Cover -- Half Title -- Dedication -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- List of Tables and Appendices -- Abstract -- Acknowledgements -- INTRODUCTION -- An Analysis of the United States' Global Strategy in the Emerging World Order -- PART I: THEORY AND METHODOLOGY -- 1 A Conceptual Framework and Principles of Inquiry -- Problems for Inquiry: The Limits of 'Theory' -- Mode of Analysis -- Theory and Practice -- Conclusion -- 2 An Inquiry into Power -- The Four Spheres of Power -- The 'Realist' Tradition -- Realism: First Image -- Realism: Second Image -- 'Liberalism' and Power -- 'Marxism' and Power -- Other Definitions of Power and Conflicting Interests -- 3 An Inquiry into Hegemony -- Introduction -- Definitions and Theories of Hegemony -- (Neo)-Gramscian Hegemony -- The Long-Cycle Approach to World Power -- Hegemonic Stability Theory -- The 'Final Word' on Hegemony? -- PART II: THE DEBATE AND THE CHALLENGE -- 4 The 'Design' of the International System and 'the U.S. Hegemony' After the Collapse of the Bretton Woods' Fixed Exchange Rate System -- Introduction -- Section I: The U.S. as 'Chief Architect' of the International Political and Economic System -- Section II: The Declinist-Renewal Debate -- Geopolitical Decline -- Economic Decline -- Section III: The 'Realists' Rejection of the Declinist School -- The 'Liberals' Rejection of the Declinist School -- The Neo-Gramscian/Marxist Rejection of the Declinist School -- Section IV: The End of the Cold War and the Emergence of 'Global Hegemony' -- Conclusion -- 5 Balance of Power or Hegemony? -- Introduction -- The Balance of Power Strategy and the Return to Multipolarity -- Eight Arguments for the Balance of Power -- Responses to the Balance of Power Strategy -- The Liberal Response to Balance of Power, and Their Idea of 'Liberal Hegemony' -- Marxist Critique of Balance of Power and Liberal Hegemony