Emergent Actors in World Politics: How States and Nations Develop and Dissolve

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Princeton University Press, 1997 M06 12 - 258 pages

The disappearance and formation of states and nations after the end of the Cold War have proved puzzling to both theorists and policymakers. Lars-Erik Cederman argues that this lack of conceptual preparation stems from two tendencies in conventional theorizing. First, the dominant focus on cohesive nation-states as the only actors of world politics obscures crucial differences between the state and the nation. Second, traditional theory usually treats these units as fixed. Cederman offers a fresh way of analyzing world politics: complex adaptive systems modeling. He provides a new series of models--not ones that rely on rational-choice, but rather computerized thought-experiments--that separate the state from the nation and incorporate these as emergent rather than preconceived actors. This theory of the emergent actor shifts attention away from the exclusively behavioral focus of conventional international relations theory toward a truly dynamic perspective that treats the actors of world politics as dependent rather than independent variables.


Cederman illustrates that while structural realist predictions about unit-level invariance hold up under certain circumstances, they are heavily dependent on fierce power competition, which can result in unipolarity instead of the balance of power. He provides a thorough examination of the processes of nationalist mobilization and coordination in multi-ethnic states. Cederman states that such states' efforts to instill loyalty in their ethnically diverse populations may backfire, and that, moreover, if the revolutionary movement is culturally split, its identity becomes more inclusive as the power gap in the imperial center's favor increases.

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Contents

Introduction
3
Modeling Actors in World Politics
14
Defining the State and the Nation
16
From Reification to Emergence
19
An Overview of the Literature
23
Why Models Are Needed
29
Why Current Models Will Not Do the Trick
32
Conclusion
36
An Example of Geopolitical Overexrension
126
Modeling Nationalism
136
A Taxonomy of Nations and States
138
Three Types of Nationalism
141
Nationalist Mobilization and Coordination
146
Nationalist Mobilization
151
Modeling Political Mobiilization
152
Modeling Collective Action
163

Toward Richer Models
37
The Problem of Historical Contingency
38
The Problem of Methodological Individualism and Materialism
44
The Complex Adaptive Systems Approach
49
An Introduction to the Models
69
Emergent Polarity
72
Power Politics and Emergent Polarity
74
A Nontechnical Overview
79
Technical Specification
81
Hegemonic Takeoff
92
Regional Balancing
98
Conclusion
104
Extending the Emergent Polarity Model
109
Strategic Adaptation
112
Proportional Resource Allocation
117
TwoLevel Action
121
Historical Illustrations
170
Conclusion
174
Appendix
177
Nationalist Coordination
184
An Ecological Model of Nationality Formation
187
Technical Specification
191
Simulation Results
197
Nationalist Coordination and the Formation of Yugoslavia
201
Conclusion
210
Conclusions for Theory and Policy
213
Closing the Metatheoretical Gap
219
Consequences for Policy
222
Bibliography
233
Index
255
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About the author (1997)

Lars-Erik Cederman is University Lecturer in International Relations at Somerville College, University of Oxford. He has written for such publications as International Organization, International Studies Quarterly, and European Journal of International Relations.

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