by Roger White, copyright December 2018
Assignment 8 -- I want you to reflect on the entire course and what you have learned. How has this course changed the way you view international politics? Discuss two global issues which you believe will be especially important in the coming decades and may impact your life in some way. Explain your reasoning for choosing each. If you cite any material (WHICH I EXPECT YOU TO), please provide in-text citations and a reference list at the end.
I have been interested in history and foreign affairs for many decades. This class in International Relations (IR) offers a different perspective on those topics. IR offers new jargon and a couple of new perspectives such as the Realist and Liberal concepts.
So, in sum, it has been useful in adding new ways to talk about concepts I already enjoy talking and writing about.
Brexit is a hot item that I have been following since the vote happened in 2016. This is interesting to me because it is yet another expression of End of World instinctive thinking, and as such, I'm predicting the pattern it will follow, both in world affairs and economics.
The End of the World pattern it will follow is that of the Hong Kong Turnover in 1997. There was lots of doom and gloom worry as the deadline approached, and then it turned into essentially an non-event when it happened. I'm predicting the same pattern for Brexit.
Economically, the pattern is an investing mania leading up to the event, and then a mild recession following it. For Hong Kong Turnover, the Asian Flu was the recession following it. For Y2K, the Dotcom Bust was the recession following it. I'm predicting a similar recession following Brexit.
When Mao Tse-Tung took over China in 1949 it became quite isolationist. This pattern started to change when Deng Xiaoping took over in 1978 and the change has accelerated greatly under China's current ruler, Xi Jinping, who took over in 2012.
China is now looking outward and its economic power is changing the world. Xi Jinping's formal name for this is the One Belt, One Road initiative. This is bringing big change to both China and the world, particularly in Africa.
This is big now, and it is going to get even bigger over the next decade or two.
References Cited
Wikipedia: Sino-British Joint Declaration, 1997 Asian financial crisis, Dot-com bubble, Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Xi Jinping, Belt and Road Initiative
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