A History of Global

Politics : Creating an
International Order
Learning Outcomes

Identify key events in the development of international relations

Differentiate internationalization from globalization
Define state and the nation

Distinguish between the competing conceptions of internationalism ; and

Discuss the historical evolution of international politics

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 The world is composed of many countries or states, all
of them having different forms of government.

 Some scholars of politics are interested in individual

states and examine the internal politics of these
countries.

 These scholars are studying international relations.

 When they explore the deepening of interactions

between states, they refer to the phenomenon of
internationalization

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Internationalization
It does not equal globalization,
although it is a major part of globalization.

o It is important to study international relations because states/governments are

key drivers of global processes
o In this lesson, we will examine internationalization as one window to view the
globalization of politics
The Attributes of
Today’s Global
System
World Politics today has Four(4) key attributes.

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4 Key Attributes
“
1. Countries/States that are independent and
govern themselves
2. These countries interact with each other
through diplomacy
3. There are International Organizations, like
UN, that facilitate these interactions
4. International relations have lives on their
own

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- The UN, apart from
being meeting ground for
Presidents and other
heads of state, also has
task-specific agencies
like World Health
Organization and
International Labour
Organization (ILO)

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What are the origin of
this system?

What is a Country? Or Nation-State is a relatively modern

what academics also phenomenon in human history, and
call
people did not always organize
Nation-State?
themselves as countries.

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What are the origin of
this system?

- People in various regions of the world have identified

exclusively with units as small as their village or their
tribe,
- At other times, they see themselves as members of larger
political categories like “Christendom”
(the entire Christian World)

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Nation-State

- It is composed of two non-interchangeable

terms.
- Not all States are Nations, and Not all
Nations are States
- Like Scotland, it has its own flag and
Culture, but it belongs to state called
United Kingdom

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Nation-State

- Many commentators believe that

Bangsamoro is a separate Nation
existing within the Philippines but,
through their elites , recognizes the
authority of the Philippines State.

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Nation-State
- Meanwhile, if there are states with
multiple nations, there are also single
Nations with multiple states.
- Nation of Korea: North & South Korea
- “Chinese Nation” may refer to both
People’s Republic of China (the
mainland) and Taiwan

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What is the difference between
Nation and State?

State refers to a country and its

governments
(i.e., the government of the
Philippines).

A State has Four Attributes.

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Four(4) Attributes of State

First: It exercises authority over a specific population,

called its citizens

Second: It governs specific territory.

Third: A state has a structure of government that crafts
various rules that people(society) follow.

Fourth: The state has sovereignty over its territory

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State has sovereignty
over its territory

Sovereignty here refers to internal and external

authority.
 Internally – no individuals or groups can operate in a
given national territory by ignoring the state.
- This means that groups like churches, civil society
organizations, corporations and other entities have to
follow the laws of the state where they establish their
parishes, offices, or headquarters
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State has sovereignty
over its territory

Sovereignty here refers to internal and external

authority.
 Externally – sovereignty means that a state’s policies
and procedures are independent of the interventions of
other states.
- Russia or China for example cannot pass laws for the
Philippines and vice versa.

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 Nation
 According to Benedict Anderson, Nation is an “imagined community”
 It is limited because it does not go beyond a given “official boundary”
 Rights and responsibilities are mainly the privilege and concerns of
that nation.
- being limited means the nation has its boundaries

- For example, anyone can become a Catholic if one chooses to, in fact
Catholic wants more people to join their community; they refer to is as the
call to discipleship.

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 Nation
 An American cannot simply go to the Philippine Embassy and “convert”
into a Philippine citizen.
 Nations often limit themselves to people who have imbibed a particular
culture, speak a common language, and live in a specific territory.
 Calling it "imagined” does not mean that the nation is made-up. Rather,
the nation allows one to feel a connection with a community of people
even if he/she will never meet all of them in his/her lifetime.

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 Nation
 In a given national territory like the Philippine archipelago, you rest in
the comfort that the majority of people living in it are also Fillipinos.
 Most nations strive to become states.
 Nation-builders can only feel a sense of fulfillment when that national
ideal assumes an organizational form, whose authority and power are
recognized and accepted by the people.

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 Nation Canada’s
Regions
 for example, the nation of Quebec, though
belonging to the state of Canada, has
different laws about language (they are
French-speaking and require French
language competencies for their citizens).

 It is also for this reason that Scotland,

though part of the United Kingdom, has a
strong independence movement led by the
Scottish Nationalist Party.

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 “Nation and State are closely
related because it is nationalism
that facilitates state formation”
- In the modern and contemporary era, it has been the nationalist
movements that have allowed for the creation of nation-states.

- States become independent and sovereign because of nationalist

sentiment that clamors for this independence.

- Sovereignty is, thus, one of the fundamental principles of modern state

politics. Understanding how this became the case entails going back as far
as 400 years ago.
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The Interstate System
╸ The origins of the present-day concept of sovereignty, can be traced back to
the Treaty of Westphalia, which was a set agreements signed in 1648 to end
the Thirty Years' War between the major continental powers of Europe.

╸ After a brutal religious war between Catholics and Protestants, the Holy
Roman Empire Spain, France, Sweden, and the Dutch Republic designed a
system that would prevent wars in the future by recognizing that the treat
signers exercise complete control over their domestic affairs and swear not to
meddle in each other's affairs.
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The Interstate System
╸ The Westphalian system provided stability for the nations of Europe, until it
faced its first major challenge by Napoleon Bonaparte.
╸ Bonaparte believed in spreading the principles of the French Revolution-
liberty, equality, and fraternity—to the rest of Europe and thus challenged
the power of kings, nobility, and religion in Europe.
╸ The Napoleonic Wars lasted from 1803-1815 with Napoleon and his
armies marching all over much of Europe.
╸ In every country they conquered, the French implemented the Napoleonic
Code that prohibited birth privileges, encouraged freedom or religion, and
promoted meritocracy in government service.
╸ This system shocked the monarchies and the hereditary elites

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The Interstate System
╸ Anglo and Prussian armies finally defeated Napoleon in the Battle of
Waterloo in 1815, ending the latter's mission to spread his liberal code
across Europe.
╸ To prevent another war and to keep their systems of privilege, the royal
powers created a new system that, in effect, restored the Westphalian
system.
╸ The Concert of Europe was an alliance of “great powers”—the
United Kingdom, Austria, Russia, and Prussia--that sought to restore
the world of monarchical, hereditary, and religious privileges of the
time before the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars.
╸ More importantly, it was an alliance that sought to restore the
sovereignty of states.

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The Interstate System
╸ Under this Metternich system (named after the
Austrian diplomat, Klemens Von Metternich, who
was the system’s main architect, the Concert’s Power
and authority lasted from 1815 to 1914, at the dawn
of World War 1

╸ Despite the challenge of Napoleon to the Westphalian

system and the eventual collapse of the Concert of
Europe after World War I, present-day international
system still has traces of this history.

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The Interstate System
╸ Until now, states are considered
sovereign, and Napoleonic attempts
to violently impose systems of
government in other countries are
frowned upon.
╸ Like the Concert system, "great
powers" still hold significant
influence over world politics.
╸ For example, the most powerful
grouping in the UN, the Security
Council, has a core of five
permanent members,
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Internationalism

╸ The Westphalian and Concert systems divided the world into

separate, sovereign entities.
╸ Since the existence of this interstate system, there have been
attempts to transcend it.
╸ Still, others imagine a system of heightened interaction between
various sovereign states, particularly the desire for greater
cooperation and unity among states and peoples
╸ This desire is called internationalism.

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Internationalism

╸ Internationalism comes in different

forms, but the principle may be divided
into two broad categories: liberal
internationalism and socialist
internationalism.
╸ The first major thinker of liberal
internationalism was the late 18th
century German philosopher Immanuel
Kant.

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Internationalism

╸ Kant likened states in a global system to people living in a given territory.

╸ If people living together require a government to prevent lawlessness,
shouldn't that same principle be applied to states?
╸ Without a form of world government, he argued, the international
system would be chaotic.
╸ Therefore, states, like citizens of countries, must give up some freedoms
and “establish a continuously growing state consisting of various nations
which will ultimately include the nations of the world."
╸ In short, Kant imagined a form of global government.

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Internationalism

╸ Writing in the late 18th century as well,

British philosopher Jeremy Bentham (who
coined the word "international” in 1780),
advocated the creation of international
law” that would govern the inter-state
relations.
╸ Bentham believed that objective global
legislators should aim to propose
legislation that would create “the greatest
happiness of all nations taken together.

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 “To many, these proposals for global
government and international law
seemed to represent challenges to states.
Would not a world government, in
effect, become supreme? And would not
its laws overwhelm the sovereignty of
individual states?”

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Internationalism

╸ The first thinker to reconcile

nationalism with liberal
internationalism was the 19th century
Italian patriot Giuseppe Mazzini.
╸ Mazzini was both an advocate of the
unification of the various Italian-
speaking mini-states and a major critic
of Metternich system

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Internationalism

╸ Like Mazzini, Wilson saw nationalism as a prerequisite for internationalism.

╸ Because of his faith in nationalism, he forwarded the principle of self determination
-the belief that the world's nations had a right to a free, and sovereign
government.
╸ He hoped that these free nations would become democracies, to be able to build a free
system of international relations based on international law and cooperation.
╸ Wilson, in short, became the most notable advocate for the creation of the League of
Nations.

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Internationalism

╸ He believed in a Republican government (without kings,

queens, and hereditary succession) and proposed a system
of free nations that cooperated with each other to create
an international system.
╸ Mazzini was a nationalist internationalist, who believes that
free, unified nation-states should be the basis of global
cooperation.
╸ Mazzini influenced the thinking of United States president
(1913-1921) Woodrow Wilson, who became one of the 20th
century's most prominent internationalist.

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Internationalism

╸  At the end of World War I in 1918, he pushed to transform

the League into a venue for conciliation and arbitration to
prevent another war.
╸ For his efforts, Wilson was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
in 1919.

American President Woodrow Wilson became

the most prominent

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Internationalism

 On one side of the war were the Axis Powers - Hitler's Germany,
Mussolini's Italy, and Hirohito's Japan who were ultra-nationalists
that had an instinctive disdain for internationalism and preferred to
violently impose their dominance over other nations.
It was in the midst of this war between the Axis Powers and the Allied
Powers (composed of the United States, United Kingdom, France,
Holland, and Belgium) that internationalism would be eclipsed.

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Internationalism

• Despite its failure, the League gave birth to some of the more
task-specific international organizations that are still around
until today,
• the most popular of which are the World Health Organization
(WHO) and the International Labour Organization (ILO).
• More importantly, it would serve as the blueprint for future
forms of international cooperation.

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Internationalism

• The League was the concretization of the concepts of

liberal internationalism.
• From Kant, it emphasized the need to form common
international principles.
• From Mazzini, it enshrined the principles of cooperation and
respect among nation-states.
• From Wilson, it called for democracy and self-determination.
These ideas would re-assert themselves in the creation of the
United Nations in 1946 (see next lesson).

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Internationalism

• One of Mazzini's biggest critics was German social philosopher

Karl Marx, who was also an internationalist, but he did not believe
in nationalism
• He believed that any true form of internationalisms deliberately
reject nationalism
• Marx placed a premium on Economic equality; he did not divide the
world into countries, but into classes

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Internationalism

• The capitalist class referred to the

owners of factories, companies, and
other “means of production.”
• In contrast, the proletariat class
included those who did not own the
means of production, but instead,
worked for the capitalists.

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Internationalism

• Marx and his co-author, Friedrich Engels, believed that in a socialist

revolution seeking to overthrow the state and alter the economy, the
proletariat "had no nation.”
• Hence, their now famous battle cry, “Workers of the world, unite!
You have nothing to lose but your chains."
• They opposed nationalism because they believed it prevented the
unification of the world's workers.
• Instead of identifying with other workers, nationalism could make
workers in individual countries identify with the capitalists of their
countries.

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Internationalism

• Marx died in 1883, but his followers soon sought to make his vision
concrete by establishing their international organization.
• The Socialist International (SI) was a union of European socialist
and labor parties established in Paris in 1889.
• Although short-lived, the SI's achievements included the
declaration of May 1 as Labor Day and the creation of an
International Women's Day.
• Most importantly, it initiated the successful campaign for an 8-hour
workday.

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Internationalism

• The SI collapsed during World War I.

• As the SI collapsed, a more radical version emerged.
• In the so-called Russian Revolution of 1917, Czar Nicholas II was
overthrown and replaced by a revolutionary government led by
the Bolshevik Party and its leader, Vladimir Lenin.
• This new state was called the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics, or USSR.

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Internationalism

• Unlike the majority of the member parties of the SI, the

Bolsheviks did not believe in obtaining power for the
working class through elections.
• Rather, they exhorted the revolutionary "vanguard”
parties to lead the revolutions across the world, using
methods of terror if necessary.
• Today, parties like this are referred to as Communist
parties.
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Internationalism

• To encourage these socialist revolutions across the world,

Lenin established the Communist International (Comintern)
in 1919.
• The Comintern served as the central body for directing
Communist parties all over the world.
• Many of the world's states feared the Comintern, believing
that it was working in secret to stir up revolutions in their
countries (which was true).

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Internationalism

• A problem arose during World War II when the Soviet Union

joined the Allied Powers in 1941.
• The United States and the United Kingdom would, of course, not
trust the Soviet Union in their fight against Hitler's Germany.
• The Soviet Union took over the countries in Eastern Europe when
the United States, the Soviet Union, and Great Britain divided the
war-torn Europe into their respective spheres of influence.

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Internationalism

• The Cominform, like the Comintern before it, helped direct the
various communist parties that had taken power in Eastern Europe.
• With the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union in 1921, whatever
existing thoughts about communist internationalism also practically
disappeared.
• The SI managed to re-establish itself in 1951, but its influence
remained primarily confined to Europe, and has never been
considered a major player in international relations to this very day.

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Internationalism

• For the postwar period, however,

liberal internationalism would
once again be ascendant.
• And the best evidence of this is
the rise of the United Nations as
the center of global governance.

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Conclusion:
• This lesson examined the roots of the international
system.
• Internationalism is but one window into the broader
phenomenon of globalization.
• Nevertheless, it is a very crucial aspect of globalization
since global interactions are heightened by the
increased interdependence of states.
• International relations are facilitated by international
organizations that promote global norms and policies.
• The most prominent example of this organization, of
course, is the United Nations.

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