Description
The intensification of great-power conflict has led to growing calls in the US and Europe for building, or strengthening, alliances and partnerships with “like-minded” countries so as to put themselves in a better position for the increasing geopolitical competition with authoritarian adversaries, notably China and Russia. In geo-economic terms, the notion of “friend-shoring” has been advanced to describe similar efforts at gradually replacing an inclusive global trade order and globally integrated supply chains with more strategically motivated trade and investment networks among “like-minded” partners.
While the idea of “like-mindedness” is thus gaining traction in international politics, it has been subject to scant academic reflection and conceptual analysis to date. What is actually meant when the concept of “like-mindedness” is invoked? Is it mostly used opportunistically to designate any ad hoc alignment of interests between countries in a given policy field, or does it reflect a shift to a more substantive commitment to common values? And how does the empirical use of the term relate to what IR theory has to contribute in this regard? This paper will examine these questions by systematically analyzing the use of “like-mindedness” in US and European foreign-policy debates over the last 5 years.
