“Wars of influence” deciphers the strategies of States to achieve their ends

Delivered. The more the world becomes complex, the more the conflicts are illegible. From this equation, Frédéric Charillon, specialist in international relations, seizes on the theme of war to alert on the nuance between “soft power” and “influence”. If the first expression means “the ability to influence others in order to obtain desired results from them, by attraction and persuasion, rather than by coercion”the second is different.

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The influence, for Frédéric Charillon, “consists of an actor A having an actor B do what he would not have done otherwise, without resorting to coercion”. However, over time, the concept has thickened: influence now presupposes a process of production and above all of remuneration, unlike soft power. It is not opposed to power. And has nothing to do with propaganda or with the lobby. But it can also be threatening as a last resort, corruptible at any time and coexists with Hybrid Wars. According to this reading, the Ukrainian crisis would be the scene of an opposition between American soft power and a war of Russian influence.

Change of scale

Legitimizing the concept of influence in the light of the pivot of world geopolitics towards the Indo-Pacific, such is the ambition of Frédéric Charillon, who deciphers the new uses of States in terms of seduction, attraction and above all remuneration of targets to be influenced. Mission accomplished and convincing demonstration when you close this accessible book, full of examples and references. According to him, talking today about “influence wars” is essential, because the passage from the transatlantic to the Indo-Pacific induces a change of scale in the geopolitical debate. It consecrates, in fact, the advent of indirect strategies specific to Asia, at a time when the West was laboriously emerging from two decades of direct and frontal strategies.

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Thus, international relations would be, in the 21stand century, subject to three models of influence: the Western, democratic and liberal model, in full doubt however about its ability to seduce. The imperial and authoritarian model (Russia, Turkey, China), whose harmful diplomacies only aim to save regimes while destabilizing their prey. Finally, the denominational model based on beliefs (States of the Arabian Peninsula), handicapped by a sulphurous reputation.

This meeting of models would lead, according to the academic, to three types of strategies: the return to spheres of influence defended by authoritarian regimes adept at a multipolar world; the emergence of “joint ventures” between States, where the logic of partnership would prevail over that of alliances; finally, the rivalries between the States and the giants of the Net (Gafam), avatar of the tensions between the real world and the virtual world. In other words, a new form of battles of values ​​in a world still faithful to the logic of domination and predation.

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