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The post-Cold-War world and post-Cold-War conflict

Contrasting the Cold War with the post-Cold War

By Ron Anderson, Scotch College

Introduction: The concept of the Post-Cold-War world

1989-1991: A turning point in the world?

It is undoubtedly true that the end of the Cold War, symbolised most graphically by the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, marks a most profound change in the global general strategic and security arrangements between the Great Powers and the two dominant superpowers.

This change has led commentators to suggest that there is something fundamentally different between the Cold War and what came after, hence the phrase the post-Cold-War era. This implies a consequent change in the nature of conflict.

We may call this the fundamental discontinuity thesis - the idea that there is a profound difference between the Cold War era and the type of conflicts associated with it and the post-Cold-War era and the type of conflicts associated with this.

Our studies so far have suggested grave reservations about the notion of a 'typical' Cold War conflict:

  • the changing nature and forms of the various phases of the Cold War;
  • the difficulty of generalising about such a varied range of conflicts; and
  • various 'non-Cold-War elements' discernible among the range of conflicts.

We will find similar reservations about post-Cold-War conflicts. Apart from the fact that they all occur after the end of the Cold War, what do they have in common? In what ways are they post-Cold-War conflict? Are there any elements of continuity? In other words does the discontinuity really exist on closer examination? To what extent is it true or exaggerated?

However, before we can answer these questions we need to know the nature of international power and security relationships, as well as the new international agenda which is alleged to be characteristic of the post-Cold-War world.

The remainder of this 16-page document includes the following sub-headings:

The debate over the effects of the Cold War

The nature of the post-Cold-War world

The new security environment

I The new global security architecture and changing power relationships

A new global power balance

  1. From bipolar to unipolar:
    1. The collapse of communism
    2. From two dominant superowers to one
    3. US military dominance
  2. Increasing instability and International
  3. Regional arms race
  4. Increase in power of international institutions
    1. The United Nations
    2. NATO
    3. IMF
  5. Growing power of INGOs
  6. Economic globalisation and declining national sovereignty
  7. Growth of Islam as a significant international influence

II New issues and the international agenda

  1. Nationalism and ethnic tension
  2. Trade and economic forces
  3. Human rights
  4. Arms control
  5. A note on the South East Asian region

Summary: Continuity or discontinuity?

  • Discontinuities at the end of the Cold War
  • Global power balance
  • Security and stability
  • New international issues: Human rights, the use of the United Nations, trade and weapons proliferation
  • Continuities between the Cold War and post-Cold-War period
  • Continuities after the end of the Cold War
  • Other changes in the Asia-Pacific
  • Continuation of 'traditional' foreign policy interests

Post-Cold-War conflicts

'Hard' and 'soft' views of the effect of the end of the Cold War

  • The 'hard' form of the theory: only two examples?
  • The 'soft' view: true but only trivially true?

The range of post-Cold-War conflicts

The Gulf Crisis of 1990 and the Gulf War of 1991

The nature of the conflict

Causes and motivation

  • Iraq's motives
  • USA's motives

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