Book Review Essay - World Order by Henry Kissinger
8 Pages Posted: 20 Dec 2014
Date Written: December 19, 2014
Abstract
We live in a world of disorder. Unfortunately, we don’t have any strategy how to move forward. With his latest book World Order, Henry Kissinger discusses the basic questions we need to address: What do we seek to prevent and to achieve in order to develop a world order for peace and how all countries agree to implement it? The book presents a summation of Kissinger´s thinking on his rich experiences over six decades in world politics. As a hard-core realist, he discussed all these points in his historical perspective brilliantly in analyzing the contemporary issues in the European, the Islamic, the Chinese and the American system and without highlighting the latest economic and political development of Latin American.
He comes to conclude that a new type of great power relationship would be based on the Westphalian system, and that the balance of power on the global basis and the principles of non-interference would be an imperative of world order today. Unfortunately, however, the book could not offer the best of what is possible and would not be a useful first step forward. There are many reasons to object his argument.
Keywords: International Relation Theory, Peace Studies, Soft Law, Buddhism, US and Chinese Foreign Policy, Vietnam War, Political Morality
JEL Classification: H70, K33, N40
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation