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"Hegemony, Hierarchy, and Unipolarity: Theoretical and Empirical Foundations of Hegemonic Order Studies" published on by Oxford University Press.

The emerging transition from unipolarity to a more multipolar distribution of global power presents a unique and unappreciated problem that largely explains why, contrary to the expectations of balance of power theory, a counterbalancing reaction to U.S. primacy has not yet taken place. The problem is that, under unipolarity and only unipolarity, balancing is a revisionist, not a status quo, behavior: its purpose is to replace the existing unbalanced unipolar structure with a balance of power system. Thus, any state that seeks to restore a global balance of power will be labeled a revisionist aggressor. To overcome this ideational hurdle to balancing behavior, a rising power must delegitimize the unipole's global authority and order through discursive and cost-imposing practices of resistance that pave the way for the next phase of full-fledged balancing and global contestation. The type of international order that emerges on the other side of the transition out of unipolarity depends on whether the emerging powers assume the role of supporters, spoilers, or shirkers. As the most viable peer competitor to U.S. power, China will play an especially important role in determining the future shape of international politics. At this relatively early stage in its development, however, China does not yet have a fixed blueprint for a new world order. Instead, competing Chinese visions of order map on to various delegitimation strategies and scenarios about how the transition from unipolarity to a restored global balance of power will develop.

This working paper deals with the claim that the decline of multilateralism is but a logical outcome of the present distribution of international power. In a first part, it analyses a double causal claim, namely that the distribution of international power (unipolarity) determines the nature of US foreign policy (primacy-plus-unilateralism) which is antithetical to multilateralism as an institution. On the basis of recent conceptual analyses of power, which challenges the assumptions necessary to make such aggregate power analysis, I argue that the general thesis of a causal relationship between unipolarity and a decline of multilateralism does not hold. A second part argues applies a constructivist twist to the conceptual analysis of power in order to assess whether a particular conception of power, if shared, has an actual effect on world order. Precisely because the distribution of power resources does not determinate outcomes, but are often understood to do so, the capacity to shape the definitions of power is not mere semantics, but has political effect. This move reverses the relationship between the two central concepts. Rather than seeing unprecedented preponderance as the cause of unilateralism, it shows how a successful (neoconservative) policy of US unilateralism could foster a certain understanding of power which, if it becomes shared by the international society, will have real power effects akin to the alleged effects of unipolarity.