Stephen Krasner
Stephen Krasner, an international relations professor at Stanford University, visited Tallinn.
International relations was about historical power relations between centers of power or states. How to think about issues without using worst-case analysis.
Characteristics of the current international system:
1 Unprecedented power of USA
2 Rising of China (and India) To supersede USA in terms of size in some time.USA has been very open to China. Policy of integrating China into the system in such a way that it becomes economicallyunfeasible to break the sytem. The addition nuclear weapons and possibilty of total mutual destruction, the system is quite stable. USA calls China a freerider.
3 EU. Unclear what it is. Not a state nor a union. High levels of independece between USA and EU. Reiterates points of Cooper. Likes France's new government.
4 Unprecedented amount of failing states. Mentions Coopers books. Iterates Fukuyamas state-building book. Many states have standard political instutions which nonetheless have no functional value.
5 Globalization. Avian influenza, AIDS, etc outbreak. Something he is certain that will happen, only a question of when. Again, Fukuyamas points. Cooperation of failed states, international criminality, illness.
6 Availability of weapons of mass destruction. North Korea, etc. Again, unprecetented. Simplicity of weapon creation and purchase. Extremly bad thing :)
7 Radical Islamic ideology.
Q: What is your position on effects of climate change as a characteristic of the current international system?
Notes from a talk on September 27, 2007
Update:
Stephen Krasner is just out with a new book.