Global Power Shifts

There has been a dramatic change in global power recently, and the east seems to be assuming the leadership as explained by Acharya (2014). It means that even the way of dealing with the international challenges may also change. For example, it is a well known fact that Asia’s strength has been growing in the recent years. China, Japan and India are the major leading power states in Asia, and presumably, their growth will overtake most western countries in years to come. Below is a scenario analysis of global power shifts in relation to issues of polarity and agency, interdependence, nuclear deterrence, trends and discontinuities.

Polarity and Agency

The power a nation possesses is determined by the population size, the resources endowment, military strength, political stability, and economic capability; this is its polarity. In the world, the distribution of power is strongly determined by the number of the super powers available. Hence, such a tendency has brought about the unipolar, bi-polar and the multipolar systems. The unipolar system implies that there is only one superpower nation in the world. Consistently, the bipolar system means that there are two opposite great powers that are well equipped in the military sphere, have stable economic and cultural influences. The multi-polar system means that there are several super power countries, and there is the need to share power among them (Glaser 2014).

For a long time now (since the World War I), the United States has been a super power nation, which has made it become unipolar. After its victory in the World War II, Russia and its surrounding countries forming the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) became the world super power. This lead to the establishment of a bi-polar system, which collapsed in early 90’s after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and the United States remained the only super power again. However, the recent rise in the East may soon result to a multi-polar system. The reason for this is the rise of powerful nations such as Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC) countries. With such advancement, it is obvious that power will soon be shifting slowly to the east (Petras & Morley 2012).

The super power nations have been seen to control the world through certain agencies, such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. For example, the World Bank’s CEO must be a US citizen, and he is appointed by the president of the United States. It means that the United States has a direct influence over the World Bank (Hoerder & Kaur 2013).  The major function of the World Bank is to finance major projects in different countries. In case power shifts, it means that there will be multi-polar system that will control some of those agencies that have strong effect on the world, and decisions will no longer be made by one nation.

Interdependence

Interdependence means that the outcomes of an interaction strongly depend on the choices made by other parties. It aims at providing an objective decision rather than a subjective one since the results of either profits or losses are only felt by individual nations and not the whole group as explained by Murray (2013).

With the global power shifts, there will be enhancement of interdependence due to the implementation of multi-polarity. In the today world, the super power country is known to control international trade, economic growth, security, international finances, technology and global governance as explained by Glaser (2014). According to the rules of the multi-polar system, the power should be equally shared and the voice of every party should be considered in the global decision making. In regard with the international trade, the eastern states, such as China, will benefit since they will be able to agree on a better market for selling the goods that they produce. China is known for its high production capability. This is why such countries as Japan depend on China for their great development.

As it has already been mentioned, most of the super power nations have the greatest security. The reason for this is the fact that they are in control of agencies such United Nations (UN) whose role is to maintain international peace and security. It will then be the role of those super power nations to provide assistance with personnel, finances and technology that will help in the running of such agencies (Dahlman 2011). The countries will then be interdependent of others in terms of their security. Having one state conducting the global governance is not the best idea since the state may be biased while making global decisions. If there was a shift in the power to the east, this can be avoided. Having more than one state conducting the global governance will be beneficial for the world a s a whole since there will be a variety of ideas that are put together to cater for the diverse needs of the world population.

Nuclear Deterrence

In the past, the global shift has not been welcomed by most states and has resulted in wars and conflicts. With the growth of the eastern countries, soon there will be more than one super power nation. There might be a conflict between the western and the eastern states as a result of the differences that exist between China, India and Pakistan (Dicken 2015). Therefore, it is important for the states to accumulate nuclear power and military so that they could be ready for anything that might happen.

Nuclear deterrence is a military tactic that is used to discourage the enemy by letting them use the nuclear weapons as long as the countries will be fully destroyed as a result. It is used to discourage the use of nuclear weapons and even scare away states that might not be equal as explained by Cox (2012). Its purpose is to create fear in the enemy and soften the battle ground. Nuclear weapons have been discouraged in the past because they cause permanent damage to the states in case of war.

Burke-White (2014) states that “the multi-polar system is supposed to introduce the rules and regulations that control the use of nuclear weapons.” It will serve as a security measure for the countries that might use the nuclear weapons for their selfish purposes and to ensure that the rules of nuclear deterrence are implemented.

Trends

The trend is a general change in something with a given pattern forming a series. In the context of the global power, the super power tends to take control of the trends. Economic performance is a trend explained by the economic growth being experienced in the recent years. Most countries in Asia have a great economic growth rate, which has formed a certain trend as explained by Brzezinski (2013). Such countries as Qatar have an increasing trend and soon will be among the most developed countries. The table below shows the comparison of the growth rate in some western and eastern countries as explained by Buzan and Lawson (2013).

Western countries	Rank	Growth rate	Eastern countries	Rank	Growth rate
United states	166	1.7	Qatar	1	18.8
United Kingdom	183	0.7	Iraq	7	9.9
Canada	138	2.5	China	10	9.2

(Buzan & Lawson 2013).

According to the table above, most of the western countries have a very slow growth rate of less than 5 while some of the countries in the east have a growth rate of more than 5. It means that in a few years’ time, if the trend of eastern countries having a higher growth rate continues, they will be in advance of the western countries.

Culture trend is another factor that can be used to demonstrate global power shifts. People from other states, especially the youth, tend to be culturally influenced by the west. The superpower nations tend to take control of the culture practices that are happening. In future, it is expected that there will be several superpower nations that might influence the divergence and acceptance of everyone’s culture (Breslin 2013).

Discontinuities

Similar to any other situation, the global power shifts have some disadvantages that cause direct effect on all the counties involved. One of them is that the global power shift will cause discontinuities. According to Ayres (2012), discontinuities are distinct disruption of progress. The reason for this is the fact that the growth rate might be disrupted and forced to remain stagnant or even reduce with time. Taking into consideration that there will be several superpowers and there will be a multi-polar system, the major causes of these discontinuities are issues such as war and group decision making. The interdependence of several countries might bring discontinuity in some of the countries since some decisions will have to be made by the whole group. This will affect the economic decisions made by a country. Destruction in wars might also bring discontinuities (Sagan 2012).

Conclusion

From the above discussion, it is clear that the eastern countries are gradually gaining power, which might soon create a need for a power balance with the western countries. This implies that both eastern and western countries will be interdependent on each other in terms of global decision making. The global power shift is expected to take place in the coming years. Although it proves the great development of the majority of countries, it might not be welcomed by the current superpowers as there will be sharing of powers in a multi-polar system. The prediction has been made after consideration of the recent economic growth experienced by some of the Asian countries.