Notes – Actors in World Politics 2022
Lecture 02: 03/11/2022
International, Global, and Transnational
Readings before lecture:
1. Transnational Relations and World Politics: An introduction – Robert Keohane, Joseph Nye
Realists see states as the most important actor. Force, violence, and threats are the core of this interplay;
therefore, the power struggle is the distinguishing mark of politics among nations. However, the agents of
the state (diplomats, soldiers) do not act in a vacuum. On the contrary, they are strongly affected by
geography, the nature of domestic politics, and advances in science and technology.
From the state-centric perspective, geography, technology, and domestic politics comprise the
"environment" within which states interact. They provide inputs into the interstate system, but for
considerations of analytic convenience, they are outside the system.
However, the interstate political environment does not include only these forces. Much intersocietal
intercourse, with significant political importance, takes place without governmental control.
Transnational relations – contacts, coalitions, and interactions across state boundaries that are not
controlled by the central foreign policy organs of governments – are essential for world politics.
Transnational interactions and organisations
There are four major types of global interactions:
1. Communication -> movement of information, the transmission of beliefs, ideas, and doctrines
2. Transportation -> movement of physical objects, war material and personal property
3. Finance -> movement of money and instruments of credit
4. Travel -> movement of persons
Some global interactions like wars are initiated and sustained almost entirely by governments of nation-
states (interstate interactions). Other interactions, however, involve nongovernmental actors (transnational).
Transnational interaction describes the movements of tangible (touchable) or intangible items across state
boundaries when at least one actor is not an agent of a government or an IGO.
A state-centric interaction pattern focuses on governments as the agencies through which societies deal
politically which each other. Interstate politics distinguish states but are also indirectly linked to domestic
politics. Transnational interactions are ignored, but governments may interact through IGOs.
Transnational interactions are different because societies can play direct roles vis-à-vis foreign governments
or societies and therefore bypass their own governments.
An actor's position is classifiable in one category (governmental, intergovernmental, or nongovernmental).
Domestic organisations like national trade unions can participate in transnational interactions. Just because
an agreement was made in one place does not say that it does not have international effects.
Most transnational organisations remain linked primarily to one national society. Multinational enterprises
tend to be managed by citizens from the home state. These organisations are transnational, but they are not
geocentric. It is only geocentric when its leadership composition and pattern of behaviour indicate that it has
lost all special ties to one or two states.
,Notes – Actors in World Politics 2022
Some effects of transnational relations on interstate politics
Five significant effects of transnational interactions and organisations have consequences for mutual
sensitivity and interstate politics.
1. Attitude changes
Transnational interactions of all types may promote attitude changes, possibly affecting state policies.
2. International pluralism
International pluralism means linking national interest groups in transnational structures, usually
involving transnational organisations for coordination purposes. Various actors might try to constrain
governments and make their policies more cooperative.
3. Increases in constraints on states through dependence and interdependence
The creation of dependence and interdependence is often associated with international transportation
and finance. Dependence is translated into policy when specific policies a government might otherwise
follow become prohibitively costly. Large states have the power to alter the international system
through policies and, therefore, must act carefully.
4. Increases in the ability of certain governments to influence others
Governments try to increase their ability to influence others through transnational interactions. This
includes the use of tourists as spies or the support of certain groups in another country. Those are
known as informal penetrations. States might also use tariff and quota policies to affect the flow of
international trade and influence others.
5. The emergence of autonomous actors with private foreign policies that may oppose state policies
Transnational organisations can alter state politics, as they have high revenues (banks) or other
influences (Roman church). The conflict between the government and transnational organisations may
reflect the policies of a home government standing behind the transnational organisations.
Transnational relations and loss of control by governments
New tasks for governments place more significant burdens on the available policy instruments and make it
more difficult to accept the intrusions of international economic integration on national economic policy.
High aspirations for control and increased interdependence go hand in hand. Transnational relations create a
control gap and may redistribute control from one state to another and benefit those governments at the
centre of transnational networks to the disadvantage of those in the periphery. The other governments seek
to extend their reach the more they involve themselves with the environment of interstate politics and
particularly with transnational relations.
Transnational relations and the state-centric paradigm
States have been and remain the most critical actors in world affairs, acting directly and through IGOs to
which only states belong. States virtually monopolise large-scale organised force, which remains the ultimate
weapon and a powerful bargaining resource. World politics describes the political interactions between
significant actors in a world system in which a significant actor is any somewhat autonomous individual or
organisation that controls substantial resources and participates in political relationships with other actors
across state lines.
Transnational relations and values
Transnational relations strengthen the strong and rich because only these can take full advantage of its
network of intersocietal linkages. Some actors, whether states or not, exploit each other. Given an agreed
concept of fairness, some transnational relations would be imperialistic (asymmetries, inequalities).
, Notes – Actors in World Politics 2022
The world has become global and with this come global issues like environmental change.
Dimensions of globalisation
1. People -> Migration of people (majority from the global South to the South)
2. Capital -> Financial flows and trade become more global (merchandise exports increased after WW2)
3. Politics -> global implications of Russo-Ukrainian conflict (energy prices, grain prices/ exports)
4. Culture -> international productions of movies (Hollywood/ Netflix recognises the global market)
Globalisation as a series of processes
1. Deterritorialisation -> geographic territory becomes less of a constraint on social interactions
2. Interdependence -> security and force matter less, and countries are connected by multiple social
and political relationships. Conflict becomes more expensive (Russia – Europe), Congo's war because
of the development of mobile phones (Coltan)
3. Time-space compression -> relative distances between places (measured in terms of travel time/
cost) to contract, effectively making such places grow closer. Faster travel in Europe than before
Theorising
1. International Relations approach (Realism) -> anarchy, division in domestic/ international, states
most essential actors, other actors exist but are negligible
2. Globalist approach (end of Cold War) -> world divides are flattened, undifferentiated investment
surface, decreased relevance of states, global society
3. Transnational critique -> problem of analytical purchase (relations develop between states and non-
state actors, states stay and adapt to globalisation: transgovernmentalism), the problem of
conceptualisation: an either/ or conception
Directions for a transnational approach
1. The "territorial trap" (John Agnew)
Academic theories have debated the disappearance or persistence of the nation-state in the face of
globalisation. States do not have absolute power over territory, domestic and foreign realms are not
separate but networked (borders are not natural in society (Konstanz)), boundaries of the state are
not the boundaries of society (no natural borders of culture (Italians NY))
