MEĐUNARODNI PROBLEMI

The Geoeconomics of Power: How States Compete for Trade Routes in the 21st Century

Mandić Stefan (University of Belgrade – Faculty of Philosophy, Belgrade, Serbia), stefan.mandic@f.bg.ac.rs

Global trade stands out as an important factor that influences the socioeconomic power within the world-system. As focusing on trade routes would contribute to an understanding of global power distribution, the objective is to examine how trade routes impact the formation of socio-economic power. Since the “geoeconomics of power”, which the theoretical framework is based on, represents an integration of world-systems theory and geopolitics, the article outlines how trade routes are conceptualised within these two systems of thought. The article further elaborates on the theoretical framework in which political power is understood as being dependent on economic wealth and trade routes. The main research question is how the 21st-century struggle for control over Eurasian trade routes reflects their structural significance for the reproduction of socio-economic power. The analysis concentrates on the positioning of China and Russia, vis-à-vis traditional thalassocratic core states led by the U.S. The significance of the trade routes in the premodern era and their transformation during the 19th and 20th centuries is examined first, in order to contextualize 21st century struggle over their control. The methodological approach is historical-structural and comparative. The article concludes that trade routes constitute one of the key determinants of socio-political power and that their importance for core positioning may grow in the 21st century.

Keywords: trade routes, resources, socio-economic power, world capitalist system, geopolitics, geoeconomics of power