Contemporary Centres of Power — Class 12 Political Science

After the end of bipolarity, alternative centres of power emerged to limit US dominance. In Europe, the European Union grew out of post-war economic cooperation aided by the Marshall Plan, the OEEC and the Council of Europe, leading to the European Economic Community (1957) and finally the EU (Maastricht Treaty, 1992). The EU has its own flag, anthem, currency (the euro) and a common foreign and security policy; it wields enormous economic, political, diplomatic and military influence, though member states retain their own policies and 'Euro-scepticism' persists. In Asia, ASEAN, founded in 1967 by the Bangkok Declaration, follows the informal, cooperative 'ASEAN Way' that respects national sovereignty; it built three community pillars and a free-trade focus, becoming an important regional forum. China's spectacular economic rise, beginning with Deng Xiaoping's 'open door' reforms of 1978, made it a great power; unlike the USSR it opened step by step, used Special Economic Zones, and joined the WTO in 2001, though inequality and other problems grew. India-China relations, friendly at first, were marred by the 1962 war but have improved through trade and dialogue since the 1980s. Japan and South Korea are also discussed as Asian centres of power.