The Protagonist Powers and the Third World

The international system has undergone great changes since the nineteenth-century European balance of power. Central in its dynamics has been the changing number, nature, and power of the protagonists in world politics. Some of the disorganization of the interwar period may be explained by the reluctance of the United States and the Soviet Union to play key roles in the postwar world. After World War II, Soviet reconstruction and preoccupation with East European and Chinese allies kept the Soviet Union from challenging America's de facto hegemony outside the socialist countries. United States policy toward the Third World was to favor nationalism and to strengthen new states by transferring arms and economic resources to them. This pattern of diplomacy stabilized the international system and led to the emergence of confident Third World governments that became protagonists in the new system. The special American role in ensuring this form of world order is now diminishing, for a variety of political and strategic reasons; and Russian capabilities, while much greater, are also heavily invested in regional and domestic commitments. Third World states are, therefore, the most dynamic elements in the changes in world politics. Their role as protagonists is accelerated by technological change and by the entrance of world corporations and other transnational actors into global politics.