States

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

Going Beyond States and Markets to Civil Societies?

Shaw, Timothy M., Sandra J. MacLean. In Strange Power: Shaping the Parameters of International Relations and International Political Economy, edited by Thomas Lawton, James Rosenau, Amy C. Verdun, 391-406. London: Routledge, 2000.

Keywords: Theory; Authority; Markets; States; Civil Society

Contributor(s): Timothy M. Shaw, Sandra J. MacLean, Maria Nzomo, Editor: Thomas Lawton, Editor: James Rosenau and Editor: Amy C. Verdun
Keywords: Theory, Authority, Markets, States, Strange-Influenced Works, 2000's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2000

World Order, Non-State Actors, and the Global Casino: The Retreat of the State?

Strange, Susan. In Political Economy and the Changing Global Order, edited by Richard Stubbs, Geoffrey R.D. Underhill, 82-90. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.

This is the an edited version of the text published as What Theory? The Theory in Mad Money (1998) with the addition of a new introduction which briefly lays out many of the arguments which Strange made her own over her long and distinguished career.

Keywords: Corporations; Knowledge; States; Theory; Authority vs Markets; Technology

Contributor(s): Susan Strange, Editor: Richard Stubbs and Editor: Geoffrey R.D. Underhill
Keywords: Corporations, Knowledge, States, Theory, 2000's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 2000

The Westfailure System

Strange, Susan. Review of International Studies 25, no. 3 (1999): 345-354.

In this posthumously published essay, Strange briefly outlines the parallel histories of the territorial system of states and the economic system of markets and suggests that until the last quarter of the twentieth century each benefited the other. However, as she often argued in the 1990s, the political system is now failing in three areas: the states system is increasingly unable to manage instability in the global financial system; the sovereign system is unable to deal effectively with globalised environmental problems; and lastly the political system's interaction with the global market is producing widening socio-economic inequality across the global system. However, only by understanding the role of non-state authority through the study of both international and comparative political economy and a move away from International Relation's state-centricism can the Westfailure system be understood and alternatives assessed. Reprinted in: Authority and Markets: Susan Strange’s Writings on International Political Economy, edited by Roger Tooze and Christopher May. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.

Keywords: Corporations; Global Governance; States; Westfailure System; International Relations

Contributor(s): Susan Strange
Keywords: Corporations, Global Governance, States, 1990's
Source and Medium: Journal Article

Year of Publication: 1999

Globaloney? (Review Essay)

Strange, Susan. Review of International Political Economy 5, no. 4 (1998): 704-711.

In this review of the influential Paul Hirst and Grahame Thompson Globalisation in Question (Oxford: Polity Press, 1996) alongside two other books arguing a similar position, Strange makes a major intervention in the debate over the 'myth' of globalisation. Arguing that the authors (like others) miss the deterritorialisation of commercial power in the global system, Strange allows that there needs to be a corrective to the extreme globalisation thesis of complete transformation, but that a failure to examine what is really happening in the global political economy, while relying on aggregated and out-of-date statistics has led too many political economists to fail to recognise the very real changes in the balance of power between multinational corporations and states. For Strange it is this balance of power that is of major importance for understanding globalisation.

Keywords: Globalization; Theory; Corporations; States; Transnational Corporations; Authority vs Markets

Contributor(s): Susan Strange
Keywords: Globalization, Theory, Corporations", States, 1990's
Source and Medium: Journal Article

Year of Publication: 1998

What Theory? The Theory in Mad Money (CSGR Working Paper No. 18/98)

Strange, Susan. Coventry: University of Warwick/Centre for the Study of Globalisation and Regionalisation, 1998.

In this, her final piece of writing, Strange reprise arguments from Rival States, Rival Firms: Competition for world market shares (with John M. Stopford and John S. Henley, 1991) and The Retreat of the State. The Diffusion of Power in the World Economy (1996) to argue that the disciplines of International Relations and International Economics fail to understand contemporary globalisation. Where IR scholars have missed the structural shifts in the global system away from state-centric power with the emergence of new non-state authority, economists have missed the role of the state in promoting these changes, and misunderstand the working of global markets, discounting, or not even recognising the political relations between firms, what Strange refers to as the new diplomacy. In this last piece Strange revisits the criticisms she has levelled at much of mainstream International Studies literature and remains as angry as ever at the myopia of many of her contemporaries, leading to a failure to recognise the real problems of the 'global casino', not least of all issues of finance and technology.

Keywords: Authority; Markets; Money and Finance; States; Theory; Technology; Authority vs Markets

Contributor(s): Susan Strange
Keywords: Authority, Markets, Money and Finance, States, Theory, 1990's
Source and Medium: Working Paper

Year of Publication: 1998

Territory, State, Authority and Economy: A New Realist Ontology of Global Political Economy

Strange, Susan. In The New Realism: Perspectives on Multilateralism and World Order, edited by Robert W. Cox, 3-19. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press/United Nations University Press, 1997.

Strange argues that the global economy is in the midst of a transition; the close incidence of political authority, economic activity and geographical territory no longer holds. This has been caused by two main groups of factors: firstly changes derived from science and technology; and secondly structural changes within the global finance structure. Authority has shifted, or is shifting, from states to other actors in the international political economy. She disputes Rosenau's hypothesis of the emergence of a second world of turbulent complexity, disturbing the old world of international relations, instead arguing that it is all the same world, just more complex! Reprinted in: Authority and Markets: Susan Strange’s Writings on International Political Economy. Roger Tooze and Christopher May, editors. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.

Keywords: Authority; Knowledge; Markets; Money and Finance; States; Authority vs Markets; Technology

Contributor(s): Susan Strange and Editor: Robert W. Cox
Keywords: Authority, Knowledge, Markets, Money and Finance, States, 1990's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 1997

The Erosion of the State

Strange, Susan. Current History 96, no. 613 (1997): 365-369.

Strange briefly revisits the globalisation debate and suggests those who argue that as the state still exists, globalisation can be ignored are very mistaken. She then goes on to outline three dilemmas of globalisation: the economic, in that increasingly there is no political authority able to govern and control market relations; the environmental, while on one hand market actors are driven by the profit motive to use up environmental resources, countervailing power is largely absent; the political, there is a major democratic deficit in the governance structure of the global system. Strange then links these aspects of globalisation to technical change and increased mobility of capital. However, a concentration on the state misses the 'new diplomacy' between firms and other non-state actors as well as states themselves as outline in Rival States, Rival Firms: Competition for world market shares (with John M. Stopford and John S. Henley, 1991) . She then restates briefly her argument from The Retreat of the State (1996). The Diffusion of Power in the World Economy (1996), the state is losing its authority due to: the decline in importance of war-making and security; its inability to control the value of the currency; and its increasingly lack of credibility as a provider of welfare. Thus, to deny the decline of the state is to deny that something needs to be done about it unless big business is to come to rule the international system.

Keywords: Authority; Globalization; Markets; States; Authority vs Markets

Contributor(s): Susan Strange
Keywords: Authority, Globalization, Markets, States, 1990's
Source and Medium: Journal Article

Year of Publication: 1997

The Retreat of the State: State Diffusion of Power in the World Economy

Strange, Susan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.

In what might effectively be regarded as the third part of a trilogy, together with States and Markets (1988) and Rival States, Rival Firms: Competition for world market shares (with John M. Stopford and John S. Henley, 1991), Strange examines states' transition towards the sidelines of global political economic relations. Though in the past authority might have been state based, now she argues it is more often based on non-state abilities to bring about (or structure) outcomes. This has to some extent been obscured by the increasing intervention by states in the lives of their citizens, giving an impression of the retention of power. While some states have fared better than others, the US being the prime example of a state retaining significant power, in general Strange sees new sites of authority in the global system are rising to challenge even the strongest states. Relations between states and non-state authority are arrayed along a continuum from the Mafia, threatening and undermining remaining state authority, to the big-six accountancy firms and transnational legal partnerships which work with state based authority and by doing so support it. Lacking the means to autonomously change its interactions with the global political economy, the state has lost the most important and significant aspect of its potential.

Keywords: Foundational Work; States; Structural Power, Power; Theory; Authority vs Markets

Contributor(s): Susan Strange
Keywords: Foundational Work, States, Structural Power, Power, Theory, 1990's
Source and Medium: Book

Year of Publication: 1996

The Defective State

Strange, Susan. Daedelus 124, no. 2 (1995): 55-74.

Strange argues that while states remain superficially important as major actors within the global system, the underlying power relations have hollowed out their authority. This authority has in some cases flowed 'upwards' to international institutions, and in other cases flowed down to markets (and also more localised organisations). These movements have led to an asymmetry of structural authority in the global system. Strange also makes some comments regarding the state-centric nature of the discipline of International Relations and suggests a new research agenda based around her conception of structural power and the importance of non-state actors in the functioning of authority. Thus while competition between states continues in some sense, it has been joined by other fields of competition that the disciplines of International Relations and International Political Economy need to contend with if they are to remain relevant to the global political economy.

Keywords: Corporations; International Institutions; States; Structural Power, Power; Transnational Corporations

Contributor(s): Susan Strange
Keywords: Corporations, International Institutions, States, Structural Power, Power, 1990's
Source and Medium: Journal Article

Year of Publication: 1995

From Bretton Woods to the Casino Economy

Strange, Susan. In Money, Power and Space, edited by Stuart Corbridge, Ron Martin, Nigel Thrift, 49-62. Oxford: Blackwell, 1994.

Strange argues as she has frequently done for the importance of historical understanding power in the international financial structure is to be fully analysed. She suggests that there are two separate but linked aspects of the global political economy that need to be thought about within the financial structure - the international monetary system and the international financial system. Thus, Strange focuses on credit creation to examine the upheavals in the financial structure and the decline of the Bretton Woods system. She also suggests that acquiescence in the uneven distribution of the benefits derived from financial 'freedom' may be becoming less assured in the post Cold War global system. While larger states have (at least for the time being) managed to retain some of their power in the financial structure, smaller states have seen a decline in their ability to resist the pressures from the international money markets. Once again Strange discusses the shift in power from states to markets, and implicitly reinforces her arguments for the centrality of structural power considerations.

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

Contributor(s): Susan Strange, Editor: Stuart Corbridge and Editor: Ron Martin
Keywords: Authority, Markets, Money and Finance, States, Structural Power, Power, 1990's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 1994

Global Government and Global Opposition

Strange, Susan. In Politics in an Interdependent World: Essays presented to Ghita Ionescu, edited by Geraint Parry, 20-33. Aldershot: Edward Elgar Publishers, 1994.

After recognising the relevance of discussions of a 'new medievalism' in the global political economy Strange suggests that the best way of addressing the nature and use of power is her structural model. She suggests that the deterriotrialisation of power and the increasing importance of 'diplomacy' between firms as laid out in Rival States, Rival Firms: Competition for world market shares (with John M. Stopford and John S. Henley, 1991), argues for a more complex view of 'interdependence'. She then highlights three central issues: the idea that the operations of multinationals might be understood as a parallel and competing tax and welfare system to that previously operated by states; this relative loss of control over social functions by states has led to reduced stability in the global economy; and lastly societies have increasingly lost their ability to make autonomous decisions concerning methods of and priorities of governance. She then links this analysis to the re-emergence of Euroscepticism, before finally identifying some possible groups that may offer opposition to these tendencies, namely environmentalism, feminism, fundamentalism and regionalism.

Keywords: Corporations; States; Structural Power, Power; Theory; Authority vs Markets

Contributor(s): Susan Strange and Editor: Geraint Parry
Keywords: Corporations, States, Structural Power, Power, Theory, 1990's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 1994

Rethinking Structural Change in the International Political Economy: States, Firms and Diplomacy

Strange, Susan. In Political Economy and the Changing Global Order, edited by Richard Stubbs, Geoffrey R.D. Underhill, 103-115. Basingstoke: Macmillan Press, 1994.

This is an abridged version and slightly revised version of 'States, Firms and Diplomacy' (1992).

Keywords: Knowledge; Markets; States; Structural Power, Power; Theory; Technology

Contributor(s): Susan Strange, Editor: Richard Stubbs and Editor: Geoffrey R.D. Underhill
Keywords: Knowledge, Markets, States, Structural Power, Power, Theory, 1990's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 1994

The Power Gap: Member States and the World Economy

Strange, Susan. In Economic Policy Making and the European Union, edited by Frank Brouwer, Valerio Linter, Mike Newman, 19-26. London: Federal Trust, 1994.

Strange criticises arguments that suggest the European Union is a sui generis political institution. She criticises such claims, self avowedly, not from a lengthy engagement with European political analysis, but from a more global concern with political economy. She suggests that except for the Commission there is little to distinguish the EU from some other intergovernmental organisations. And given the Commission's inability to move on anything but essentially trivial matters she remains sceptical of the entire European project, remaining as she contends merely a sophisticated free-trade area. The problem, however, is not a particularly European one; the decline of state power vis-a-vis the global economy has been evident for some time. Only by recognising the problems for sovereign political authorities in the global political economy and planning for new constitutional developments in Europe to address this problem can this 'power gap' be narrowed. Strange here implicitly draws on the elements of her work that have supported the 'state-in-decline' thesis even though at other times she seems less willing to accept the absolute decline of state power than such arguments suggest.

Keywords: Europe; Global Governance; States; Global System; European Integration

Contributor(s): Susan Strange, Editor: Frank Brouwer and Editor: Valerio Linter
Keywords: Europe, Global Governance, States, 1990's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 1994

Who Governs? Networks of Power in World Society

Strange, Susan. Hitotsubashi Journal of Law and Politics Special Issue (1994): 5-17.

Starting from Strange's response to Waltz's (in)famous London School of Economic lecture (see Millennium 22/2 - Summer 1993) in this article she first argues for a wider reading of politics – not just what states do. She then briefly summarises her arguments regarding structural power before discussing the roles states have historically played as producers of security, credit, market relations and environment. The power over finance and environment has moved to centre stage, but states have been losing relative power over these areas. But this is not to agree with the America-in-decline writers. Rather Strange argues that the US. retains structural power, which the non-US Group of Seven states, through joint action need to encourage Americans to recognise. This will enable the US. to once again act as hegemon for the general good. America's ability to supply market public goods needs to be matched by its will to do so, through diplomatic pressure. This is one of the few pieces where Strange makes her underlying prescriptive stance on the need for American leadership completely explicit. Reprinted in: Authority and Markets: Susan Strange’s Writings on International Political Economy, edited by Roger Tooze and Christopher May. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.

Keywords: Hegemony; States; Structural Power, Power; Theory; United States

Contributor(s): Susan Strange
Keywords: Hegemony, States, Structural Power, Power, Theory, United States, 1990's
Source and Medium: Journal Article

Year of Publication: 1994

Ethics and the Movement of Money: Realist Approaches

Strange, Susan. In Free Movement. Ethical Issues in Transnational Migration of People and Money, edited by Brian Barry, Robert E. Goodin, 232-247. Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1992.

Identifying herself as a Realist, Strange notes that there is not one easily defined Realist perspective on the ethics of international monetary flows. Focusing on the continued existence and relative power of states she explores the problems these flows cause for states and stability in the international system overall. Here she examines international debt, free trade and protectionism, the transfer of profits, and but-outs or take-overs. Strange still seems to have some confidence that the state may play a useful regulatory and political role in economic affairs, a position she would move away from by the end of her career in 'The Defective State' (1995) and The Retreat of the State. The Diffusion of Power in the World Economy (1996) and elsewhere.

Keywords: Money and Finance; States; Realism

Contributor(s): Susan Strange, Editor: Brian Barry and Editor: Robert E. Goodin
Keywords: Money and Finance, States, 1990's
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 1992

States, Firms and Diplomacy

Strange, Susan. International Affairs 68, no. 1 (1992): 1-15.

This article in a brief summation of Rival States, Rival Firms: Competition for world market shares (with John M. Stopford and John S. Henley, 1991) outlining the central argument of the book concerning the diplomacy between firms and states, and discusses some areas for further research. This represents a useful entry to the book picking out the salient points from the longer work, without the empirical elements. Reprinted in: Authority and Markets: Susan Strange’s Writings on International Political Economy, edited by Roger Tooze and Christopher May. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.

Keywords: Theory; Markets; States; Structural Power, Power; Technology

Contributor(s): Susan Strange
Keywords: Theory, Markets, States, Structural Power, Power, 1990's
Source and Medium: Journal Article

Year of Publication: 1992

An Eclectic Approach

Strange, Susan. In The New International Political Economy (International Political Economy Year Book No. 6), edited by Craig N. Murphy, Roger Tooze, 33-49. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1991.

Strange reiterates the structural dimensions of power from States and Markets (1988) and then goes on to develop this further by adding three conditioning factors that influence the structural elements of power - these are states, markets and technology. Essentially the new element here is the dynamic of technology. Strange makes the contribution of the technological dynamic to the four structures more explicit in this article than previously. She then concludes by again stressing the need for interdisciplinary understanding of IPE and how this should influence the teaching of the subject.

Keywords: Theory; Markets; States; Structural Power, Power; Technology

Contributor(s): Susan Strange, Editor: Craig N. Murphy and Editor: Roger Tooze
Keywords: Theory, Markets, States, Structural Power, Power, 1990's, Susan Strange
Source and Medium: Book Chapter

Year of Publication: 1991

Rival States, Rival Firms: Competition for World Market Shares

Strange, Susan, John M. Stopford, John S. Henley. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

A self-avowedly part international relations - part international business management work which in keeping with Strange's views discusses the interdependence between politics and economics without fore-grounding one at the expense of the other. The book builds on Strange's theory of power and links it through three national studies (Brazil, Malaysia, Kenya) to a consideration of the effect of structural change in the international political economy on the role of TNCs in international economic development. The authors suggest that diplomacy is now triangular; (traditional) state-state diplomacy has been joined by state-firm, and firm-firm diplomacy in the international political economy. In addition they note that the linking of TNCs with specific nations is increasingly difficult, not least due to the decreasing centrality of territorial considerations of power. The book concludes with policy advise for both states and multinationals and pointers for further research.

Keywords: Corporations; Foundational Work; Structural Power, Power; States; Transnational Corporations; Triangular Diplomacy

Contributor(s): Susan Strange, John M. Stopford and John S. Henley
Keywords: Corporations, Foundational Work, Structural Power, Power, States, 1990's
Source and Medium: Book

Year of Publication: 1991