Historical Experience

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe theory of long cycles is a set of propositions about the behavior of the global political system. It has its roots in a tradition of “oceanic” thought and it may be contrasted with two more conventional models of world politics, the states‐system model and the imperial model. The theory offers a basis for strategic analysis and for the derivation of policy implications: The United States is seen as successor to a line of world powers; this world role calls for a defensive strategy that would avoid the “imperial presumption”; on past experience another global war is not imminent in the present phase of the long cycle; the major immediate problem is the nationalist phase of the cycle; but the long‐term problem confronting the global system is the decay of its political structure.