Power and the Varieties of Order - Liberal Leviathan: The Origins, Crisis, and Transformation of the American World Order - page 39

Disorder is manifest in geopolitical competition and war. International order returns when a
new leading state rises up and uses its dominant position to organize and run the system. Of
course, not all command-based orders are global in scope. Major powers have established
and presided over more limited hierarchical orders within regions or maritime systems.
As noted earlier, Britain in the nineteenth century and the United States created and led
international orders with a mix of hierarchical characteristics. Each acquired commanding
power advantages—economic, technological, military—and used these advantages to estab-
lish a global system of diplomatic, political, and commercial relationships. The British world
system contained an extraordinary variety of types of hierarchical rule: formal colonial pos-
sessions, informal governing arrangements, and spheres of influence and control. 36 Both Bri-
tain and the United States established a set of loosely arranged rules and institutions around
which world markets and politics turned. Each used its internal market to promote trade
abroad and manage an open system of commerce. Britain championed the gold standard as
a mechanism to facilitate worldwide trade and investment. Its naval dominance was used to
protect shipping and provide security protection to friends and allies. The United States used
its power advantages after World War II to reopen the world economy and create an array
of political and alliance institutions that provided the foundation for postwar security and
the management of economic openness. 37 But the United States also used its commanding
position to disciple and coerce weaker states, particularly in Latin America and the Middle
East. 38
The challenge for theories of hierarchy is to capture the nature of and variation in power
relations between the leading state and weaker and secondary states. Hierarchy can come in
many varieties, and the character of domination can be overtly coercive or involve a more
complex mix of incentives and constraints. What makes hierarchies of states persist? Is it the
simple dominance of the leading state, coercing weaker and secondary states to operate under
its command? Or do weaker and secondary states operate within a hierarchical order through
a more negotiated process of give-and-take? The rise of unipolarity after the Cold War is a
puzzle to realist theories of anarchy and balance. It is less so to theories that see hierarchy
as a basic and enduring feature of world politics. But is the American-led international order
simply the most recent manifestation of a long sequence of command-based systems, or is
there something profoundly distinctive about it? Is it best seen as a modern form of empire, or
is it something different? The American-led order is hierarchical but—at least in its Western
core—it is also organized around open and loosely rule-based relationships. How does hier-
archy and liberal order coexist? We can look more closely at liberal theories of order and
variations in the logic and character of hierarchical systems.