Už nejsme sami na světě - Nový pohled na "globální uspořádání světa" – Badie Bertrand (2020)

The study by French political scientist and geopolitician Bertrand Badie, "We Are No Longer Alone in the World" (Nous ne sommes plus seuls au monde. Un autre regard sur l'"ordre international", La découverte, Paris, 2016), is a concise and insightful summary of the fundamental elements of diplomacy and the rules of foreign policy as they have been constituted throughout history, along with a characterization of the current situation in this field. In the historical overview that forms the first part of the book, Badie describes the emergence of key concepts such as state, sovereignty, borders, power, war, peace, and interstate relations at the dawn of European modernity in the context of the Peace of Westphalia, whose role has been decisively influential in this area for a very long time (up until 1918, or rather 1945-48). The Peace of Westphalia signifies the definitive replacement of the remnants of a vague medieval universalism—the never-actually-realized idea of a unified Christian empire—with a pragmatic recognition of the status quo for a group of equally sovereign states that establish relations, enter into treaties, and, above all, engage in conflict with one another. The creation of modern European states is thus concomitant with the recognition (often only de facto) of other states, i.e., the Other, which is more or less the same as the Self. The decisive...