Discussion 8 international relations - Essay Example

INTERNATIONAL RELATION Discussion- 8 …………………. College/ ………….. The creation of European Union was one of the remarkable achievements and developments in world politics. What do you think is the main obstacle toward EU political union? European Union, the largest Trade Bloc to date, is an economic cooperation and policy coordination among 27 European countries, designed to enable the free exchanges of goods, services, capital and labor. The EU has widened its membership and provided stronger framework for economic, monetary and political union integration.

Its policy makings and economic integration have been evolving major developments through Single European Act, Masstricht Treaty, 1995 Enlargement and 2004 Enlargement. Though there have been greater achievements to prosper economic development of the European region, EU faces a number of obstacles in relation to bringing economic integration and Economic and monetary integration is not mutually reinforcing and it is more likely to be best only among homogenous set of economies, but, EU comprises of many countries with very different size and strength as economy is concerned.

When EU adds new members of poor and les-industrialized nations, the Union essentially requires extra provisions and complex negotiations among those countries. Therefore, integration and member-widening process seem to be greater challenges especially due to that this is between nations of very different in economic size and power. As Warleigh (2004) pointed out that the complexity in integration of the economy of its member countries reflects and partly causes Union’s close acquaintance with controversy in recent years.

Crude power politics and member nations intransigence causes EU decisions to become demonstrably unfair (p. 75). 2- Hypothetical scenario of the paragraph Russett, Starr and Kinsella (2009) critically observed that conflict will be a feature of future world politics, and this conflict is going to be more likely between West and the rest. The clash between countries can better be viewed as clash between civilizations and cultural boundaries and not between ideological blocs. International political system has been released from the framework of Western culture dominance by the end of this era, but the centre of the gravity shifted to the reciprocal connections and clashes between West and non-Western culture and among non-Western cultures themselves (Shay, 2009, p. 178). The argument about ‘culture-clash’ has become more known after Huntington’s suggestion that ‘culture matters’ and it will be the same in the future of world politics.

Culture will be the central aspect of future conflicts (Lubjuhn, 2010, p. 6). Religion and culture will be central-theory behind conflicts and religious or cultural ideologies will drive thoughts for political conflicts between countries. There strong cultural as well as religious differences between the core political values especially between Western opinions. This views and observations highlights the argument of Russett, Starr and Kinsella (2009) that the conflict is more likely between the West and Rest.

References Lubjuhn, P (2010), A Response to Huntington ?s "Clash of Civilizations": Civilizations Vs Nation State, GRIN Verlag Russett, B, Starr, H and Kinsella, D (2009), World Politics: The Menu for Choice, Ninth revised edition, Cengage Learning Shay, S (2009), Islamic Terror and the Balkans, Transaction publishers Warleigh, A (2004), European Union: the basics, Third reprinted edition, Routledge