Neo-classical Realist and Innenpolitik Perspectives on the changing position of the US, and its Relationship with China, in Contemporary Global Politics

This paper will look at the history of the U.S. to explain the current position of the U.S. in global politics and particularly it will explain U.S.’ imbalanced and co-dependent relation with China. The paper will focus on international factors to explain U.S.’ situation by adopting a neoclassical realist framework. While realism is often accused with being ‘ahistorical’ – that is, it does not acknowledge historical change very well - this paper buys into this criticism by also looking at the relevance of domestic factors in both countries by drawing on insights from Innenpolitik theory. Adopting this dual theoretical framework will provide a better theoretical analytical tool for the interaction of domestic and international factors as it allows to be flexible and sensitive to empirical evidence. First, the paper will start from an in-depth analysis of the ‘grand strategies’ of both the U.S. and China. Next, the analysis will be narrowed down to U.S. – China relations and also includes an in-depth analysis of both countries’ position within the topic of global imbalances. Third, the paper explains U.S.’ position in the global political economy as an imbalanced and codependent relationship with China, where both international (neo-classical realism) and domestic factors (Innenpolitik) play a predominant role at different points in time. Finally, the paper concludes that by adopting a dual theoretical framework that taps on insights from Innenpolitik and Neoclassical realism, U.S.’ political economic relations with China can be explained as an empirically driven relationship. In this relationship both international and domestic factors operate at all time in interplay and the balance of which factors are predominant is dynamic.