Strategic Panorama 2009 - 2010 - IEEE

Florentino Portero Rodríguez
development of a system of blocs which lasted until the fall of the Berlin
Wall and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. These blocs disappeared
once the exceptional circumstances did. The new international society
is characterised and will continue to be characterised by a more closewoven
network of organisations that are very different in nature. States
need to organise themselves more than ever to address the challenge of
globalisation and interdependence. To this end they have organisations
that date from the past and now face the challenge of adapting to a new
international environment. Together with them others will emerge from the
urgent need to find responses to the problems of our time. We are therefore
not dealing with a Cartesian design. Only a war disaster would allow
a coherent design to emerge from the ruins of the old organisations. If we
succeed in avoiding a major war the map of the international institutions
will grow chaotically but pragmatically until the conditions are in place for
a general agreement allowing it to be simplified.
A global world is not an integrated world. We are interdependent to a
degree never witnessed before; our cultures are mutually influential; and
we know more about each other than in earlier times… yet we continue
to be different and geography continues to play a crucial role. A global
world entails a larger number of actors on the stage and, accordingly,
greater complexity. The United States will continue to be the «hyperpower»,
the only state with interests throughout the planet and the ability
to act—be it diplomatically, commercially or militarily—anywhere in the
world. Russia has not managed to develop either a modern economic
system or a democracy. High energy prices have enabled it to knock
its accounts into shape but it has not succeeded in consolidating an
attractive national project. The most obvious proof is its demographics.
Russia’s population continues to shrink and its average life expectancy,
of less than sixty, indicates that we are dealing with a depressed society.
Unless a major change occurs, Russia will continue to suffer from its old
problems in the future: inability to join the developing world and difficulty
of defending borders that are out of proportion to the existing population.
Neither France nor the United Kingdom has sufficient critical mass to be
an actor on the global stage. Both would need to bring Europe around to
their own viewpoints, but cultural differences and the weight of Germany,
which is inclined towards pacifism and non-intervention, will make such
a manoeuvre difficult. Japan is an economic power that is perfectly integrated
into the world economy. It was the first of the great cultures of the
India-Pacific area to understand and join in the process of modernisation.
Its international status was determined by its being a loser in the Second
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