Robert Keohane was one of the first to question the theory of “hegemonic stability”, according to which power is no longer the monopoly of the hegemonic country, but is distributed through the interdependence of states. Professor Emeritus at Princeton University talks to K and explains how the war in Ukraine has undermined the power of international organizations. Could Russia’s decline in power be a factor that makes Russia even more dangerous?

“We don’t have coherent, strong multilateral institutions,” Keohane says. “Even leaving aside the countries of the South, which may have very different interests, there is no overarching organization in which the US, China, and Russia can work effectively together.”

International institutions operate where member countries have strong common interests. “Look,” the professor remarks, “at the European Union. She has repeatedly defied predictions of her collapse, including the Greek crisis, which she handled very harshly for Greece, but she succeeded.”

“Can we say that 30 years after the end of the Cold War, the balance of power between the Eastern and Western blocs has shifted again?” we ask Mr. Keohane.

“The big lesson is that if you want to prevent new conflicts, you should always be asking yourself about interdependence asymmetries.”

“The big difference from 1990 is that now China is a strong country, while it was very poor and dependent. And now it is still heavily dependent on trade with the West. It has a lot of vulnerabilities, but it is also very strong technologically, and militarily it is becoming more and more powerful, ”responds the Princeton professor. “The second big difference is that Russia is much weaker and with a smaller economy. It’s the size of California. He has nuclear weapons, but also the army, which after the war in Ukraine, as we understand it, is completely ineffective – misled by a bad system of government. Russia is very clumsy, it has atavistic ideas about its role in the world, and this makes it a dangerous, but not a powerful actor. In world politics, the most dangerous actors are the weakest,” Keohane notes, giving a vivid historical example: “Austria-Hungary was a dangerous actor in 1914, not because it was strong, but because it was falling apart and desperately trying to maintain its multinational empire. So she was willing to take the risk. Now Russia is dangerous because it is weak. China is dangerous because it is strong.”

According to the professor, this image also reflects the theory of “hegemonic stability”: “Robert Gilpin’s view is that when we have the emergence of a great power from a former subject state, this is a dangerous point in the system. The emerging power lost not only its status, but also its territory, which means it became an object of exploitation. When she becomes strong again, she will want to regain her status.”

Could this uncertainty lead Russia to use nuclear weapons? “I always get scared when we have nuclear-weapon states that lose a war,” Keohane explains. “You should be concerned, but it seems very difficult to me how they can benefit from the use of nuclear weapons. They could normally use nuclear weapons to destroy part of the Ukrainian army, but their problem with Ukraine is that they cannot govern. Russia must understand that it cannot control all of Ukraine in any way.”

How to find a new post-war equilibrium? “Joseph Nye and I have said that asymmetric interdependence is a source of strength. If you are more dependent on me than I am on you, then you are vulnerable. Why don’t Germans read this book (“Power and Interdependence”) every year? Why didn’t Merkel remember our book? He did not and made a huge mistake by making the country dependent on Russian natural gas. They haven’t learned their lesson. They foolishly pursued wealth with little regard for vulnerability. So the big lesson is that if you want to prevent new conflicts, you should always be asking yourself about the asymmetry of interdependence. And if you find those who are opposed to you, ask: am I vulnerable or just sensitive? Europe was sensitive to its dependence on oil, but it was vulnerable to its dependence on natural gas because it had no alternatives.”