Western Europe of the early 21st century is going through a process that is sometimes referred to as “the arrival of the Third Wave civilization”, that is the information civilization. The civilizational transformations result in two “revolutions” – post-national and post-industrial. Just like the 19th-century national and industrial revolutions, they involve deep social changes and consequently provoke resistance and a wave of counter-mobilisation against the upcoming “new order” – global, post-national, and post-industrial. The basic assumption of this article is that the classical theoretical schemes developed by Stein Rokkan and Seymour Lipset may come as analytical tools useful in explaining contemporary political phenomena. Rokkan’s theory seems to be the analytical model that is still helpful in explaining the election behaviours as well as political conflicts and divisions present within current political systems, and its heuristic power is high.

The relationship between the two countries has been a complex and diverse subject of investigation and contemplation. The interconnection between the two countries can be described by the following central notions, such as economic cooperation, rivalry in terms of status acquisition of global hegemonic power, particularly in the Pacific region and beyond controversy mutual suspicion over each other’s intentions. Therefore, it is clearly justified that each state has elaborated and adopted a specific manner of conduct and attitude regarding each other as a potential adversary but has meanwhile maintained an extremely strong economic partnership. It is fair to state, that the relationship between both countries has been described by multiple world leaders and academics as the world’s most significant bilateral relationship of the 21st century. Due to the fact that Chinese economy has started to develop increasingly fast and PRC has strengthened its positions on the world’s arena, the United States started to perceive the Middle Kingdom as a direct threat to the established world order in its drive for regional hegemony in East Asia now as well as future aspirant for global supremacy. Beijing, by contrast rejects these notions, and continues its assertive policies and its quest for allies.

The objective of this article is to demonstrate the place of the global governance concept in four international relations theories: realism, liberalism, neoliberal institutionalism and social constructivism. Global governance is defined as the sum of ways that institutions and international organizations, both public and private, use to try to cooperate at the global level in order to manage their common affairs. In addition, the paper defines global governance as being a specific perspective on world politics that offers a tool for understanding global change in an era of shifting boundaries and relocated authorities. The main research questions of the article are: how the most influential IR theories have reacted to the global governance concept and why the term ‘global governance’, so popularly and so frequently used in the 1990’s, has not resulted in a stable concept. Conclusions and suggestions presented in the summary point out that global governance held the promise of a radical transformation (predicted by almost every IR theory) of world order at the end of the Cold War. However, this great institutional transformation has never taken place. Therefore, current global politics still remain resistant to any form of world (or global) governance.

Food constitutes the basic human need. Changes in the modern world indicate that the problem of food security will steadily grow in importance in the future. The key question is therefore how to provide it, how to governance it in a dynamically changing world under the globalization processes. The article deals with the problem of global governance of food security. Its main assumption is that the globalization processes create the qualitatively new environment of food security global governance. The analysis permits three conclusions. First, as a consequence of the globalization processes, the way food security is perceived has changed while the problem itself becomes complex and multi-dimensional, which increases demand for new forms of its governance. Second, under the influence of the globalization processes, the responsibility for ensuring food security extends over an increasingly large group of actors and requires coordinated actions taking an increasingly broad group of so-called stakeholders into consideration. Third, globalization processes stimulate the formulation and development of paradigms and strategies for food security, offering an ‘infrastructure’ and creating their intellectual foundation as in the case of the free-market model, as well as offering an ‘infrastructure’ and being the point of reference, in opposition to which alternative proposals are developed, such as food self-sufficiency and food sovereignty

The COVID-19 pandemic and the conflict in Ukraine have brought to the surface problems of the modern world that the international community has not seriously addressed. These problems appear to be, on the one hand, the management of global public health and, on the other, relations between states on international trade. These situations are linked to circumstances that have altered the power relations of states over the years, challenging the centrality of the West and the already fragile power of UN institutions. This research analyses the international situation of two UN bodies: the WHO and the WTO, addressing the governance crisis on public health and international trade and trying to understand the causes of the decline in the leadership of their institutions. Adopting a thorough literature review, the findings show how faulty leadership within the UN has led to a significant increase in nationalism among emerging nations, distrust and lack of cooperation. The divergent political visions of members have radically shaken the international balance, triggering a cycle of change in the governance of global health and global trade on a new premise, that of ‘multilevel’ global governance.