Restraining Great Powers
Regular price
€34.99
A01=T. V. Paul
Age Group_Uncategorized
Age Group_Uncategorized
alliance
Author_T. V. Paul
automatic-update
balance of power
Category1=Non-Fiction
Category=HBLX
Category=JP
Category=JPH
Category=JPQB
Category=JPSD
Category=KCP
Category=NHB
cold war
COP=United States
Delivery_Delivery within 10-20 working days
diplomacy
economic sanctions
eq_bestseller
eq_business-finance-law
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_society-politics
Format=BB
Format_Hardback
international relations
Language_English
military buildup
military intervention
PA=Available
Price_€20 to €50
PS=Active
realist foreign policy
softlaunch
south china sea
superpower
ukraine
Product details
- ISBN 9780300228489
- Format: Hardback
- Weight: 522g
- Dimensions: 156 x 235mm
- Publication Date: 13 Nov 2018
- Publisher: Yale University Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
- Language: English
Secure
checkout
Fast Shipping
Easy returns
How subtler forms of balance-of-power politics can help states achieve their goals against aggressive powers without wars or arms races
At the end of the Cold War, the United States emerged as the world’s most powerful state, and then used that power to initiate wars against smaller countries in the Middle East and South Asia. According to balance-of-power theory—the bedrock of realism in international relations—other states should have joined together militarily to counterbalance the United States’ rising power. Yet they did not. Nor have they united to oppose Chinese aggression in the South China Sea or Russian offensives along its western border.
This does not mean balance-of-power politics is dead, argues renowned international relations scholar T. V. Paul; instead it has taken a different form. Rather than employ familiar strategies such as active military alliances and arms buildups, leading powers have engaged in “soft balancing,” which seeks to restrain threatening powers through the use of international institutions, informal alignments, and economic sanctions. Paul places the evolution of balancing behavior in historical perspective, from the post-Napoleonic era to today’s globalized world. This book offers an illuminating examination of how subtler forms of balance-of-power politics can help states achieve their goals against aggressive powers without wars or arms races.
At the end of the Cold War, the United States emerged as the world’s most powerful state, and then used that power to initiate wars against smaller countries in the Middle East and South Asia. According to balance-of-power theory—the bedrock of realism in international relations—other states should have joined together militarily to counterbalance the United States’ rising power. Yet they did not. Nor have they united to oppose Chinese aggression in the South China Sea or Russian offensives along its western border.
This does not mean balance-of-power politics is dead, argues renowned international relations scholar T. V. Paul; instead it has taken a different form. Rather than employ familiar strategies such as active military alliances and arms buildups, leading powers have engaged in “soft balancing,” which seeks to restrain threatening powers through the use of international institutions, informal alignments, and economic sanctions. Paul places the evolution of balancing behavior in historical perspective, from the post-Napoleonic era to today’s globalized world. This book offers an illuminating examination of how subtler forms of balance-of-power politics can help states achieve their goals against aggressive powers without wars or arms races.
T. V. Paul is the James McGill Professor of International Relations at McGill University. He has authored or edited eighteen books, including The Warrior State and The Tradition of Non-Use of Nuclear Weapons.
