Power in the Global Age

This brilliant new book by one of Europe's leading social thinkers throws light on the global power games being played out between global business, nation states and movements rooted in civil society. Beck offers an illuminating account of the changing nature of power in the global age and assesses the influence of the ever-expanding counter-powers. The author puts forward the provocative thesis that in an age of global crises and risks, a politics of "golden handcuffs" - the creation of a dense network of transnational interdependencies - is exactly what is needed in order to regain national autonomy, not least in relation to a highly mobile world economy. It is imperative that the maxim of nation-based realpolitik - that national interests have necessarily to be pursued by national means - be replaced by the maxim of cosmopolitan realpolitik. The more cosmopolitan our political structures and activities, Beck suggests, the more successful they will be in promoting national interests, and the greater our individual power in this global age will be.

Reflections on the rise of right-wing populism in Europe Foreword Chapter I Introduction: New Critical Theory with cosmopolitan intent Chapter II Critique of the national outlook Chapter III Global domestic politics changes the rules: On the breaching of boundaries in economics, politics and society Chapter IV Power and counter-power in the global age: The strategies of capital Chapter V State strategies between renationalization and transnationalization Chapter VI Strategies of civil society movements Chapter VII Who wins? On the transformation of concepts and forms of the state and politics in the second modernity Chapter VIII Brief funeral oration at the cradle of the cosmopolitan era References