Balance of Power

In the modern International System where does the balance of power stand? In the past, it had shifted from empire to empire, sometimes many empires held power at once. To explain the polarity of the world today we must first examine the definition of power in order to know what it means to have power and how it spreads. Then we must look at the polarity of the past to determine how the powers of today got to where they are now and what it took to be unipolar and how it is challenged today.

Power, since the beginning of human history has been a force that drives man. Every civilization has aimed to increase its power, locally or globally. How is power defined? According to Dr. Robert Dahl, political science professor at Yale University, power is defined as “A’s ability to get B to do something that he or she would not otherwise do” (Lake, 2006, p. 24). Some political scientists believe that the ability to get someone to do something can be derived from two different types of power: hard power and soft power. Hard power is closely linked with the use of coercive tactics such as the use of military forces, economic pressure, and other forms of intimidation (Lake, 2006). The more liberal form of power, soft power, was coined by Harvard University political scientist Joseph S. Nye. Nye states that “soft power is a notion that non-traditional forces such as culture and commercial goods can exert influence in world affairs” (Ferguson, 2003, p 21). What he means by this is that through goods that are a part of a nation’s culture, a nation can spread its sphere of influence. An example being McDonalds, a company that is a big part of American culture, a giant multi-national cooperation spreading American capitalistic ideology in the nati...

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