Hegemony: Leadership; preponderant influence or authority; -- usually applied to the relation of a government or state to its neighbors or confederates.

There are three primary qualities that a nation must satisfy in order to be considered a hegemon. 1. Economic Power, 2. Military Power, 3. Cultural Power. The word "Power" may be replaced with "Dominance" if that forwards the point enough for anyone. Right now, the United States exists as the only true hegemon remaining in the international system today. The US economy dwarfs that of any other nation in the world. The US military is no less far ahead of any other. The culture of America is no less influential. The most recent example of another hegemon is the Soviet Union during the Cold War. It was during that period that the world's two hegemonic powers vied for supremacy. We all know how that ended.

The objective of this particular discourse is to identify the perceived responsibilities and the resulting actions of a hegemon as well as to take a look at the future. Why does the United States do what it does? Why do American politicians feel the need to build those nuclear bunker busters that I so vociferously attacked two evenings ago? What are the driving forces behind these decisions?

First, everyone reading this needs to recognize a VERY important fact. Our international system is inherently anarchic. For a moment, take away everything separating nations in terms of size, alliances, power, and remember this: Any international actor has the right to do anything it wants pertaining to its own affairs. Now think about that, there is no law. Even when signing "binding" agreements, a nation can just as easily decide to back out and forget the whole deal. Does anyone remember Hitler's promises? His signature on so many worthless agreements?

The only true law (if it can be called that) in the system, is force. Sanctions are fine, and they can help, but any nation truly committed to doing as it will would have no problem whatsoever ignoring some pesky sanctions and an international outcry. Only force can bring these nations to heel. But there's a problem with that. If we respect the right of every nation to do as it will in its own affairs, then what right do we have to use our force on them when we think they're doing wrong? In that case, it generally comes out to the majority wins. For example, NATO and the ethnic cleansing in the Balkans.

Unfortunately, neither NATO or the United Nations could manage to stem to flow of blood in Rwanda when 800,000 people were murdered 1994. But that's another story. (Props to James for writing an excellent essay on that topic) That's just an example of the fallability of the current system.

The idea here, is that there needs to be a means of enforcing 'laws' in the world. That's where a hegemon comes in, IE the United States. The position of hegemon means the U.S. has a lot of responsibility on its shoulders. The job of enforcing laws and punishing those the majority claims are doing wrong falls to the hegemon. The United Nations is a good attempt at providing a needed counter to the possibility of a hegemon becoming overpowered, but once again we fall back to the nature of the international system: anarchy. The U.N. couldn't stop the U.S. from invading Iraq now, could it? Of course not. The U.S. can do whatever it wants, that's the system. All the rest of us can do is call it down, argue, try to convince it to use another method. But when it comes down to it: the conflict is between the target, and the attacker. But putting that aside for the moment...

What type of hegemon does everyone want? Do we want a hegemon active in the world, for good or ill? Or an isolationist hegemon that just doesn't care?

It's pretty hard to argue in favour of the isolationist bandwagon. World War 2 quite neatly knocked that idea out of anyone's head. Isolationism was a strategy that only worked when the world was much larger. The isolationists that argue how the U.S. should get its nose out of other people's business should take a look back in history and ask themselves if millions upon millions of lives could have been saved had the nations of the world done something about Hitler before it was too late. Instead of the terrible strategy of appeasement that consequently murdered millions.

The problem people seem to be having with the United States is that they swung from one extreme to the other. From an isolationist nation, to a nation seemingly obsessed with everyone else's business. There have been no shortage of mistakes, no shortage of gross miscalculations. We all know this. At the risk of sounding like an apologist, we could argue that the U.S. was pretty new to the whole hegemon thing, maybe it should be given a break for its mistakes. I think the U.S. got his with a little too much responsibility, a little too fast. As soon as the Second World War was over, suddenly the threat of Communism was upon the world, and the only country that wasn't completely ravaged from the war with any ability to counter the threat was the United States. So for awhile, perhaps we can forgive some overzealousness.

Right now, the U.S. has been comfortable in it's position for a fair while, and without any direct competition for quite a few years. There shouldn't be anymore excuses for mistakes.

But we've reached a situation where the hegemon has become so comfortable in its position, that it can advance its own agenda without fear. Who is there to dispute the 'mighty' United States? There are those who speak of a real alternative in the European Union, and despite of impressive strides in amalgamation, the EU is still a long ways off from providing a real alternative.

For now, U.S. continues to dabble it's hands in the affairs of the world, for good or ill. The Gulf War was seen as a success, in spite of the result. (They freed Kuwait! But then left Hussein as leader on Iraq while telling his people to rise up against him. Even thought there was no intention of supporting them, a byproduct of the ceasefire agreement.) In 1999 the Ethnic Cleansing in the Balkans was stopped as a result of NATO involvement (and how much did the resident hegemon pony up for that?). Then everyone went to fight the Taliban after September 11th. The same Taliban the United States had outfitted with weapons and training only years before. In fact, the same could be said of the Iraqi's the U.S. was fighting in the Gulf War. Now, they're back in Iraq, and it's anyone's guess who's next.

These are only recent examples, as well. The U.S. continues to push it's influence everywhere in the world, because it feels it must. I think that the primary determinant of U.S. policy right now is fear of inaction. In both the first and second world wars the U.S. were latecomers, and have been consistently critisized over the years for taking to long to join in to help the 'good guys'. Then on Sept 11th, 2001 the U.S. was again hit with something where it may have been thinking afterwards: We could have prevented this, had we acted sooner. Thus the continuing war on terrorism.

I honestly believe that a lot of the actions we've seen from the United States are based around a desire to reshape the world into their version of a 'better place'. I believe that they have been provoked just enough to be moved to the point where the rest of the world is now in danger.

The United States, our hegemon, is becoming so focused on fighting terrorism and fighting the good fight, that it is failing to see the problems with it's own buildup. I mentioned the 7 listed potential targets for U.S. weapons 2 days ago. Iraq was one of them, how long before the others come under fire? And nuclear weapons! I shudder to think about it.

Like a weight lifter that somehow fumbled the bar at his last competition, the United States has been engaging in it's own massive buildup. As though building muscles will fix a problem of finesse.

As for the future, it's hard to see what could happen. The possibilities are always endless, the doom are the most talked about because they're the most feared. The chances of an arms race, of a cold war, are very real and very disturbing. At the same time, no less disturbing is a hegemon completely out of hand - in which case, we could be experiencing tyranny on the greatest scale.

There needs to be a balance struck. But how and where can it be found?

I'm open to everyone's opinions on this matter, and I'd really love to hear some comments. If any of the above isn't clear, I apologize and will attempt to clarify anything asked of me. In my own defense, I'm really sick right now, and so tired I can't even see the words I'm typing properly.

So off I go to sleep, and dream.

~K