BALANCE OF POWER CONCEPT IN ANALYZING ANALYTIC AND THEORETICAL CONCLUSIONS WITHIN THE END OF THE COLD WAR AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

Name : Sri Rezeki

NPM: 0806322962

Source : Fred Halliday, The End of the Cold War and International Relations : Some Analytic and Theoretical Conclusions in Booth, Ken & Steve Smith, International Relations Today (Pennysylvanisa: Pennisylvania State University Press, 1995)

BALANCE OF POWER CONCEPT IN ANALYZING ANALYTIC AND THEORETICAL CONCLUSIONS WITHIN THE END OF THE COLD WAR AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

The end of the Cold War presents something in international relations studies. It presents an academic discipline with a special view. It could be seen in the third challenge. Those two of three challenge maybe self evident and the third rather less so. On the one hand, it poses a range of empirical and analytical questions, which in analytical empirical way we could see what happened when Cold War period, why was it happened, and also what the implications for the course of the international relations studies that exactly could be examined and it probably could produce further theoretical work. On the other hand, it poses a theoretical challenge, namely that of assessing how far the course of events over the past few years, and the broader revision of how we see historical trends in the twentieth century.

The First World War produced international relations as an academic discipline and generated a field of theoretical work, the much maligned as utopianism, which dominated the inter-war years. The Second World War and Cold war followed marked the domination of realism, But here is mainly not talking about whether the issue does or not but rather for what issue of substance posed by the past really are, and which processes currently under way in the world outside merit our prospective analytic and theoretical attention. As the “utopians” and “realist” in their time recently, we may get it wrong but there is no reason to avoid the challenge which the end of the Cold War. Looking deeper for what was happened in 1980s, the historical and originality could be summarized in brief. In a bloc of states dominated by the USSR which had been engaged in great power competition with the West, and which also had form of the USSR itself been challenging the Western world since 1917. The originality of this system’s collapse needs mentions that it occurred without interstate war, in a very short time and without the presence of evident form of political vanguard or opposition organization and without significant bloodshed.

The collapse of Soviet Union is not only the end of the Soviet Union but also the end of the history that began in 1879 which named as France Revolution. Why it called so, it because it brings the end of the longer period of international history in which a movement of contestation of the hegemonic capitalist form was identifiable. In this perspective the “end of the Cold War” is a composite phenomenon involving four broad historical trends, each of which will take time to work it out and each of which may have identifiable theoretical implications. The implications are:

1. The end of the Cold War marks the end of the interstate conflict that has dominated the world since 1945 and of the Soviet-US nuclear confrontation. Two obvious prospective issues are whether this marks an end of great power military rivalry as whole, at least for a generation or so, whether a new pattern of interstate bloc and of hegemony will emerge to replace the old.
2. The end of the Cold War is the end of communism as political force. As already indicated, a phenomenon confined to Europe but the trend within China would seem to indicate a move toward capitalism, if not liberalism and the remaining of communist states such Cuba, Vietnam, North Korea are unable to provide an international alternative.
3. The end of the Cold War is the break-up of the USSR and its alliances system. It also has broken a “regime” that prevailed since the end of the Second World War.
4. The end of the Cold War means the collapse of communism and the apparent spread of liberal democratic political form to a range of countries, post-communist and Third World, has led some to suggest that a new era of global democracy is at hand.

At least four broad, interrelated theoretical issues, ones that go to the heart of international relations, would seem to arise, they are as follows:

1. Homogeneity and “international society” which means how far the international system does operate on the basis not only of shared inter-state norms, but also shared common internal norms
2. The mechanisms of inter-society relationships under capitalism and also the mechanism of how the dynamic of globalization under capitalism operates, with both incorporation and blockages to development
3. The mechanism of power in the contemporary world, power relationship with military to economic and ideological power
4. The workings of the balance of power in an era without major great power conflict.

The cold war was one episode in the evolution of that system, a phase of the conflict in which one group of states guided by an ideology that challenged the prevailing models of political and economic development, sought to pioneer an alternative path, and in so doing came into international conflict with the dominant powers of the West. A new theorization of international relations may, therefore be needed to deal with what may be a long period of intra-hegemonic peace. Much will, however, depend on how the central underpinnings of this new period (international economic prosperity, the consolidation of liberal democracy in major states, a reduction in North-South tensions) are consolidated.

The writer is agree about what Fred Halliday have said, yes the end of the Cold War and even Cold War itself presents something for international relations studies. It brings a field for researcher, scholars, and students to examine it. Seeing the Cold War which means rivalries between USA and USSR, we took it in balance of power concept. According to Niebuhr, “neither world government nor a pragmatic understanding with the Russian is an attainable goal. They are therefore tempted to grasp the second horn dilemma. They accept the fact of an inevitable war.”[1] From this statement, we know that between USA and USSR there is a system in could war era that makes this two great power countries inevitably linked to the war. It’s because they believe in balance of power concept. Balance of power concept itself is the concept when a country tends to intended to prevent any one nation from becoming sufficiently strong so as to enable it to enforce its will upon the rest.[2]

If we examine this cold war case in analytical and empirical way with balance of power concept, we could answer some questions about what cold war was and why it could be happened. As the history already talked, this concept dominated for the reasons why US and USSR keeps struggling to win from their battle. Even in ideology, economic and politics. They attempts to spread their influence more than its rivals. Such what Hartman said that concept of Balance of Power in International Relations as “a system in the sense that one power bloc leads to the emergence of other and it ultimately leads to a network of alliances.”[3] Balance of power so perfectly described the polarity of the Cold War that it became integral to, indeed practically synonymous with, the concept of the East-West order. Although the image was so familiar as to be almost transparent, a great deal of political presumption was locked within its crystalline structure. East and West existed, and there was a "balance" between them that presumably somehow "weighed" a quality called power, possessed by the enemies, each side, in the way material objects possess mass.[4] This explanation above is quite answered for questions that questioning in the analytical and empirical way. Concept of balance of power, direct or indirectly live in rivalry between USA and USSR.

From the theoretical issue also could be seen that how the condition of balance of power concept after the end of Cold War-collapse of USSR-which reveals that USA as the winner of the long period of battle. Something that may confuse us is how this concept could be going if there is no rival anymore for USA (who won the battle)? Due to we are getting used to see USA having its great rival yet suddenly this rival is supposed to not appear. Who’s become the next rival? Those are questions that we really curious to. The concept of balance of power would still remain because there will be appear some potential rival for America. That could be Islam-for what we see right now-or it could be another developed countries such as Russia, Japan, or it could be China. We then considered what is the new structure of the international system? Whether bipolar, multipolar, or mix of the two?[5]

Most people could assume there are a lot of changes that already happened, but actually it’s not full true. The world we live after the end of cold war could be named as “same” because the end of the cold war itself didn’t change anything. Such what Ian Clark stated that “the world of 2000 would not look totally unfamiliar to someone who had been asleep for twenty years”.[6] In line with Clark, Keith L. Shimko stated that, “the ended of the Cold War has not brought with it any fundamental alteration in the scope of American military power and commitments throughout the world.” [7] What we really know after the end of Cold War are the gap between the world’s rich and poor due to capitalism, large portion of humanity go to bed hungry every night and have no access to the basic necessities of life, the global environmental problems that were emerging as critical global issues before the end of the Cold War remain as pressing as ever-the demise of the superpower rivalry has not restored the hole of ozone layer and ended the global warming.[8] If we are living in a new world order, it shares many similarities with the one we left behind.

CONCLUSION

The end of the Cold War is actually presents a field to be examined with analytical empirical way or theoretical issue. Within analytical empirical way we could examine what the Cold War was and why it could be happened, and within theoretical issue we could examine it from what happen future after could war. In analyzing this material, writer use balance of concept as the indicator to explain the answer. How’s this concept used when Cold War and after Cold War and what happened in the world from both time.

In this review, writer attempt to convey what’s same and what’s a difference after the end of the Cold War and the answer is even before and after the end of the Cold War, condition of the world doesn’t have much change. It still could not eliminate poor, could not fix the global environmental, etc. What had been change are the gap between rich and poor are huge because of capitalism and globalization, democracy belief doesn’t have any strict action if facing American power and bias of homogeneity and also bias of the concept of International Society that attempt to convey after the end of Cold War. Last, concept of power is still about military, economic, and ideology. Those are what we find out after the end of the Cold War.

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[1] Torbjorn L. Knutsen, A history of International Relations Theory (New York: Manchester University Press, 1992) p. 226.

[2] Was Accessed from http://www.cambridge.org/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=9780521697606 on February, 6^th 2010 at 21:24.

[3] Was Accessed from http://www.legalserviceindia.com/article/l326-Balance-of-Power-in-International-Relations.html On February, 6th 2010 at 21.43.

[4] Ibid.

[5] James E. Dougherty and Robert L. Pfaltzgraff, Jr., Contending Theories of International Relatons;mA Comprehensive Survey (New York: Wesley Educational Publisher Inc, 1997)p.397.

[6] Ian Clark, The Post Cold War Order: The Spoils of Peace (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001)p. 40.

[7] Keith L. Shimko, International Relations Perspectives and Controversies (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2008)p.42.

[8] Ibid.