The Historical Context of
Contemporary International Relations
Class 3: Introduction to International
Relations
Eva wishanti
Introduction
International Relations (IR)
 After Two World Wars
 War
 Realism : state, power
 World Politics diversity Pluralism
Six Periods of Historical Context of
Contemporary International Relations
1. Before 1648
2. After Westphalia
3. Nineteenth Century Europe
4. Interwar Years
5. The Cold War
6. The Post-Cold War
Periodisasi Sejarah Penting dalam HI
History and
Philosophy
A Series of
world events
The world in the
21st century
• Greek’s (political)
philosophy
• Renaissance
• First World War
• Second World War
• Cold War
• Changing world
order
• New challenges
Before 1648:
The Pre-Westphalian World
• The Sovereignties of the Greek city-states (400 B.C.)
• Imperialism by The Roman Empire (50 B.C – 400 A.D.)
• Centralization & Decentralization in the Middle Ages
(400 – 1000)
Three civilizations: Arabic, Byzantine, Europe
• The development of transnational networks in the Late
Middle Ages (1000 – 1500)
a. Transnational Business Community
b. Individualist & Humanist
c. Writers on Classic Literature
Munculnya sistem
Westphalia : Nation - States
• Development of practical sovereignty
Sovereignty by Jean Bodin: absolute and perpetual power
• The Growth of Military Control
The Thirty-years war ⇒ Treaty of Westphalia
• The Emergence of Capitalist Economic System
Adam Smith: Invisible Hand of the Market ⇒ Capitalism
Europe in the Nineteenth Century
• The Aftermath of Revolution: Core Principles
- Legitimacy
- Nationalism
• Peace at the Core of the European System
- Solidarity sharing among European
- Fear of Revolution among independent states
- Unification of Germany and Italy
• Balance of Power
Independent European states counteract predominant
states
• The Breakdown: Solidification of Alliances
The end of Balance of Power system
Interwar Years and World War II
• Three Empires are Weakened
Russia ⇒ New leader and new ideology
Austro-Hungary ⇒ Replaced by new states
Ottoman ⇒ Reconfigured and ousted from Europe
• Fascism in Germany
- Mobilized support from the masses
- Superior civilization
• The Weakness of League of Nations
- Prevent all future wars
- No political weight, legal instruments, legitimacy
The Cold War
• Origins of the Cold War
- The emergence of two superpowers: United States
and Soviet Union
- The incompatibilities in national interests and ideology
- The end of colonial system
- The realization of indirectly conflict
• The Cold War as a Series of Confrontations
- High level tension with no military conflict
- Confrontations between proxies
- Confrontations between two blocs: NATO vs. Warsaw Pact
• The Cold War as a Long Peace
John Lewis Gaddis: to dramatize the absence of war
between superpowers
The Post-Cold War
•
•
•
•
The Continuity of Glasnost and Perestroika in Soviet
- Glasnost: Political Openness
- Perestroika: Economic Restructuring
Changes of Soviet Foreign Policy
- Cooperate in multilateral activities to preserve
regional security
- Mark the post-Cold War era
Iraq Invasion of Kuwait in 1990
- The test of New World Order
- U.N. Security Council ⇒ Economic sanctions
The Disintegration of Yugoslavia
- Disintegrates into independent states
- Bosnia-Kosovo civil war leading to U.N. and NATO
action
SUMMARY: Learning from History
• How can we begin to predict what the current era
is or what the future will bring?
• How core concepts of international relations – the
state, sovereignty, the nation, and the international
system- have emerged and evolved over time?