Power politics

Power politics (or, in German, Machtpolitik) is a form of international relations in which sovereign entities protect their own interests by threatening one another with military, economic or political aggression. The term was the title of a 1979 book by Martin Wight, which the Times Literary Supplement listed as the 18th most influential book since World War II.

Power politics is essentially a way of understanding the world of international relations: nations compete for the world's resources and it is to a nation's advantage to be manifestly able to harm others. It prioritizes national self-interest over the interest of other nations or the international community.

Techniques of power politics include, but are not limited to, conspicuous nuclear development, pre-emptive strike, blackmail, the massing of military units on a border, the imposition of tariffs or economic sanctions, bait and bleed and bloodletting, hard and soft balancing, buck passing, covert operations, shock and awe and asymmetric warfare.

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