International political economy

International political economy (IPE), also known as global political economy (GPE), is an academic discipline within political science that analyzes economics and international relations. As an interdisciplinary field, it draws on many distinct academic schools, most notably political economy, political science and economics, also sociology, history, and cultural studies.

The academic boundaries of IPE are flexible and they, along with acceptable epistemologies, are the subject of robust debate. This debate is essentially framed by the discipline's status as a new and interdisciplinary field of study. Despite such disagreements, most scholars can concur that IPE ultimately is concerned with the ways in which political forces (states, institutions, individual actors, etc.) shape the systems through which economic interactions are expressed, and conversely the effect that economic interactions (including the power of collective markets and individuals acting both within and outside them) have upon political structures and outcomes.

IPE scholars are at the center of the debate and research surrounding globalization, both in the popular and academic spheres. Other topics that command substantial attention among IPE scholars are international trade (with particular attention to the politics surrounding trade deals, but also significant work examining the results of trade deals), international development (poverty and the role of institutions in development), international finance, global markets, political risk, multi-state cooperation in solving trans-border economic problems, and the structural balance of power between and among states and institutions. Unlike the broader field international relations, power is understood to be both economic and political, which are interrelated in a complex manner.

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