Bretton Wood: Fixed exchange rates, government trying to control global economy, ending in 1973

 

Strong growth of global trade starting in 1970s

 

 

 

 

After 1990 three developments:

* Internationalization of trade and finance

* Increased power of transnational corporations

* Enhanced role of international economic institutions

 

 

 

 

Two mainstream approaches of the Bush Decade (2001-2009):
neo-realism and neo-liberalism

• More than just theories, neo-realism and neo-liberalism represent paradigms
or conceptual frameworks that shape individuals' images of the world and
influence research priorities and policy debates and choices.

• Neo-liberalism in the academic world refers most often to neo-liberal
Institutionalism. In the policy world, neo-liberalism is identified with the
promotion of capitalism and Western democratic values and institutions.

• Rational choice approaches and game theory have been integrated into
neo-realist and neo-liberal theory to explain policy choices and the behaviour of
states in conflict and cooperative situations.

• Neo-realist and neo-liberal theories are status-quo oriented problem solving
theories. They share many assumptions about actors, values, issues and power
arrangements in the international system.
Neo-realists and neo-liberals study different worlds. Neo-realists study security
issues and are concerned with issues of power and survival. Neo-liberals study
political economy and focus on cooperation and institutions.

• Structural Realists minimize the importance of national attributes as
determinants of a state's foreign policy behaviour. To these neo-realists, all
states are functionally similar units, experiencing the same constraints
presented by anarchy.

• Structural Realists accept many assumptions of traditional realism. They
believe that force remains an important and effective tool of statecraft and
balance of power is still the central mechanism for order in the system.
 

• Contemporary neo-liberalism has been shaped by the assumptions of
commercial, republican, sociological, and institutional Liberalism.

• Commercial and republican Liberalism provide the foundation for current
neo-liberal thinking in Western governments. These countries promote free
trade and democracy in their foreign policy programmes.

• Neo-liberal Institutionalism, the other side of the neo-neo debate,
is rooted in the functional integration theoretical work of the 1950s and 1960s
and the complex interdependence and transnational studies literature of the
1970s and 1980s.

• Neo-liberal Institutionalists see institutions as the mediator and the means
to achieve cooperation in the international system.
Regimes and institutions help govern a competitive and anarchic international
system and they encourage, and at times require, multilateralism and
cooperation as a means of securing national interests.

• Neo-liberals believe that states co operate to achieve absolute gains and the
greatest obstacle to cooperation is 'cheating' or non compliance by other states.

• Neo-realists explain that all states must be concerned with the absolute and
relative gains that result from international agreements and cooperative efforts.

Neo-liberal institutionalists are less concerned about relative gains and consider
that all will benefit from absolute gains.

• Globalization has contributed to a shift in political activity away from the state.
Transnational social movements have forced states to address critical
international issues and in several situations that have supported the
establishment of institutions that promote further cooperation and,
fundamentally challenge the power of states.

• Neo-realists think that states are still the principle actors in international
politics. Globalization challenges some areas of state authority and control; but,
politics is still inter-national.

• Neo-realists are concerned about new security challenges resulting from
uneven globalization, namely, inequality and conflict.

• Globalization provides opportunities and resources for transnational social
movements that challenge the authority of states in various policy areas.
Neo-realists are not supportive of any movement that seeks to open critical
security issues to public debate.

• Free market neo-liberals believe globalization is a positive force.
Eventually, all states will benefit from the economic growth promoted by
the forces of globalization.
They believe that states should not fight globalization or attempt to control it
with unwanted political interventions.

• Most analysts agree after the end of the Bush Decade: Neo-liberalism and
neo-realism brought us into the mess we are in today.

 

 

2010: The end of neo-liberalism, Seoul (Nov.) to confirm stronger role of politics.

 

"It's very clear we're in the middle of a paradigm shift.
We are witnessing the end of the neo-liberal project."

Phillip Blond, recently anointed the "Philosopher King" of the British Conservative Party.
He is attached to the British think tank, Demos, and has been tasked with
articulating a new philosophy for the Tories.

David Cameron launched Blond's Progressive Conservatism project.
At the Davos Conference 2009, he argued for "conservatism with a conscience"
instead of "markets without morality".