Editor: Randall Germain

Ahead of her Time? Susan Strange and Global Governance

Sell, Susan K. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 39-50. London: Routledge, 2016.

This chapter argues that Strange's work is of enduring significance because it helps us forge a practical understanding of critical global problems. Global environmental problems, global financial crises, and global inequalities are three of the small set of global problems regularly pointed to by promoters of the new global public policy degree programs established over the last decade. In the contemporary world, the knowledge structure serves the production and financial structures, not the other way around. Strange's analysis contains an argument about the recent wave of economic globalization. She sees the globalization of private finance and the globalization of production as, in part, responses to changes in technology to things like containerized shipping and the Internet changes that came from that contemporary knowledge structure. The programs like the one that Mahbubani created at NUS with Kofi Annan reflect a global governance paradigm that emphasizes subsidiary as a way to enhance both accountability and legitimacy.

Keywords: Global Governance; Structural Power, Power; General Framework

Contributor(s): Susan K. Sell and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Global Governance, Structural Power, Power, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

Corporate Power in a Global Economy

Palan, Ronen. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 170-182. London: Routledge, 2016.

What is the nature of the powers of corporations in a globalized economy? Has there been a shift of power from states to corporations? From states to markets? And if yes, how and why? These are the sort of questions that were at heart of Susan Strange's work. Political science during the time of her writing, and even more so international relations, was occupied with forms of relational power (Tajfel and Turner 1979). These theories assumed that an existential condition of scarcity (of material or ideational goods) encourages the formation of collective action groups, each intent on advancing or protecting their vested interests. Political scientists would use key concepts such as actors, intentions, interests and power, which, in combination were supposed to provide the analyst with a good grasp over policy outcomes.

Keywords: Corporations; Structural Power, Power

Contributor(s): Ronen Palan and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Corporations, Structural Power, Power, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

Diagnosing the Human Condition in a Dynamic Global System

Pauly, Louis W. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 183-192. London: Routledge, 2016.

Virgil's 'rerum cognoscere causas,' adorns the crest of the London School of Economics and Political Science. 'To know the cause of things' expressed an abiding aspiration for Susan Strange, even if she doubted all absolute truth-claims. In the mid-1970s, after she had rejoined her alma mater as a lecturer in the International Relations Department, I attended her course on 'The Politics of International Business.' As we know now, she was then helping to lay the foundations for a field that would soon be called 'international political economy.' In other places during the same period of time, Professors Kindleberger, Cox, Gilpin, Keohane, Krasner, Katzenstein, and Cohen were also working to carve out the intellectual space where history, economics, international relations, political science, and management studies would fruitfully intersect during the next four decades (Cohen 2008a).

Keywords: Theory

Contributor(s): Louis W. Pauly and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Theory, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

Money, Power, Authority

Cohen, Benjamin J. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 129-143. London: Routledge, 2016.

This chapter discusses the political economy of the global transformation. The share of American gross domestic product (GDP) in relation to global GDP had declined; the control of American corporations over key international markets remained high and was even growing. Strange argued that the global articulation of power was constituted by a complicated amalgam of public and the private authority. The superior innovative capacities of the firms, bolstered by government-sponsored military research, bestowed onto certain segments of the Americas economy, an unalloyed competitive advantage. The financial crisis began in the US financial system, even if it was aided and abetted by global forces and dynamics. The Carr suggests through his analysis of the foundations of mass society in the middle years of the twentieth century, when society exerts pressure on the operation of government, government in turn becomes much more involved in society, including the economy and its financial system.

Keywords: Money and Finance; Authority; Markets; Structural Power, Power; General Framework

Contributor(s): Benjamin J. Cohen and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Money and Finance, Authority, Markets, Structural Power, Power, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

Shaping the World Beyond the 'Core': States and Markets in Brazil's Global Assent

Tussie, Diana. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 73-86. London: Routledge, 2016.

This chapter argues that the global financial crisis of 2008 presented a unique opportunity to re-visit them and to re-evaluate Strange's core argument about the enduring structural power of the US in global finance. It explains how this power was particularly apparent in two international developments that took place at the height of the crisis: the US international lender-of-last-resort role and the absence of a dollar crisis. The chapter argues that an analysis of these two developments not only demonstrates the validity of Strange's argument about the US position in global finance but also provides a chance to clarify some analytical aspects of Strange's concept of structural power. The experience of the 2008 crisis demonstrates how structural power in global finance provides a number of benefits to the US, ranging from the unique influence it had in politics of crisis resolution to the unusual macroeconomic flexibility that stemmed from foreign support of the dollar.

Keywords: States; Markets; Structural Power, Power; Authority

Contributor(s): Diana Tussie and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: States, Markets, Structural Power, Power, Authority, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

Still an Extraordinary Power After All These Years: The US and the Global Financial Crisis of 2008

Helleiner, Eric. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 111-126. London: Routledge, 2016.

This chapter explores Strange's analysis of the centrality of dominant knowledge and financial structures in the constitution of the contours of the global political economy and of financial capitalism. It draws upon critical political economy, focusing on the how of power and its mobilization through dominant knowledge and financial structures to establish central bank independence and financial liberalization as grundnorms of the global financial system. In seeking to develop a sociological understanding of the construction of dominant power structures, the chapter draws upon critical political economy traditions inspired by the works of Michel Foucault and Antonio Gramsci. Strange identified the central problematique as a problem of governance and the absence of the leadership required to address the economic malaise of the 1980s. This chapter examines Strange's analysis of problems in global financial leadership and it reveals her significant contribution to the understanding of the material dimensions of financial governance.

Keywords: Hegemony; Money and Finance; Structural Power, Power; General Framework

Contributor(s): Eric Helleiner and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Hegemony, Money and Finance, Structural Power, Power, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

Strange Bedfellows? Bankers, Business(men) and Bureaucrats in Global Financial Governance

Cutler, A. Claire. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 144-169. London: Routledge, 2016.

This chapter explains how to diagnose the human condition in a dynamic global system. Strange was the one who insisted that the things to be explained were not always what they seemed, and that theory, especially the grand theory, could obscure the fundamental realities. Discerning the causes and the larger meanings behind the social and political arrangements through which these values are distributed in the particular global policy arenas framed Strange's IPE. Murphy focused on the capital markets that are not reliably backstopped by the emergency fiscal capabilities, and therefore not reliably regulated; expansive systems for producing goods and the services that depend on degrading the life-sustaining bio-sphere; and the absence of redistributive instruments adequate enough to stabilize an emerging global society. Helleiner used the conceptual and the empirical grounding to show us precisely how the global financial system worked during the crisis of 2008.

Keywords: Money and Finance; Authority; Westfailure System

Contributor(s): A. Claire Cutler and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Money and Finance, Authority, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

Strange Power Over Credit; or the Enduring Strength of US Structural-Power

Schwartz, Herman Mark. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 87-110. London: Routledge, 2016.

This chapter provides some retrospective comments on what Strange says on the nexus of money and power; and second, in the light of what she had to say, to assess her vision of where the monetary system is heading. Strange was certainly right that the dynamics of power and governance in global finance today are changing. A leaderless diffusion of power is generating greater uncertainty about the underlying rules of the game. The linkage between money and power was one of the most enduring themes in Strange's work. The US political scientists, Peter Bachrach and Morton Baratz, had pointed out that the direct action represented just one face of power, and perhaps not even the most important. The causal mechanism works along the lines of the sequential Stackelberg leadership model of game theory. The United States acts unilaterally, as it typically does, exploiting what is often described as its exorbitant privilege.

Keywords: Money and Finance; Hegemony; Structural Power, Power; General Framework

Contributor(s): Herman Mark Schwartz and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Money and Finance, Hegemony, Structural Power, Power, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation

Germain, Randall, editor. London: Routledge, 2016.

This edited volume addresses the 2007/2009 financial crisis as the occasion to engage critically with the corpus of Susan Strange's work, in order to consider what changes (if any) this crisis portends for the structural organization of the global political economy. The contributors use Strange's rich conceptual framework to explore the financial crisis and its aftermath, and reflect critically on the broader contributions which her work has made to the discipline of IPE. The volume makes three valuable contributions for scholars and students. First, it raises the profile of Susan Strange, a unique and powerful contributor to the field of IPE whose ideas matter to our current circumstance and can provide deep and enduring insights into important questions and issues. Secondly, each contributor to this volume combines her work and ideas with that of other traditions or individual theorists in ways that extend and/or deepen Strange's own efforts. Finally, this volume leaves us with a judicious optimism about the future of both IPE and the world as it actually is, on the ground.

Keywords: Money and Finance; Structural Power, Power; Authority; Markets

Contributor(s): Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Money and Finance, Structural Power, Power, Authority, Markets, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Edited Volume

Year of Publication: 2016

Susan Strange and the Future of IPE

Germain, Randall. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 19-36. London: Routledge, 2016.

This chapter explains how contributors use Susan Strange's rich conceptual framework to explore the financial crisis and its aftermath, and reflect critically on broader contributions which her work has made to the discipline of international political economy (IPE). Susan Strange's life and times spanned the most tumultuous decades of the twentieth century. Susan Strange spent much of her academic career lamenting and cataloguing the serial failure of scholarship in political science, international relations and international economics to understand how the world and its political economy had changed or was in the process of changing. The global demand for American credit during the financial crisis both fed off and reinforced the pre-existing American capacity to generate and deploy the financial resources. The Strange was an inveterate optimist that things on the ground could be improved upon, if only analysis was sound and the determination to act was both robustly held and appropriately grounded in sustainable values that were widely shared.

Keywords: Political Economy; Theory; Structural Power, Power; General Framework

Contributor(s): Randall Germain and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Political Economy, Theory, Structural Power, Power, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

The Political Economy of Global Transformation: Susan Strange, E.H. Carr and the Dynamics of Structural Change

Germain, Randall. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 183-200. London: Routledge 2016.

Do international relations precede or follow (logically) fundamental social relations? There can be no doubt that they follow. Any organic innovation in the social structure, through its technical–military expressions, modifies organically absolute and relative relations in the international field too.

Keywords: Hegemony; Authority; Markets; Structural Power, Power

Contributor(s): Randall Germain and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Hegemony, Authority, Markets, Structural Power, Power, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016

The Westfailure System' Fifteen Years on: Global Problems, What Makes Them Difficult to Solve and the Role of IPE

Murphy, Craig N. In Susan Strange and the Future of Global Political Economy: Power, Control and Transformation, edited by Randall Germain, 51-70. London: Routledge, 2016.

This chapter argues that some of Susan Strange's insights hold heuristic value that remains underused in the literature that is emerging from the regions, on the regions, and in the wider international political economy (IPE) field itself. In a nutshell, a closer examination of the regions out there can reveal important scope conditions for understanding the structural re-organization of the global political economy which may otherwise be missed. Susan Strange's analysis of business and power opens up the possibility of looking at developing countries as makers and not just takers of international policy. It reinforces the call today for IPE to move on and speak to a new global landscape. This narrative is certainly consistent with the institutional turn in development theory. Internationalization beyond the core also marks a new stage in development. Fiscal solvency has changed the character of the state, enabling it to provide centrally mandated subsidized credit.

Keywords: Authority; Structural Power, Power; Westfailure System; General Framework

Contributor(s): Craig N. Murphy and Editor: Randall Germain
Keywords: Authority, Structural Power, Power, Strange-Influenced Works, 2010's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2016