Unipolarity and Its Consequences - Liberal Leviathan: The Origins, Crisis, and Transformation of the American World Order - page 96

state will provide public goods and exercise power in ways that promote stability, openness,
and rule-based relations. These factors all give the leading state new advantages in institu-
tional bargains.
But unipolarity may also reduce some of the power advantages that the lead state has un-
der Cold War bipolarity. To start, weaker and secondary states are not threatened by a global
rival power, and so their security needs decline—and therefore their potential dependence on
the lead state for security protection declines. To some extent, this reduces the bargaining
advantage of the security-providing unipolar state. The unipolar state has an abundance of
military capacity, and so it is in a position to provide security protection around the world.
But this protection is not in demand in the way it was before, or at least the demand for uni-
polar security protection will be more disparate and unevenly manifest in various parts of the
world.
More generally, the legitimacy of the lead state is less self-evident. In the eyes of weaker
and secondary states, the exercise of power is less easy to see as normatively right or proper.
Junior partners in a bipolar coalition see the lead state as a security protector and provider of
order. The power of each is seen as good for the well-being of all. In a unipolar order, the
power of the lead state is less obviously good for the other states within the order. If there is
a decline in the legitimacy of the international order under conditions of unipolarity, the lead
state is faced with new problems about how to establish restraints and credible commitments
on its power that are necessary for the maintenance of legitimate rule.
These shifts in power advantages and bargaining circumstances allow us to see a variety
of possible impacts on the leading state's strategies of rule, on the policy responses of weaker
and secondary states, and on the overall patterns of global rules and relationships. We can
look at these impacts in turn.
Renegotiation of Institutional Bargains
The first impact of unipolarity relates to opportunities it creates for the leading state to recap-
ture some of its policy autonomy through the renegotiation of institutional bargains. These
opportunities emerge from gains in power advantages. If power disparities shift in favor of
the lead state, it finds itself with new bargaining advantages. It is potentially less dependent
on other states, and so it can walk away more easily from international agreements. Other
states are potentially more dependent on the lead state. These changing circumstances cre-
ate shifts in bargaining advantage, putting the unipolar state in a position to hold on to or
regain policy autonomy. It is out of this logic that we can expect that the unipolar state—if
the power shifts are sufficiently great and manifest in these ways—will seek to renegotiate
its institutional bargains with other states and make adjustments in its strategies of rule. 29