International Relations Essay

All the countries all over the world are coexisting in the frames of the international relations, which are built on the basis of some principles. Sometimes these principles are broken and this results in various conflicts, either military or economical or any other. The fulfillment of supporting of mutual obligations is usually under the control of the specially structured organizations, operating in a concrete sphere of relations. Generally international relations present  “a field of political science that studies relationships among countries, the roles of sovereign states, inter-governmental organizations (IGOs), international non-governmental organizations (INs), non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and multinational corporations (MNCs).” (Bertucci, Alberti, 2009).

  1. Globalization has without any doubts played its significant role for formation of modern states. Usually this term is applied for explaining of various world processes and phenomena. At the same time this is a rather controversial process, as often it is used with positive connotation, still it could bring negative changes as well. Mostly negatively it is viewed by those people, who see as a threat for social cohesion and challenging power of the state. Globalization is the phenomenon, which is able to have impact upon social, economic and cultural spheres of any country, which makes it next to impossible to provide short definition of this process. Any kind of exchange and flows of either goods or services, either capital or information between several countries belongs to globalization. This explains why it could be seen equally as additional possibilities for a country, as well as extra costs. Globalization certainly limits independence of any country via several driving forces: trade and investments; technological innovations; entrepreneurship; global social networks. (Bertucci, Alberti, 2009). Globalization with its introduction of technological progress, development of informational technologies and telecommunications caused the necessity to develop various issues and regulations in order to keep these processes under control. At the same time globalization is one of the causes of conflict, which is not purely related to ethnic or cultural norms, rather to economic conditions and other spheres, which are at any rate interrelated in any state. However, such conflict should not be seen only as threatening. There are some points of view, stating that globalization is the process that puts at risk existence of state. All types of cooperation between states in the frames of globalization are based on sovereignty of them and their independence.
  2. The issues, related to the future relations between China and America, are rather complex nowadays and became the subject of various debates. There are different predictions made, some of them are based on more positive approach, stating that most luckily the two countries would turn from their competition towards cooperation, adding stability to their relations. The more pessimistic forecasts on the contrary suggest that this competition might even deepen and lead to terrible consequences, even to war maybe. Most analytics, working over these relations’ analysis, base their views upon three main theories: realism, liberalism and constructivism. (Friedberg 2009). None of them managed to develop any clear position as for future relations between the two countries, still they contribute to understanding of them. For example realists are sure that these relations would be generally stable and more positive. Liberals are afraid that conflicts are inevitable. Constructivists don’t stick to any concrete position, stating that these relations might go any direction in the future. There are numerous forces, which are involved into the process from both sides, which means that the moment might come, when any of these forces might become the strongest one, turning the situation into the corresponding direction. “Harvard Professor Graham Allison has found: “in 12 of 16 cases in the past 500 years when a rising power challenged a ruling power, the outcome was war.” Chicago University scholar John Mearsheimer has bluntly argued: “China cannot rise peacefully.” (Friedberg 2009). Taking into consideration that the situation is dependant not purely upon the direct relations between China and the U.S., rather also upon maintenance of economic and military dominance in neighboring countries as well, the situation is not that simple. If China became a democracy, there could be still no guarantee of the possibility to avoid conflicts, as there are numerous factors involved into the process.
  3. Foreign policy of any country has a versatile specter of areas, related to it, including economic, immigrations and so on. Generally the foreign policy is utterly important for a state, as it helps to organize and to develop the relations with other nations and states, based on some unified standards, via cooperation of organizations and individual citizens. These relations should be based on such universal principles, which would be able to guarantee international security and benefits for people, living in all countries. One of the main aims of any state is to introduce the system of protection into its international relations policies. This is probably one of the main reasons, why force and threat became integral parts of any diplomacy, including the diplomacy of international relations. There have been numerous historical examples, which made it evident that purely diplomatic methods are not universal and could not be the guarantees of peace and stability in relations between nations. At the same time there are enough counter examples, proving the military force might turn out to be costly in all senses and still ineffective in solving of some of the conflicts. This means that it is not possible to draw a concrete line between war and peace in the world, especially taking into consideration the progress in technology, which also led to creation of such weapon, which makes the measuring of time not in months or weeks, rather in days or even minutes. Certainly such issues in foreign policy, as sanctions for example, should be prevailing in order to limit nations only to economic losses, however at the same time not a single nation could be considered ready nowadays to refuse from its military potential. In other words, peace is the final aim of any international relations, still every state is constantly ready for war, in order to be able to protect its sovereign, borders, citizens.
  4. The issues, related to oppression of women in different countries all over the world have been the subjects of discussion for a long time already. The situation seems to have positive dynamic, i.e. there are numerous changes in education, social and political life of women, still this problem is far from being solved completely. In order to improve the situation further there have been various means, suggested and developed, including for example the gender quotas, which were seen as a way to involve women more into the sphere of politics. By many political leaders introduction of these quotas is considered to be a step towards changing of the position of women within a country. Some experience in India really proves that quotas influence positive the female leadership formation. “Quotas aim to directly increase female representation in leadership positions. They can bypass discrimination by directly mandating that certain positions be reserved for women.” (Rohini 2012). Taking into consideration that men and women have mostly different approaches in politics, in solving various conflicts and problems, introduction of female forces would most luckily contribute to introduction of fresh approaches and ideas, leaving space for further development and improvements. Another important point is the presentation of political and social interests of women, which would without any doubts be increased in case of application of gender quotas. Any innovation is luckily to bring not only positive, but also negative consequences, or at least some risks. In case with gender quotas such risks are related to the possibility of crowding out of ethnic and socioeconomic groups, because if some places and positions are reserved for women, according to these gender quotas, this might mean that these positions are closed for other candidates, representing various social groups. In this case there is a risk of real democratic representation violation.
  5. Some experts started to discuss the possibility of the second Cold War, because of the evident tensions in relations between Russia and America lately. There is an opinion that Russia considers NATO to be a potential threat and NATO seems to treat Russia in the same way. Gorbachov, who was a head of the state in the 1990s, stated that NATO could not be a threat, because there was an agreement with the Soviet Union. However, when the Soviet Union fell, this agreement was not in action any more. Along with this, anti-American propaganda was spreading in Russian mass media, and most of citizens there really considered NATO to be a serious threat. One of the problems, as it was indicated by some experts, was the fact that during the first Cold War usual Russian people were not against Americans, they might have disliked some policies of the country or its political leaders of that time. Nowadays, the situation is different, as a lot of people in Russia see Americans as “brash, brutal…wanting to impose their system on everybody.” (Saunders 2014). Certainly a lot depends upon the actual leader of the country, as Putin managed to set an authoritarian system in his country, making his people really believe that his actions in Ukraine and his attitude towards America are correct. Generally the military conflict in Ukraine is seen by many experts as one of the driving forces for the possibility of the second Cold War. At the moment none of them is however ready to state, whether this would be the close Cold War or there would be any significant differences. Or maybe this situation would result in something absolutely different from the first Cold War. The most important difference here is the comparison of the two countries – modern Russia and the former Soviet Union, because Russia today could not become an equal opponent of America due to lack of the super power, which was present there during the times of the Soviet Union. It is difficult to foresee what exactly issues or steps could stop this tendency and make the two countries unite and cooperate, maybe this could be the desire not to ruin the general order in international relations, doing harm to their own economies.
  6. North Korea has been known as a country, which had broken some agreements, for example the Agreed Framework in 1994. In 1989 North Korea signed the Non-proliferation Treaty, still “it has not granted the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) the access necessary to confirm its 1992 IAEA report. North Korea has since withdrawn from the NPT, and announced it is reprocessing nuclear material that it has threatened to sell.” (Suan 2012). This was an important moment, when those, who supported the change of the regime in this country, started to talk about North Korea as an unreliable partner. These officials stand for taking up some measures against North Korea, but without clear defining of them. At any rate military confrontation would hardly be rewarding. Such action would without any doubts provoke the corresponding reaction from North Korea, which would lead to numerous deaths of people. In addition there is a high risk that any military confrontation would not remain limited to only the Korean peninsula, rather spreading to Japan and China. These are the reasons, why most of the experts insist upon working out of a set of economic means or sanctions, which might have impact upon North Korea. One of the examples was the “statement from the Republican Policy Committee seems to be advocating the forced collapse of North Korea when it calls for economic sanctions against the country, coordinated interdiction of North Korean ships, and funding to encourage the exodus of North Korean refugees.” (Suan 2012). On the one hand it is not possible to build international relations without agreements between various countries. On the other hand, if any country has broken at least two of them already, as in 2009 the second round of the nuclear missile tests were continued, then this country could hardly be considered to be a reliable partner for the future and even if not to start any brutal confrontation with it, there is a need to have some spare options, to be on the safe side.
  7. Human rights are moral principles and norms, which were described with the aim of guaranteeing of many-sided protection of individuals in relation to their legal rights and international laws. Generally they are accepted as universal fundamental rights, which each individual has irrespective of his nation, location, origin, status or anything else. There is a need in legal basis in order to guarantee that all people bear the responsibility for respecting human rights of other individuals. Certainly the doctrine of human rights became rather important for international relations, international legislation, existence of global institutions. The central idea of human rights states that “if the public discourse of peacetime global society can be said to have a common moral language, it is that of human rights.” (Normand, Zaidi, 2008). At the same time it is necessary to acknowledge the controversy of this notion and the continuous debates. Philosophers during various epochs made the accent upon different human rights and till the moment this discussion is not finished with any universal compromise. One of the reasons could be the significant differences, existing in various countries, where the mode of life is formed under the influence of cultural and local ethical beliefs, often related to religion. The process of globalization is related to universal human rights, as it is supposed to introduce these rights to all countries. However, there are probably some flaws in the system of human rights, as it is till the moment only theoretically universal; the rights of individuals are broken in various countries constantly due to military conflicts, poor economic conditions and so on. As it was already mentioned even cultural peculiarities of a county are able to impact the degree of acceptance by this concrete country of these human rights.
  8. Free Trade Agreements (FTA) is a rather popular practice in world economy. The first such agreement was signed by America with Israel and went into effect in 1985. Four years later there was the second one with Canada and so on. The 2000s were marked with intensification of these agreements in the whole world. One of the strongest benefits from international trade is certainly related to the fact that not all countries are equal in their production capacities and natural resources, correspondingly for their economies there are positive tendencies, as soon as they gain the right for free trade with their international partners. Thus FTAs allow countries to concentrate on their own resources, exchanging them for the missing products. At the same time introduction and spreading of FTAs led to the situation, when taking into consideration the number of countries-participants, it is more difficult to reach the consensus in each round of negotiations. Secondly, in case the more dominating countries are to agree first, then the new members are to participate in later rounds, which leave the more sensitive countries to negotiate the last and cause problems. Some specialists are worried that if the situation continues to develop in this way, it would lead to formation of huge trading blocs “the United States and the Western Hemisphere, the EU and nearby countries, and Japan and its trading partners in Asia and the Pacific Rim–a result that would be inferior to multilateral free trade” (Amartya 2009). The unequal bargaining power in its turn is luckily to lead to certain restrictions for other counties, which would be set by large countries and it would not be possible to talk about equal negotiating power. One of the weighty positive outcomes of FTAs is considered the possibility to support the developing countries by providing them with additional possibilities of free trade.
  9. The issues, related to Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), seem to be beneficial for developing countries, as this is the way to provide them financial support during the period of financial crisis. At the same time lately there have been a lot of problems discussed, as FDI is also a way of potential impact upon the countries. “The resilience of FDI during financial crises was also evident during the Mexican crisis of 1994-95 and the Latin American debt crisis of the 1980s.” (Amartya 2009). Still the recent studies and opinions are more and more insisting on the cautions of FDI. First of all FDI is often indicated as sign of weakness of a host country. “One striking feature of FDI flows is that their share in total inflows is higher in riskier countries, with risk measured either by countries’ credit ratings for sovereign (government) debt or by other indicators of country risk” (Amartya 2009). One of the reasons could be the fact that FDI is one of the often capital flow forms exactly in countries with inefficient markets. This makes the foreign investors work directly, instead of involving of local markets. There are cases, when FDI are not beneficial for the countries, which get it, this happens for example when the investment is geared towards serving domestic market, and there is protection via high tariffs. Thus along with potential benefits from FDI, there are a lot of serious risks, which also need to be considered.
  10. Usually European Union (EU) enlargement is defined as the process of accepting new members. “Since ‘the six’ (Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands) signed the Treaty of Paris in 1951, creating the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), the EU has successfully enlarged on six occasions” (Albuquerque 2010). States are not simply accepted to the EU, they are first to prove that each of them corresponds to the “Copenhagen criteria”. Historically the EU had managed to be successful in accepting new members and developing of new ideals. At the moment a lot of experts consider the situation to be rather challenging. The initial aim was to reunite Europe, gain higher economic and political level and balance between the countries via creating a single market. Controversies were however related to the situation with budgets of new members, which were financially less stable. At the same time expansion of the borders of EU is sometimes seen as breaking of their fundamental rules in ideology. Also it is necessary to take into consideration the geographical positions of the counties, as till the moment most of the EU members are situated on the European continent. Physical distance could be important for building trade or any other relations between potential new members.
  11. One of the most serious problems, related to environment, is without any doubts the effect of global warming. This is a mistake to think that global warming is able to bring disastrous consequences only for climate and environment; in reality environmental problems are directly or indirectly related to economical and social issues as well. Thus it is possible to state that economic crisis might be dependant upon climate change and climate problems. First of all addressing the climate problems could be advantageous for economics because new work places would be created, economics would be generally stimulated and provide better future perspectives in all spheres. At the same time ignoring of climate problems and concentrating purely upon finding the ways out of economic crisis will most luckily bring poor results. “Creating a green economy will require investments to reduce CO2 emissions and although this will involve initial up-front costs, these investments also represent a stimulus to economies and will build modern and more resilient infrastructure for the future, so these costs will eventually be recouped.” (Albuquerque 2010). Another important aspect to consider is the fact that solar and wind energy have proved to be more competitive, due to their cheaper prices and there are a lot of experts, who state that alternative energy sources are vitally important for future. The relations between economic success and environment could be reveled with simple examples, thus the Asia Pacific Region is said to save US $4 for each spend dollar for reducing the risks. In order to overcome the acute economic problems, it is necessary not only to make the correct investments into sustainable economy, but also to consider the ecological issues.
  12. Nowadays the issues, related to immigrants, their citizenship and well-being, are rather controversial for America. There are various approaches worked out with the aim to guarantee many-sided benefits for both the arriving people and the country. One of the suggestions, which is under a discussion, is the providing of earned citizenship to undocumented immigrants in the U.S. According to reports, immigrants, who are living and working not officially in the country, consequently earn less money, than they could earn according to their potential, consequently they pay less taxes into the budget, which decreases their contribution into the economy of the country. In case they are provided with the chance to obtain their legal status, there is a possibility that the situation will be changed for better. “According to outside estimates, providing earned citizenship for these workers would increase their wages and, over 10 years, boost U.S. GDP by $1.4 trillion, increase total income for all Americans by $791 billion, generate $184 billion in additional state and federal tax revenue from currently undocumented immigrants, and add about 2 million jobs to the U.S. economy.” (Albuquerque 2010). Important factor is that a lot of actual American citizens support this initiative. Some experts are sure that immigration reform should foresee only legal status, not giving the chance to those individuals, who are on the right side of the law for earning of their citizenship. In a way the “legalization-only” approach is criticized for breaking of the main principle of the country, stating that any person is able to become a citizen of America, as long as he is aiming at working for the sake of this country and takes all the responsibilities of becoming its citizen. It is not correct to ignore people, who are living and working in America, who pay taxes and make their contributions into the further development of this country, but will never have the chance to become real citizens of it.
  13. There are various opinions concerning foreign aid or development assistance, as some specialists consider it to be a good practice, whereas others are sure that this is nothing more but wasting money for corrupted governments. Initially the basic aims of this program were certainly rather positive, as they included different forms of help, for example food, clothing, military assistance and so on, for the countries, which were in crucial situations due to some reasons. If to list the main flaws of this system, it is necessary to mention that often this aid doesn’t get directly to the people, who suffered most and need it badly, “Aid amounts are dwarfed by rich country protectionism that denies market access for poor country products, while rich nations use aid as a lever to open poor country markets to their products”, even if huge grants are prepared, the money often is embezzled away. (Shah 2014). These drawbacks seem to be considered by the DAC members and they plan to introduce further Donor’s Forward Spending plans for till the year 2017.

Overall, international relations include many spheres of business, economy, social life, culture and so on, which are so important for all countries all over the world; the ideal model would be if all countries could perfectly cooperate with each other, providing the resources, which are missing in a way of exchange. Unfortunately, nothing could be perfect and certainly there are a lot of controversial and sophisticated issues in international relations, solution of which depends on numerous factors.

 

Works cited:

Albuquerque, R., “The Composition of International Capital Flows: Risk Sharing through Foreign Direct Investment,” Bradley Policy Research Center Working Paper. Rochester, New York: University of Rochester, 2010

Amartya, S.  Development as Freedom, A.A. Knopf, New York. 2009

Bertucci, G, Alberti, A. Globalization and the Role of the State: Challenges and Perspectives. New York, 2009

Friedberg, A. “The Future of U.S.-China Relations: Is Conflict Inevitable?” Journal Article, International Security, volume 30, issue 2: 2009, pages 7-45

Goldstein, S.J., Pevehouse, J.C. International Relations. Longman; 9th edition, 2010

Normand, R., Zaidi, S. Human Rights at the UN. The Political History of Universal Justice, Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2008

Rohini, P. Gender quotas and female leadership. World Development Report 2012. Gender Equality and Development, 2012

Saunders, P., J. “Some of the differences would be good for America, some would be bad—and one could be ugly.”.  May 11, 2014

Shah, A. Foreign Aid for Development Assistance. September 28, 2014

Suan E., O. Can North Korea be Trusted? The North Korea deal suggests a gradual shift in policy. March 13, 2012

 

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"The terms offer and acceptance." freeessays.club, 17 May 2016

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