It is a given that new eyes are needed to view the global political scene. On a global basis, the way we deal with international developments and the possibilities of consolidating peace or the possibilities of an outbreak of war need to be seen from different angles. Since the years of the Second World War, the politically powerful countries, led by the USA, have used a realistic theory of dealing with developments, focusing on the containment of any threats and having as a tool the military power of a weapon in their hands.
Today, however, many of these realistic facts have changed. And the ways of considering the exercise of international politics need restructuring as well as the factors that those who plan it must now take into account in order to achieve substantial results. Robert C. Johansen, professor of political science and peace studies at the University of Notre Dame and senior fellow at the Kroc Institute of Peace in the US, tackles exactly this topic in his latest book. In: “Where the Evidence Leads: A Realistic Strategy for Peace and Human Security”, Oxford, 2022, Johansen hopes for a paradigm shift in Washington’s global strategy to recognize the declining utility of military engagement, the rise of non-state actors and agencies, the proliferation of transnational problems such as climate and the increase of global poverty and social despair.
The realist theory of international relations holds that conflict and war are integral elements of relations between countries. Johansen’s revolutionary analysis argues that the anarchic system based on a militarized balance of terror can be gradually changed by extensive law enforcement methods and by changes in internationally controlled systems of governance. Bridges are thus built between the self-evidently failed policies of the past and by addressing the new realities of peacebuilding. In a world full of threats Johansen recommends ways that can lead to peace.
As the world becomes more chaotic, political economy becomes more and more important. The methods of economic policy applied and dominated indicate influences and indirect dependencies. For years after the war the US had promoted Keynesian logics that attempted to find a middle ground between policies of suffocating state control of the economy and a completely unregulated free market. This logic prevailed for several decades with positive results. Later, however, with the initiative of political figures from Europe (M. Thatcher and economists from Germany and Austria), neoclassical concepts that were called neoliberal came flooding to the fore. These gradually dominated the world but did not have a purely American origin. Consequently, global balances and influences shifted. As Peter J. Katzenstein, et al., writes in “The Downfall of the American Order?”, Cornell, 2022: the liberalization of economies brought great prosperity to the countries of the South and developing states while causing deadlocks, crises and inequalities in developed North. The instability that followed characterizes the global economy to this day. This uncertainty needs concerted efforts by all to be overcome.
