Crisis of the Old Order - Liberal Leviathan: The Origins, Crisis, and Transformation of the American World Order - page 17

the American postwar order, it is necessary to explore the logic of hierarchy. In contrast to
anarchical forms of order, hierarchical orders entail ongoing relations of domination and sub-
ordination between polities. But hierarchical systems of domination and subordination can
vary widely in their logic and organization, involving different mixes of domination and con-
sent. I will offer a distinction between types of hierarchical political orders and focus in par-
ticular between imperial and liberal forms of hierarchy.
Liberal forms of hierarchical order require that the leading state engage in institutionalized
forms of restraint and commitment. Power and domination are channeled through more or
less agreed-upon rules and institutions. Chapter 3 explores state power and the logic of rule-
based order. A powerful state has incentives to shape and control the international system in
which it operates. While weak and subordinate states are “order takers,” powerful states are
on occasion “order makers.” The type of order that a powerful state seeks to construct will
flow from its interests and its geopolitical position in the global system. But the order that
emerges will also reflect the tools and strategies that the leading state has available to it to
assert control over other states.
I offer what might be called a “political control” model of rule-based institutions. Rules
and institutions are tools by which states gain some measure of political control over the
behavior of other actors in the global system. Doing so involves trade-offs between policy
autonomy and rule-based commitments. A state bargains away some of its policy autonomy
to get other states to operate in more predictable and desirable ways—all of it made cred-
ible through institutionalized agreements. The shifting incentives, choices, and circumstances
surrounding this “institutional bargain” help explain variations in state commitments to rules
and institutions. The degree to which the leading state sponsors and operates within multilat-
eral rule-based relations determines the degree to which the global hierarchy has imperial or
liberal characteristics.
Chapter 4 probes the prospects for rule-based order under conditions of unipolarity—and
how this logic shifts as unipolarity wanes. Unipolarity does shift the incentives that a leading
state has to operate under multilateral rules and institutions. Two strategies of unipolar gov-
ernance are identified—“rule through rules” and “rule through relationships.” The first entails
traditional multilateral commitments to rule-based governance—and it has been most fully
manifest in U.S. relations with Europe. The other involves building order around patron-cli-
ent relations—and it is most fully manifest in America's “hub-and-spoke” relations with East
Asia. Under conditions of unipolarity, the United States has incentives to move toward a hub-
and-spoke system. However, to the extent that the leading state calculates that its unipolar
power is waning or is rendered less effective in securing control over its environment because
of a loss of legitimacy and the acquiescence of weaker states, it will find incentives to remain
tied to other states through multilateral rules and institutions.