The Limits of Globalisation: Unveiling Resilience and the Primacy of the Nation State in World Politics

Abstract

Globalisation as a phenomenon has subsumed several multi-layered and complex social processes that have been simultaneously at work, especially, after the end of the Cold War in 1991. While analysing the bilateral as well as multilateral interactions among the contemporary nation states, in the context of globalisation, this article sheds light on the existential stresses and strains that contemporary nation states, developed as well as developing, have been constrained to encounter owing to the rise of transnational actors as well as sub-national/secessionist forces. In the process, it revisits concepts such as capitalism, the nation state, hegemony, in Gramscian sense and imperialism while recasting them under changing circumstances of world politics. It argues that, despite diverse existential challenges, the nation state has proved remarkably resilient. It continues to survive as the primary de jure anchor/actor that provides major communication channels to work out projects of cooperation/coalitions, including alliances and treaties. Hence, it is the most reliable entity towards management and even resolution of issues of global concerns as also intra- and inter-state conflicts in contemporary world politics.