ABSTRACT
World politics as an area of academic inquiry and practical activity holds at one and the same time immense promise and immense potential difficulty. Its promise-and a major reason for its attractiveness to students at all levels as well as to politicians and practitioners-lies in its focus on phenomena which are heavy with implications for the continued existence and flourishing of humankind. Questions of security and prosperity, order and justice, war and peace, and ultimately life and death, have always formed a major preoccupation of those engaged in the field. Although these questions have always been important, the attempt to establish the study of world politics as an academic discipline was largely a product of the twentieth century: indeed, the emergence of an identifiable area of study, known widely as International Relations, was one of the less apocalyptic consequences of the First World War. The growing awareness throughout the last century that international events have important implications for political life at all levels was also accompanied by a persistent expansion and diversification of the subject. As we move into the twenty-first century, the analysis of world politics has become one of the most rapidly expanding fields of study in higher education, with an increasing number of people wanting to develop some understanding of what is happening in world politics.
