Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Foreword -- Introduction -- Organisation of the book -- Part One Periods of Theorising Conflict in the Modern State System -- Introduction to Part One -- Chapter One Critical-Liberal, Marxist and Neo-Weberian Approaches -- Chapter Two Power Politics and (Neo-)Realism within the Field of International Relations -- Chapter Three Deficits and Desiderata for Future Research -- 1. Neorealism and power politics -- 2. Critical approaches -- 3. Preliminary summary -- Part Two A Global Political Economy Framework for Explaining Geopolitics -- Chapter Four Foundations for Analysing Capitalism -- 1. Analyses of the capitalist mode of production -- 1.1 Commodity production: Mutual dependence and competition -- 1.2 Commodity, money, capital: Exploitation and accumulation brought on by competition -- 2. Structural features of capitalism -- 2.1 Critical social forms -- 2.2 Four features of capitalism -- 2.2.1 Wage labour relations - the vertical axis of capitalist social conflicts -- 2.2.2 Relations of competition - the horizontal axis of capitalist social conflicts -- 2.2.3 Money relations -- 2.2.4 The individuation of the political and the plurality of individual states -- 2.2.4.1 Structural interdependence and 'the interest of states in themselves' -- 2.2.4.2 The plurality of individual states -- Chapter Five Capitalism as a Globally Fragmented System across Space and Time -- 1. Combined and uneven development, relations of space and time, and the 'international' -- 1.1 The need for a global analytical perspective -- 1.2 Combined and uneven development and the level of the international and the inter-societal -- 1.3 A spatial economy of contemporary capitalism -- 2. The dynamic of the global economic process of accumulation.

2.1 The inter- and trans-nationalisation of individual capitals, the world market/world economy, and the tendency towards crisis -- 3. The dynamic of the international state system -- 3.1 Multi-statehood as a structural characteristic of capitalism in space and time -- 3.2 International political institutions: The 'rights of the strong' and 'second-order condensations' -- 4. Considerations on various forms of competition -- 4.1 The dynamic of precapitalist imperialisms -- 4.2 Geopolitical and economic competition -- 4.3 Market competition, arms races and forms of geopolitical-military conflicts -- 4.3.1 The role of the arms economy and the 'military-industrial complex' -- Chapter Six Historical Phases of the World Order and the Periodisation of Socio-Economic and Geopolitical Power Relations -- 1. Structural features, phases and constellations -- 1.1 Excursus: On the relationship between structure and agency -- 2. Hegemonic and non-hegemonic phases of the world order -- 3. Phases of socio-economic development -- 3.1 The rhythms of accumulation in the global economy -- 3.1.1 Dominant and late-developing economies -- 3.2 The inter- and transnationalisation of trade, investments, and production -- 3.2.1 The internationalisation and macro-regionalisation of commodity trade and commodity sales -- 3.2.2 The inter- and transnationalisation of investments and production -- 3.2.3 On the inter- and transnationalisation of corporations -- 3.2.3.1 Interim conclusion -- 3.2.4 Transnationalisation of classes? -- 3.2.5 Using the EU as an example of macro-regional integration of power élites -- 3.2.5.1 'Internal bourgeoisies'? -- 3.3 Periodising money and currency relations -- 3.3.1 The contemporary, non-hegemonic currency system -- 4. Phases of statehood.

4.1 The politicisation of the economic, the economisation of the political:The ever-changing relations between the political and economic -- 4.1.1 Contemporary market-liberal statism -- 4.2 Phases of hard and soft geopolitics -- 4.2.1 Excursus: The economic effects of the geopolitical arms race during the Cold War -- 4.3 The structure of capitalist state competition and the Soviet Union -- 4.3.1 The pressures of capital accumulation in the Eastern bloc -- 4.3.2 Soviet geopolitics -- 4.3.3 The East-West conflict: Consequences for theory building, consequences for US politics -- Part Three Market-Liberal Statism: Contemporary Geopolitical Phenomena -- Introduction to Part Three -- Chapter Seven The Balance between Soft and Hard Geopolitics -- 1. 'Democratic wars' -- 2. Excursus: international law within fragmented capitalism -- Chapter Eight Geopolitical and Economic Competitive Relations -- 1. The aspirations and realities of US empire -- 2. The EU and the US: a conflict-laden partnership -- 3. China and the US: A new cold war? -- 3.1 State-permeated capitalist development -- 3.2 The integration of Chinese capitalism into a fragile world system -- 3.2.1 Currency disputes -- 3.3 China, international political institutions, and East Asian regionalisation -- Summary -- References -- Index.