Thinking about complexity: the displacement of power along time and through space

Abstract

Is there any notion of power left in what we call international relations if one rules out nation-states and political and strategic dynamics? The articles in this special issue give readers a good panorama of the multiple aspects of this interrogation, allowing them to question even what seems unquestionable, its “International” dimension. Covering historical process from the twentieth century, they paradoxically permit a positive answer to be flirted with, while clearly reminding us that the nation-state and its core mechanisms have not disappeared despite being strongly challenged. Society and social forces are the main focus of the narratives about the past published in this special issue. They were captured building transnational interactions and relations, challenging ethnocentrism as frequently seen in the literature in the past few years1. However, even when the analysis tackles classic inter-state dynamics, with actors advancing “posture[s] of Gladiators,” to quote Hobbes2, those societal forces were remarkably acknowledged and scrutinized. At the same time, since “capacities” and “results” were also taken into account, these articles take us to the very core of the dialectical relationship between powerful and powerless entities