Key insights from
The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order
Audio available
10 minute read
Published Aug 2, 2011
What you'll learn
Not since the 1940s had a Foreign Policy piece elicited such strong reactions as Samuel Huntington’s piece titled “The Clash of Civilizations?” So furious was the pushback and frequent the misinterpretations of his thesis that Huntington turned his essay into a lengthy treatise, arguing that the strongest alliances and divides between peoples will not be between social classes, the rich and poor, or political ideologies, but between civilizations. Even decades after its publication, it is every bit as controversial and illuminating, and still considered one of the most significant essays on geopolitics.
Key insights
- • What you'll learn
- 1 The sad truth of geopolitics is that you can’t have true friends without true enemies.
- 2 Competing views of international relations all suffer from significant defects.
- 3 The civilization view of geopolitical relations has many of the strengths of competing theories, without their weaknesses.
- 4 The West must hold its values as unique rather than universal if it hopes to minimize clashes with other civilizations.
- 5 Each civilization has a core country that orients other countries in its cultural sphere of influence.
- 6 China’s skyrocketing economy and confidence will disrupt global status quos.
- 7 Islam and the West have a long, bloody history—and the resurgence of religious identity makes it likely this will continue.
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