Did The End Of The Cold War In 1989-91 Fundamentally Change The Nature Of International Politics?

Introduction

Cold War can best be described as an international system characterized by bipolar states. It involved military and economic contest between the two superpowers in the time. One end of the continuum involved United Sates and the USSR on the other. The end of this bipolar system thus marks the end of cold war. The end of the bipolar system led to increased economic cooperation between states, regionalism and other fundamental changes. The end of cold war changed the nature of international politics.

Body

The end of cold war characterized by the collapse of Eastern Europe socialist regimes in what is formerly known as Soviet Union, transformed the way each nation undertakes its international affairs. Fundamental changes that have taken place brought to end the bipolarity in cold war that was mainly characterized by tightly knit alliances, ideological confrontation, and emphasis on military security. Since the end of cold war, international politics has shifted emphasis from militarization for security reasons, to cooperation and economic development. However, though there is a great reduction in the cases of military conflict, and nations are taking advantage of cooperation for economic reasons, there has been an increase in economic competition among various countries that has been raised by the shift towards economic interdependency. Additionally, the traditional geographic boundaries have been blurred due to the shift to economic dominance in international politics, as economic development requires a country to participate in international trade (Croix, plummer, & Lee: 180).

There has also been a shift from demand for peacekeeping towards peace building. International community has expanded the command given its peace operations. The end of cold war resulted in increased cooperation and as a result increased rates of intervention. The rise in these interventions is characterized both by changes from interstate to internal conflicts and a rise in negotiated agreements that brought to an end these conflicts. Negotiated agreements have become the prevalent modes of ending conflict after the cold war era. Additionally, it is also evident that those in disputes have registered an increased call for peace building after the Cold War. This not only represents an available option to international community, but it also represents a large-scale will to take action (Balas, Owsiak, & Diehl 2012: 218). Therefore, peace building has become a common practice in post Cold War era, which is partly due to increased demand from the various disputants to bring peace and also its availability characterized by global cooperation.

The end of Cold War also led to increased tendency towards regionalism. This has been associated with existence of inverted capabilities and resources, which leads to increased interstate hostilities. States that are endowed with certain resources in a particular period would thus tend to move towards regionalism. The multi-polar system that characterizes the nations in the post Cold War era thus tend to move toward regionalism as it would be the case in a bipolar system, where most resources are concentrated in a two nations. Regionalism is considered as a form of increased hostilities. In the regionalism relations allies tend to trade more amongst themselves as opposed to trade with adversaries. Accordingly, the end of Cold war led to more cross-cutting coalitions and increased military cooperation. The best example is expansion of NATO and Bosnian crisis resolution (Carkoglu, Eder, & kirisci: 26).

Russia one of the superpowers in the bipolar states, has had significant transformation both economically and politically. One of the most important elements of its transformation is the emphasis to build a new relationship with the more advanced West. The country leadership has been pushing for economic integration with the West. However, this has not yet been very successful with gains including being enjoined as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. Economic integration though has been shadowed by the country weakened economic status. As a result, Putin as the leader has tried to develop a foreign policy that asserts Russia’s national interests and at the same time incorporating it to international community (Sakwa 2008: 242). However, Russia faced a lot of resistance with many nations not willing to accept it into international community. Just before the end of Cold War, Europe was divided into two. Establishment of NATO reactivated the States intention to create a defense mission for Western European countries. In 1991, European countries signed the Maastricht treaty to unite then as a foreign security policy (Yildirim 2013: 332). This marled a period of greater European Union unification.

In the United States on the other hand, there were profound changes in foreign policy particularly just at the end of the cold war during President Reagan’s regime. His view of the USSR suddenly changed around 1988. During his first seven terms of his leadership together with his advisors they considered the Soviet Union as a threat and adversary. However, by the time he was going for a summit in Moscow in May 1988, there was a sudden change in the views of many powerful people in the United States regarding the USSR. Reagan also started to openly show a reversal in his opinion of the Soviet by claiming that assertions that USSR was an evil empire were a past view. After this summit there was a change with absence of the traditional negative developments. Instead, the two nations were on the path towards cooperation and less threatening relations, something that was not easy to conceive at the time of Reagan entry into presidency. These changes are better explained by changes in Soviet foreign policies that emphasized on cooperation and transformation of its internal ideology and institutions (Haas: 148). Some of the fundamental changes that can describe international relationship in the post Cold War era includes the long peace prevailing between the two main superpowers, Soviet post transformation of international system and abandonment of its leading role as a superpower and the empire (Lebow 1994: 249).

Conclusion

Indeed there several fundamental changes that have taken place since the end of Cold War. There has been an increased tendency towards economic cooperation among nations, but at the same time economic rivalry is prevalent in international relations because of the resultant economic interdependency. There is also an increased demand for peacebuilding especially involving nations that have been engaged in long disputes. Regionalism is another aspect that has characterized the modern world with nations endowed with similar capability and resources amalgamating for economic and security reasons. The greatest changes in international politics are evident by looking at the long period of peace among the two superpowers and the shift in their international policies with Soviet taking a stance towards cooperation.

References

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