POLB80 Lec 3 Notes.docx

POLB80 Lecture 3 Monday, September 22, 2013 Instance Exercise • Sovereignty, state exercising sovereignty (inAfrica, asserting control over natural resources within their boundaries) • Growing power of China, and what it’s doing with its power. Expansion of Chinese ambition globally • Limits of China’s power • Resource curse (development country had abundant resources, able to take advantage of it) o Don’t have the full capacity to control all the resources (can hurt self, rely on external actor, not able to take full advantage) o Can run into problem in sovereignty and environmental degradation • Irrational states o Rejecting the money • Economic competition between China and the West o Globalize dynamics o Emergence of new superpower o China been able to invest and do whatever they want in the country o Africa is trying to act the sovereignty over the natural resources Con’t Lecture 2 Cold War history and Post-Cold War World • Impact of Cold War Today o Change in type of conflict  Proxy warfare  In the early 20 century, large army, lots of gun.  Today: civil war, intrastate warfare. Change of type of conflict. No longer have we had interstate war. (intervention of intrastate war form the outside)  Two large blocks, result of cold war. Conflict in the proxy block. Competition of who was going to be in which block. Soviet and US supporting each side. o Prominence of the UN  To have an authoritative voice, security council has to agree (authoritative and make binding resolution, call upon members to use force) • Majority and P5 (Russia, China, France, US, Britain) veto members to agree (during cold war, very few binding resolution, disagreement between US and Soviet Union) • Russia boycotting the meeting. Pushing back N. Korea invasion • P5 less ideologically divided. Prominence increase due to expansion of agenda o Primacy of the US  US was the only superpower, undisputed hegemon. o Expansion of international agenda  How do we manage the relationship between US and Soviet Union. • Shape what post-cold war looked like. Trace dynamics back to cold war, the legacy of it. Thinking Theoretically • Questions to ask • Facts that are important • Stories that makes sense of facts POLB80 Lecture 3 Monday, September 22, 2013 • 4 keys for every IR theory o Who are the important ACTORS? o What is the NATURE of those actors? o What is the CONTEXT of global politics like? o What INTERACTIONS should we expect? Realism • Not ‘