Abstract

Various changes have affected the international system since the end of the Cold War. One of them has been the diversification of the elements providing states or groups of states with structural power over the global order. Now, a greater diversification of sources of power does not necessarily imply that power in itself is less concentrated and more distributed today than it was before. This article proposes an empirical analysis of the evolution of structural power in the international system since the end of the bipolar order through a neoclassical realist lens, combined with Susan Strange's structural power analytical model. Its main arguments are that the "liberal bloc" formed by the G7 and the European Union countries still holds the most part of power in the contemporary international system, and that the rise of China provokes its relative decline but not the strengthening of the Global South.