International Politics in the Pacific Rim Era

In the history of international relations, economic, technological, and demographic developments have, over the centuries, caused the center of economic and political activities to shift from one locus to another. The modern world's history can best be understood as a process of historical change that began in the Mediterranean and subsequently diffused north to Atlantic seaboard states and then spread both westward across the Atlantic and eastward across the Eurasian continent. Forces of change swept across both the North American continent and what the geographer Halford J. Mackinder called “the heartland of the Eurasian continent†in eastern Europe and European Russia. Today, historic movements of economic, political, and technological forces are converging on the Pacific. A more pluralistic world is rapidly emerging in which the Pacific Basin nations and economic forces will play an increasingly important role.