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Email this citationCIAO DATE: 04/04
If Not Balancing, What? Forms of Resistance to American Hegemony
Jeremy Pressman
March 2004
International Security Program
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs (BCSIA)
Harvard University
Executive Summary
While traditional understandings of international affairs would predict the formation of a balancing coalition against the dominant U.S. position in world affairs, some analysts now contend that the U.S. advantage is so comprehensive and so unprecedented that we have not seen and will not see balancing behavior on the part of second tier powers like China, Russia, Japan, and Germany. It would be a mistake, however, to assume that the absence of balancing means the United States will not face any meaningful opposition in the international arena. Though in the short term a bloc of states is unlikely to form a counter-coalition - the historical form of resistance to dominant powers - other states still find important ways to resist U.S. dominance.
If not balancing, what? The current emphasis on U.S. power and dominance wrongly implies that nothing other than balancing is consequential, yet resistance short of balancing could still significantly undermine U.S. interests. Furthermore, today's forms of resistance to U.S. hegemony could serve as the building blocks for balancing against the United States down the road.
What, then, are these forms of resistance? While the past decade of U.S. hegemony does not offer a crystal clear road map, it does suggest several different avenues by which states and disaffected peoples will resist U.S. hegemony.
