tionship between the economic and social forces summarized by the term
globalization, and the power of the US. The US has in the past been the
driver of globalization, but it could, equally, in the future be its gravedigger.
The first age of globalization ended in 1914. The present globalization is
unlikely to end in interstate war but it could end up an unexpected casualty
of America’s search for security, if the result of that search is to close down
borders that previously were opening up. A globalized world is unlikely to
be a world of national security-oriented states, and if the current trend in
this direction continues then many of both the negative and positive features
of globalization will gradually shut down.
Finally, and linked to this last point, a key question for the first half of the
new century is whether the rich developed world decides to try to handle the
challenge from the poor, developing world by adopting a more active pro-
gramme of wealth-creation in the South or by pulling up the drawbridge,
with Fortress America (or the North American Free Trade Area) and
Festung Europa looking Southwards at an increasingly disaffected and vio-
lent world. Some may feel that the war on terror will push aside any
thought of social justice, but others will argue, with Tony Blair in this
respect, that, in the longer run, the only way to defeat terrorism is to drain
the sea within which the terrorists swim, to adopt an old Maoist metaphor.
It would be silly to suggest that the rich men’s sons who largely make up
Al Qaeda’s leadership are motivated by social justice – and the independent
power of religious belief should never be underestimated – but many of
their recruits are the product of an impoverished material and political cul-
ture. Doing something about this would not be an act of altruism but one of
generous, long-term self-interest. When the balance sheet on American
power is finally drawn, a key question will be how well the US rose to this
challenge – and the same question will be asked of its critics.
252
Understanding International Relations
US Hegemony and World Order
253
Further reading
Michael E. Brown, S. M. Lynn-Jones and S. E. Miller, The Perils of Anarchy:
Contemporary Realism and International Security (1995), contains the essays
by Mearsheimer and Wohlforth referred to above, as well as Kenneth Waltz’s
‘The Emerging Structure of International Politics’ (1993). Scott D. Sagan and
Kenneth Waltz, The Spread of Nuclear Weapons (1995), debate the implica-
tions of nuclear proliferation in a post-Cold War world. William C. Wohlforth,
‘The Stability of a Unipolar World’ (1999), appears in International Security, as
does Kenneth Waltz, ‘Structural Realism after the Cold War’ (2000), a major
restatement of his position. Mearsheimer restates his position at length in
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