Chapter 3: Global Interstate System and Global Governance
Global Interstate System
Definition: It is the whole system of human interactions. The modern world-system is structured politically as an interstate system—a system of competing and allying states. Political scientists commonly call this the international system, which serves as the focal point of the field of international relations.
World-systems are defined by the existence of a division of labor. The modern world-system has a multi-state political structure (the interstate system) and therefore its division of labor is an international division of labor.
The division of labor consists of three zones according to the prevalence of profitable industries or activities:
Core: High-income nations in the world economy functioning as the manufacturing base of the planet where resources funnel in to become technology and wealth enjoyed by the Western world today. Dominant capitalist countries that exploit peripheral countries for labor and raw materials (e.g., US, Western Europe, Japan).
Semi-Periphery: Middle-income countries such as India, Brazil, South Africa, and parts of Asia. These are considered semi-periphery due to their ties to the global economic core and share characteristics of both core and peripheral zones.
Periphery: Low-income countries whose natural resources or labor support wealthier countries, first as colonies and now by working for multinational corporations under neocolonialism. Dependent on core countries for capital with underdeveloped domestic industry (e.g., much of Africa, parts of Latin America).
Immanuel Wallerstein's World-Systems Theory
Interconnected Economic System: Analyzes global inequality by viewing the world as a single interconnected economic system.
core
semi-periphery
periphery
Unit of Analysis: Stresses that world-systems should be the basic unit of social analysis, focusing on relations between state groupings (core, semi-periphery, and periphery) rather than individual states.
Resources are systematically redistributed from underdeveloped regions (the poor part of the world—the periphery) to developed countries ( core).
The core depends on resources and labor from the periphery, while keeping them underdeveloped to maintain dominance.
The system is dynamic, permitting individual countries to move between categories, but the overall structure continuously maintains global inequality.
Temporal Features of World-Systems
Cyclical Rhythms represent short-term economic fluctuation of economy, while Secular Trends means deeper long-run tendencies, such as general economic growth or decline.
Contradiction: A general controversy in the system, usually concerning short-term versus long-term trade-offs.
Crisis: Occurs if a constellation of circumstances brings about the end or transformation of the system.
Global Governance and Its Impact
Definition: Global governance (or world governance) is a movement towards political cooperation among transnational actors negotiating responseso problems affecting more than one state or region. It refers to the process of designating laws, rules, or regulations intended for application on a global scale.
Effects on State Policy: Globalization restrains governments by inducing increased budgetary pressure. As a consequence, governments frequently attempt to curtail the welfare state—often seen as a drag on international competitiveness—by reducing expenditures on transfers and subsidies.
Internationalism vs. Globalism
Internationalization: Refers to the increasing importance of international trade, diplomatic relations, treaties, and alliances. The term "international" explicitly means between or among countries, where the nation-state remains the fundamental unit of political and economic organization.
In a classic internationalized economy, national labor and national capital cooperate within a national community to produce goods using domestic natural resources, which then compete in international markets against goods from other nations.
Globalism: Refers to the global economic integration of many formerly national economies into one global economy, minly by free trade, and free capital mobility, but also by easy or uncontrolled migration.