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The main purpose of this paper is to explore the objectives and possible consequences of the Chinese investments in Portugal in the last decade. Are they business as usual in a globalized economy, or something else inside a broad political strategy? Trying to answer this question, the approach will be made both through the lens economic diplomacy and the geopolitical analysis. The research will be developed throughout several points: firstly, the Chinese model of socialist market economy within a global environment configured by liberal ideas; secondly, the main characteristics of China's economic diplomacy model, one where the economic and the political are closely intertwined; thirdly, a focus on the economic attractiveness that China exerts upon Portugal, having the investment in the Portuguese energy sector as a case in point; and finally, some conclusions about the possible consequences for Portugal economic and strategic dependence on China in a world where the USA–China rivalry is growing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops a critical international political economy analysis of the processes that we commonly understand as globalization and their application in the development of Poland's transition from state socialism. It does so by tracing the rise of social forces shaped by the restructuring of social relations of production and the form of state in Poland. The paper argues that a series of important social shifts occurred to move Poland towards a neoliberal strategy of capitalist accumulation with the failure of state-socialism as a development project and the uncoupling of the social basis of Communist Party hegemony. It is social forces most intimately associated with transnational capital, irrespective of their party or social position, that are most successful in the struggle over competing reform strategies. These strategies eventually coalesce through material and ideological changes associated with a new openness to transnationalized circuits of capital.International Politics (2006) 43, 474–499. doi:10.1057/palgrave.ip.8800166 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trafficking in persons (TIP) is one of the fastest growing areas of global criminal activity and one that is of monumental concern to the US government and the international community. It is estimated that 800,000–900,000 persons, mostly women and children are bought, sold or forced across international borders every year. An estimated 45,000–50,000 persons are trafficked to the US every year. In fact, current estimate by the International Labor Organization (2005) put the minimum of persons in forced labor at a given time as a result of trafficking at 2.45 million. This lucrative criminal activity generates between $10 and $12 billion annually, making it the third largest illicit business after drugs and arms trade. The paper argues that the 21st century TIP represents a global demand for cheap and vulnerable labor which is facilitated by the process of globalization and the existence of underground and informal economies mostly in industrialized countries. TIP constitute serious problems which affects every country. Post- September 2001, the US has been proactive in fighting to eliminate TIP and persuading other countries to join in the campaign to end this trade. This paper therefore examines the efforts by the US government to combat TIP.International Politics (2006) 43, 241–265. doi:10.1057/palgrave.ip.8800142 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper traces the ‘securitization’ of US foreign economic policy since the advent of the Bush administration.11An earlier draft of this paper was first presented to a conference on ‘Globalization, Conflict and Political Regimes in East and Southeast Asia’, organized by the Asia Research Centre, Murdoch University and the Southeast Asia Research Centre of the City University of Hong Kong, Fremantle, Western Australia, August 15–16, 2003. Comments to richard.higgott@warwick.ac.uk. This paper was written while the author was Visiting Professor at the Institute for Defence and Strategic Studies in Singapore. Thanks are extended to its Director, Mr Barry Desker and Professors Amitav Acharya, Mely Anthony and Helen Nesadurai and the staff of IDSS for support during this period. Needless to say, the views expressed in the paper are those of the author alone and do not reflect those of anyone mentioned or of the IDSS It argues that in the context of US economic and military preponderance in the world order, the US has been unable to resist the temptation to link foreign economic and security policy. While there was evidence of the securitization of economic globalization in US policy from day one of the Bush administration, it was 9/11 that firmed up this trend. For the key members of the Bush foreign policy team, globalization is now seen not simply in neo-liberal economic terms, but also through the lenses of the national security agenda of the United States. Economic globalization is now not only a benefit, but also a ‘security problem’. 9/11 offered the opportunity for what we might call the ‘unilateralist–idealists’, in the Bush Administration, to set in train their project for a post-sovereign approach to American foreign policy. The paper identifies some intellectual contradictions in current US strategy and raises a series of questions about the implications for world order of the consolidation of the trends identified in the paper.International Politics (2004) 41, 147–175. doi:10.1057/palgrave.ip.8800073 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper inquires as to how the internationalization of politics, society and the economy has affected the liberal-democratic foundations of European nation-states. ‘Europeanization’, the rise of global firms as powerful political actors, international migration within and towards Europe, international terrorism and organized crime as well as the state's responses to these challenges, and the surge of right-wing radicalism and populism are identified as the major forces that tend to put both the democratic and the liberal components of liberal democracies under pressure. Future research should devote more attention to studying the factors determining the extent to which different European countries are affected by the dynamics of internationalization and the relationship between different internationalization-related challenges. Moreover, politics as an academic discipline should be more ambitious about providing some normative guidance to coping with internationalization.International Politics (2009) 46, 48–64. doi:10.1057/ip.2008.33 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article replies to an earlier forum (International Politics (42.3) on ‘Globalization Theory: a Post Mortem’. Whereas the ’Post Mortem’ had criticized Globalization Theory largely for its neglect of Classical Social Theory's achievements, the current paper emphasizes its reproduction of one of Classical Social Theory's greatest limitations: the failure to incorporate ‘the international’ into its theorization of historical development. This limitation, it is argued, may be overcome using the idea of ’uneven and combined development’, an idea which is first reformulated (in order to re-connect the premises of social and international theory), and then used as a vantage point from which to respond to criticisms of the ‘Post Mortem’. ‘The international’, it turns out, is not the fading reality postulated by Globalization Theory but rather a fundamental dimension of social existence that IR, uniquely among the social sciences, encounters as its core subject matter.International Politics (2007) 44, 450–482. doi:10.1057/palgrave.ip.8800200 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How far does globalization extend the boundaries of community by bringing distant suffering directly into the lives of onlookers, and how far does the greater visibility of suffering arouse compassion and a willingness to help? Modern self-images that stress the growth of emotional identification between the members of the same society encourage the belief that similar attachments may develop at the level of humanity as a whole. Critics of this position emphasize deep-seated tendencies to remain indifferent to remote suffering. In the light of these differences, this paper asks whether the extension of human solidarity largely depends on the development of feelings of guilt or shame when harm is done to ‘distant strangers’ or when little is done to help them. It asks whether universal vulnerabilities to basic forms of mental and physical suffering create the possibility of global empathy and sympathy, and whether the idea of ‘embodied cosmopolitanism’ provides adequate normative foundations for collective action to reduce unnecessary suffering in distant places.International Politics (2007) 44, 19–36. doi:10.1057/palgrave.ip.8800156 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article responds to Justin Rosenberg's critique of what he terms ‘Globalization Theory’. In turn the paper elaborates substantive, meta-theoretical and theoretical objections to Rosenberg's diagnosis. On this basis it is concluded that globalization remains both a significant subject and a promising concept for contemporary social research.International Politics (2005) 42, 390–399. doi:10.1057/palgrave.ip.8800122 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The widely held view ascribes China's remarkable economic growth in the 1990s to the communist regime's gradualist reform policies and illiberal development strategy. This essay challenges that view. The author argues that economic growth became the most important source of legitimacy of the Chinese communist regime in the aftermath of the Global 1989. The Chinese regime adopted a radical efficiency-biased economic reform in the 1990s. Such radical reform regardless of social justice gave rise to rampant corruption and a huge income gap between the rich and poor. Meanwhile, misinterpreting the East Asian growth model, the Chinese regime, eager to drive the economy to grow faster, carried out an externally oriented development strategy that combined export promotion with import liberalization at the expense of autonomous national development. By the late 1990s, both the economic reform and industrial development were stuck in a quagmire, rendering the economic growth difficult to sustain. Its deep concern for legitimacy thus led the Chinese regime to accept harsh terms on economic liberalization in order to secure WTO membership, in the hope of increasing export and FDI on a larger scale to reverse the declining economic momentum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]