Carla Norrlof
Biographic Data
| ID | 4096497 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Carla Norrlof |
| GIVEN NAMES | Carla |
| FAMILY NAME | Norrlof |
| SIGNATURE | NORRLÖF C |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Toronto |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-8598-7689 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 17 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 71 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 17 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1999 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Unipolarity, Grand Strategy, and the Economics Security Trade-Off
A decade after Nuno Monteiro’s Theory of Unipolar Politics (TUP) appeared, major developments, from renewed great power rivalry to Russia’s war in Ukraine to the unraveling of the open international economic system, seem to contradict the book’s arguments. A taproot of this disjuncture is TUP’s implicit assumptions about the interaction between economics and security. We show that relaxing those assumptions exposes a complex set of interactions b…
The Ibn Khaldûn Trap and Great Power Competition with China
The return of great power rivalry has been the defining feature of the 21st century. Since the beginning of the new millennium, China and Russia have openly defied the United States and upset the s
Global Monetary Order and the Liberal Order Debate
The recent “liberal international order” (LIO) debate has been vague about the institutions and issue areas that constitute the order. This is likely driven by competing views of “liberal” and, perhaps more importantly, by security scholars dominating the debate. From the perspective of scholars who explore the elements of the global monetary order (reserve currencies, international financial institutions, and central banks), the picture is diffe…
Is covid-19 a liberal democratic curse? Risks for liberal international order
Covid-19 is the latest blow to the ailing liberal international order, which has faced a series of challenges in the postwar era. This article traces the global spread of the virus scaled to population and case fatality rates of different countries. Using inferential statistics, I find that liberal democracies have higher case fatality rates than other regime types and offer some plausible explanations for why. Systemically, I show how the spread…
Why not default? The political economy of sovereign debt
Debt involves an obligation to repay the creditor, principal plus interest. But how does one oblige a sovereign state to honour its debt obligations? While creditors can bring defaulting private borrowers before a court and lay claim to their income and assets in order to compensate for default losses, sovereigns are not so easily summoned. In the absence of a supranational authority to enforce repayment of sovereign debt, and without legal means…
Is Covid-19 the end of US hegemony? Public bads, leadership failures and monetary hegemony
COVID-19 is the most invasive global crisis in the postwar era, jeopardizing all dimensions of human activity. By theorizing COVID-19 as a public bad, I shed light on one of the great debates of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries regarding the relationship between the United States and liberal international order (LIO). Conceptualizing the pandemic as a public bad, I analyze its consequences for US hegemony. Unlike other international publi…
Raison de l’Hégémonie (The Hegemon’s Interest): Theory of the Costs and Benefits of Hegemony
When and under what conditions does hegemony pay? The fate of any hegemonic order hinges on the answer to this question. Notwithstanding major relevant research traditions, international relations scholarship remains poorly equipped to answer it. We fill this gap with a theoretical framework for understanding the costs and benefits of hegemony that identifies the conditions that affect potential complementarity between military protection and eco…
Hegemony and inequality: Trump and the liberal playbook
Journal Article Hegemony and inequality: Trump and the liberal playbook Get access Carla Norrlof Carla Norrlof Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 94, Issue 1, January 2018, Pages 63–88, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iix262 Published: 01 January 2018 Article history Accepted: 13 November 2017 Published: 01 January 2018
Hegemony, Hierarchy, and Unipolarity: Theoretical and Empirical Foundations of Hegemonic Order Studies
Scholars of international political economy in the 1970s explored the relationship among a dominant power, leadership, and openness. The discussion soon centered on the concept of hegemony, meaning a situation in which a single state exercises leadership in creating and maintaining the fundamental rules of the international system. The scholarly arguments that ensued focused on the rationale for, and durability of, hegemony, and seemed relevant b…
The international political economy of money, macro-money theories and methods
The 2008 financial crisis exposed the fragility of advanced economies to financial caprice and the centrality of the United States in the global monetary order. Understanding the power structures behind global monetary orders, their distributional effects, as well as the systemic consequences associated with practices within domestic financial systems, particularly within financial centres, remains a priority. In a recent commentary, Cohen argues…
Is US grand strategy self-defeating? Deep engagement, military spending and sovereign debt
Questions regarding the economic consequences of US grand strategy have gained new salience. This article provides an empirical test of the relationship between US military expenditures and public debt and clarifies the real constraints the US faces issuing debt. Neither results from the statistical analysis nor the economic theory of sovereign debt support the retrenchment position regarding the impact of military spending on public debt (1973–2…
American and Chinese leadership during the global financial crisis: Testing Kindleberger’s stabilization functions
Heavily reliant on the work of Charles P Kindleberger, theories of hegemony and power transition have been built on the largely unchallenged assumption that the United States acts as a global economic stabilizer in time of crisis. However, there has been no attempt systematically to delineate, operationalize and test whether the United States performs this role utilizing Kindleberger’s five functions. Proponents of these theories have, in contras…
Dollar hegemony: A power analysis
The dollar has been the world's first currency since the end of World War II, possibly since the inter-war period, and is the leading currency today. A growing chorus of observers believes this dollar-centered order is coming to an end. While much commentary revolves around changes in the distribution of power, measures are only loosely related to the material basis for currency dominance. A proper understanding of the dollar's global role requir…
America's Global Advantage: US Hegemony and International Cooperation
For over sixty years the United States has been the largest economy and most powerful country in the world. However, there is growing speculation that this era of hegemony is under threat as it faces huge trade deficits, a weaker currency, and stretched military resources. America's Global Advantage argues that, despite these difficulties, the US will maintain its privileged position. In this original and important contribution to a central subje…
Key Currency Competition: The Euro versus the Dollar
In this article, I investigate whether the euro is set to eclipse the dollar as the world currency. Although the euro has gained in importance at the expense of the dollar in all key currency functions, I argue that it is not about to replace the dollar as the unique currency of global importance. Notwithstanding America’s current weakness, I argue that different preferences for monetary and fiscal policy inside the euro-zone, and the need to coo…
Strategic Debt
Accumulating debt is usually harmful for states, but a cyclical deficit policy and large-scale borrowing have been beneficial for the United States. While structural changes in the international political economy may cap America's future ability to process debt, an empirical analysis of the economic dimensions of hegemony over the last quarter century shows unambiguously that the hegemon reaps disproportionate gains in the area of trade and inves…
The New Political Economy of Trading and its Institutional Consequences
This article offers a theory that can explain a relatively open international trade system as corresponding to a non-cooperative (in the game-theoretical sense) outcome of bargaining interactions between states. Such a non-cooperative outcome, as will be shown, can be expressed as a subgame perfect Nash equilibrium between several states or trading blocs. This type of Nash equilibrium does not lead countries to complete “free” trade, but to an ou…
Dollar hegemony: A power analysis
The dollar has been the world's first currency since the end of World War II, possibly since the inter-war period, and is the leading currency today. A growing chorus of observers believes this dollar-centered order is coming to an end. While much commentary revolves around changes in the distribution of power, measures are only loosely related to the material basis for currency dominance. A proper understanding of the dollar's global role requir…
Global Monetary Order and the Liberal Order Debate
The recent “liberal international order” (LIO) debate has been vague about the institutions and issue areas that constitute the order. This is likely driven by competing views of “liberal” and, perhaps more importantly, by security scholars dominating the debate. From the perspective of scholars who explore the elements of the global monetary order (reserve currencies, international financial institutions, and central banks), the picture is diffe…
Hegemony and inequality: Trump and the liberal playbook
Journal Article Hegemony and inequality: Trump and the liberal playbook Get access Carla Norrlof Carla Norrlof Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 94, Issue 1, January 2018, Pages 63–88, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iix262 Published: 01 January 2018 Article history Accepted: 13 November 2017 Published: 01 January 2018
Is US grand strategy self-defeating? Deep engagement, military spending and sovereign debt
Questions regarding the economic consequences of US grand strategy have gained new salience. This article provides an empirical test of the relationship between US military expenditures and public debt and clarifies the real constraints the US faces issuing debt. Neither results from the statistical analysis nor the economic theory of sovereign debt support the retrenchment position regarding the impact of military spending on public debt (1973–2…
Strategic Debt
Accumulating debt is usually harmful for states, but a cyclical deficit policy and large-scale borrowing have been beneficial for the United States. While structural changes in the international political economy may cap America's future ability to process debt, an empirical analysis of the economic dimensions of hegemony over the last quarter century shows unambiguously that the hegemon reaps disproportionate gains in the area of trade and inves…
The Ibn Khaldûn Trap and Great Power Competition with China
The return of great power rivalry has been the defining feature of the 21st century. Since the beginning of the new millennium, China and Russia have openly defied the United States and upset the s
The international political economy of money, macro-money theories and methods
The 2008 financial crisis exposed the fragility of advanced economies to financial caprice and the centrality of the United States in the global monetary order. Understanding the power structures behind global monetary orders, their distributional effects, as well as the systemic consequences associated with practices within domestic financial systems, particularly within financial centres, remains a priority. In a recent commentary, Cohen argues…
Is covid-19 a liberal democratic curse? Risks for liberal international order
Covid-19 is the latest blow to the ailing liberal international order, which has faced a series of challenges in the postwar era. This article traces the global spread of the virus scaled to population and case fatality rates of different countries. Using inferential statistics, I find that liberal democracies have higher case fatality rates than other regime types and offer some plausible explanations for why. Systemically, I show how the spread…
Raison de l’Hégémonie (The Hegemon’s Interest): Theory of the Costs and Benefits of Hegemony
When and under what conditions does hegemony pay? The fate of any hegemonic order hinges on the answer to this question. Notwithstanding major relevant research traditions, international relations scholarship remains poorly equipped to answer it. We fill this gap with a theoretical framework for understanding the costs and benefits of hegemony that identifies the conditions that affect potential complementarity between military protection and eco…
Is Covid-19 the end of US hegemony? Public bads, leadership failures and monetary hegemony
COVID-19 is the most invasive global crisis in the postwar era, jeopardizing all dimensions of human activity. By theorizing COVID-19 as a public bad, I shed light on one of the great debates of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries regarding the relationship between the United States and liberal international order (LIO). Conceptualizing the pandemic as a public bad, I analyze its consequences for US hegemony. Unlike other international publi…
American and Chinese leadership during the global financial crisis: Testing Kindleberger’s stabilization functions
Heavily reliant on the work of Charles P Kindleberger, theories of hegemony and power transition have been built on the largely unchallenged assumption that the United States acts as a global economic stabilizer in time of crisis. However, there has been no attempt systematically to delineate, operationalize and test whether the United States performs this role utilizing Kindleberger’s five functions. Proponents of these theories have, in contras…
Key Currency Competition: The Euro versus the Dollar
In this article, I investigate whether the euro is set to eclipse the dollar as the world currency. Although the euro has gained in importance at the expense of the dollar in all key currency functions, I argue that it is not about to replace the dollar as the unique currency of global importance. Notwithstanding America’s current weakness, I argue that different preferences for monetary and fiscal policy inside the euro-zone, and the need to coo…
The New Political Economy of Trading and its Institutional Consequences
This article offers a theory that can explain a relatively open international trade system as corresponding to a non-cooperative (in the game-theoretical sense) outcome of bargaining interactions between states. Such a non-cooperative outcome, as will be shown, can be expressed as a subgame perfect Nash equilibrium between several states or trading blocs. This type of Nash equilibrium does not lead countries to complete “free” trade, but to an ou…
The New Political Economy of Trading and its Institutional Consequences
This article offers a theory that can explain a relatively open international trade system as corresponding to a non-cooperative (in the game-theoretical sense) outcome of bargaining interactions between states. Such a non-cooperative outcome, as will be shown, can be expressed as a subgame perfect Nash equilibrium between several states or trading blocs. This type of Nash equilibrium does not lead countries to complete “free” trade, but to an ou…
Strategic Debt
Accumulating debt is usually harmful for states, but a cyclical deficit policy and large-scale borrowing have been beneficial for the United States. While structural changes in the international political economy may cap America's future ability to process debt, an empirical analysis of the economic dimensions of hegemony over the last quarter century shows unambiguously that the hegemon reaps disproportionate gains in the area of trade and inves…
Key Currency Competition: The Euro versus the Dollar
In this article, I investigate whether the euro is set to eclipse the dollar as the world currency. Although the euro has gained in importance at the expense of the dollar in all key currency functions, I argue that it is not about to replace the dollar as the unique currency of global importance. Notwithstanding America’s current weakness, I argue that different preferences for monetary and fiscal policy inside the euro-zone, and the need to coo…
America's Global Advantage: US Hegemony and International Cooperation
For over sixty years the United States has been the largest economy and most powerful country in the world. However, there is growing speculation that this era of hegemony is under threat as it faces huge trade deficits, a weaker currency, and stretched military resources. America's Global Advantage argues that, despite these difficulties, the US will maintain its privileged position. In this original and important contribution to a central subje…
Dollar hegemony: A power analysis
The dollar has been the world's first currency since the end of World War II, possibly since the inter-war period, and is the leading currency today. A growing chorus of observers believes this dollar-centered order is coming to an end. While much commentary revolves around changes in the distribution of power, measures are only loosely related to the material basis for currency dominance. A proper understanding of the dollar's global role requir…
American and Chinese leadership during the global financial crisis: Testing Kindleberger’s stabilization functions
Heavily reliant on the work of Charles P Kindleberger, theories of hegemony and power transition have been built on the largely unchallenged assumption that the United States acts as a global economic stabilizer in time of crisis. However, there has been no attempt systematically to delineate, operationalize and test whether the United States performs this role utilizing Kindleberger’s five functions. Proponents of these theories have, in contras…
Is US grand strategy self-defeating? Deep engagement, military spending and sovereign debt
Questions regarding the economic consequences of US grand strategy have gained new salience. This article provides an empirical test of the relationship between US military expenditures and public debt and clarifies the real constraints the US faces issuing debt. Neither results from the statistical analysis nor the economic theory of sovereign debt support the retrenchment position regarding the impact of military spending on public debt (1973–2…
Hegemony, Hierarchy, and Unipolarity: Theoretical and Empirical Foundations of Hegemonic Order Studies
Scholars of international political economy in the 1970s explored the relationship among a dominant power, leadership, and openness. The discussion soon centered on the concept of hegemony, meaning a situation in which a single state exercises leadership in creating and maintaining the fundamental rules of the international system. The scholarly arguments that ensued focused on the rationale for, and durability of, hegemony, and seemed relevant b…
The international political economy of money, macro-money theories and methods
The 2008 financial crisis exposed the fragility of advanced economies to financial caprice and the centrality of the United States in the global monetary order. Understanding the power structures behind global monetary orders, their distributional effects, as well as the systemic consequences associated with practices within domestic financial systems, particularly within financial centres, remains a priority. In a recent commentary, Cohen argues…
Hegemony and inequality: Trump and the liberal playbook
Journal Article Hegemony and inequality: Trump and the liberal playbook Get access Carla Norrlof Carla Norrlof Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 94, Issue 1, January 2018, Pages 63–88, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iix262 Published: 01 January 2018 Article history Accepted: 13 November 2017 Published: 01 January 2018
Raison de l’Hégémonie (The Hegemon’s Interest): Theory of the Costs and Benefits of Hegemony
When and under what conditions does hegemony pay? The fate of any hegemonic order hinges on the answer to this question. Notwithstanding major relevant research traditions, international relations scholarship remains poorly equipped to answer it. We fill this gap with a theoretical framework for understanding the costs and benefits of hegemony that identifies the conditions that affect potential complementarity between military protection and eco…
Global Monetary Order and the Liberal Order Debate
The recent “liberal international order” (LIO) debate has been vague about the institutions and issue areas that constitute the order. This is likely driven by competing views of “liberal” and, perhaps more importantly, by security scholars dominating the debate. From the perspective of scholars who explore the elements of the global monetary order (reserve currencies, international financial institutions, and central banks), the picture is diffe…
Is covid-19 a liberal democratic curse? Risks for liberal international order
Covid-19 is the latest blow to the ailing liberal international order, which has faced a series of challenges in the postwar era. This article traces the global spread of the virus scaled to population and case fatality rates of different countries. Using inferential statistics, I find that liberal democracies have higher case fatality rates than other regime types and offer some plausible explanations for why. Systemically, I show how the spread…
Why not default? The political economy of sovereign debt
Debt involves an obligation to repay the creditor, principal plus interest. But how does one oblige a sovereign state to honour its debt obligations? While creditors can bring defaulting private borrowers before a court and lay claim to their income and assets in order to compensate for default losses, sovereigns are not so easily summoned. In the absence of a supranational authority to enforce repayment of sovereign debt, and without legal means…
Is Covid-19 the end of US hegemony? Public bads, leadership failures and monetary hegemony
COVID-19 is the most invasive global crisis in the postwar era, jeopardizing all dimensions of human activity. By theorizing COVID-19 as a public bad, I shed light on one of the great debates of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries regarding the relationship between the United States and liberal international order (LIO). Conceptualizing the pandemic as a public bad, I analyze its consequences for US hegemony. Unlike other international publi…
The Ibn Khaldûn Trap and Great Power Competition with China
The return of great power rivalry has been the defining feature of the 21st century. Since the beginning of the new millennium, China and Russia have openly defied the United States and upset the s
Unipolarity, Grand Strategy, and the Economics Security Trade-Off
A decade after Nuno Monteiro’s Theory of Unipolar Politics (TUP) appeared, major developments, from renewed great power rivalry to Russia’s war in Ukraine to the unraveling of the open international economic system, seem to contradict the book’s arguments. A taproot of this disjuncture is TUP’s implicit assumptions about the interaction between economics and security. We show that relaxing those assumptions exposes a complex set of interactions b…
Economics (16 works) · Political science (15 works) · Law (12 works) · Politics (12 works) · Global Financial Crisis and Policies (9 works) · Hegemony (8 works) · Law (8 works) · Political economy (7 works) · Finance (5 works) · Currency (4 works)