Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Most Important Issue in World Politics
I believe that the most important issue in world politics at the moment is that of global warming. Well right now, there is not as strong a connection between global warming and world politics as there will be in the future if things continue as they are. Right now we see a group of industrialized countries talking about ways to reduce emissions that are leaking CFC, Chloro Floro Carbons, into the atmosphere in the hopes that they can agree to reduce the emissions and help stop global warming. So far there isn’t much success even at this level. If global warming is not controlled – if it even can be controlled - at its current rate there will certainly be global implications for the future. As global warming continues, the precious and necessary resources that are on this planet will start to diminish. This will most likely lead to countries fighting over the resources. Increasing global temperatures will cause farm land to disappear and worldwide famine will be the inevitable result causing countries to be at war. Also low lying countries and parts of countries will start to disappear because of rising sea levels. Refugees will be moving into countries and causing a strain on resources. And so on and so on. So, if global warming is not slowed or stopped, every person in the world will feel the effects both politically and environmentally.
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2 comments:
I really like your approach Rob. When Professor Jackson asked us "What is the Most Important Issue in World Politics?", I must admit that global warming didn't even come to my mind. Global warming is an incredibly relevant issue to the policies of every nation, and I imagine that it will become a major part of the relationships between countries in the future. For instance, it seems likely that if the US embraces an effort to reduce carbon emissions, and encourages other nations to follow suit we may run into conflicts with countries with massive populations/industrial complexes (like China or India). I guess that we can only hope that:
1) The US government will recognize the existence of global warming (seems unlikely with this administration).
2) That our government will come up with some kind of plan to considerably reduce emissions (again seems very unlikely seeing as our government is run by those who stand to benefit from oil consumption).
3)That the governments of the world will work cohesively to stop the effects of global warming, particularly because there are many low lying nations (in Africa for instance) that produce very few greenhouse gases, but will be severely impacted.
Anyways, good point...I agree.
I’m afraid that I must disagree with you on global warming being an important issue in world politics. Even though it is a significant global issue, I feel that one issue that we cannot ignore is the rise of a globalized economy. I am referring to the increasing number of foreign investments, outsourcing of American jobs and the growth of overseas monopolies. For example, when the Dutch company Inbev bought out Anheusser-Busch, it signaled that former local monopolies are beginning to expand overseas. Since our trade routes expanding all over the globe, we may find that the trading companies are asserting more financial power than the individual Nation states. As more businesses continue to move overseas, the national economies will be stretched too thin and should a depression hit one country the rest will follow. This was evident during the 2008 recession when Germany and Japan suffered sharp declines in their economies due to their heavy investment in the US Market.
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