After reading “Making of the Modern World” by Erik Ringmar, I wasn’t surprised by the fact that during the colonial centuries good relationships between neighboring states in Europe were little to non existent as all the states were power hungry. However, it was interesting to see the relationship between the colonies and it’s colonizer. During the colonial era, Europe was ruthless when it came to it’s relationship with the Americas, South America and the Caribbean. For example, the Spanish committed mass genocide and took over almost the whole continent in the South and even in the Caribbean islands. Native Indians were either killed, forced to work, raped, or even being sold for slavery. Ironically, these colonies rose to sovereignty despite being under control by states for several decades.
Another thing that was interesting to me, was the Treaty of Westphalia. This whole Westphalia system, was made after the Thirty Years’ War(1618-1648), where states came together and formed a treaty which gave a whole new approach to international relations between states. While the treaty made it clear that each state would be allowed to rule their territories as they saw fit, every state was equal and there was no overarching power, the effect of it was anarchy. Where there was a breakdown in order and law and everyone was for themselves. The states’ powers were decentralized meaning there was no main source of power to keep common rules in check. As a result, states had to form alliances or rely on their own resources against other rival states. This caused a lot of tension between the states which allowed many colonies like the ones in the Americas to gain sovereignty due to the fact that the states were too busy “watching” their own backs and lost control of their colonies.
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Victor,
This is an interesting take, but you seem to be implying it is the international state system’s fault that there was war between European countries prior to (and following) the Treaty of Westphalia. It is perhaps more accurate that the Treaty of Westphalia acknowledged the frequent warfare between princes and attempted to codify some preliminary ordering principles, such as respect for sovereignty.” Of course, because it is an anarchic world system, states had (and still have!) very little recourse if another state violates their sovereignty, except self-defense. Does that make sense?
Yeah, that makes sense. To me it just felt that treaties or even statutes for some reason while they are signs of states taking steps for better international relationships globally, they never seem to fully work. This can be seen historically, as time and time we can see states violating these foreign policies.