National power

[1] Assessing the national power of political entities was already a matter of relevance during the classical antiquity, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and today.

[2][failed verification] Classics Shang Yang,[3] Guan Zhong[4] and Chanakya,[5] widely discussed the power of state.

[10] National power stems from various elements, also called instruments or attributes; these may be put into two groups based on their applicability and origin - "natural" and "social".

[13] The relation between foreign policy and geographic space gave rise to the discipline of geopolitics including the concepts of lebensraum and "grossraum".

The presence of large accessible seaboards also permitted these nations to build strong navies and expand their territories peacefully or by conquest.

Writing half-a-century after Organski, he noted that the Industrial Revolution is still not "galloping triumphant throughout the world" but remains bound to the temperate zone.

[16] It appeared that besides the mild temperature, a right amount of rain was necessary, as only humid temperate areas have been sources of great power.

In size, Russia is larger than the United States, but its temperate zone with optimum rainfall is smaller, as most of the territory is in latitudes well north.

Globally important states with dominant positions in all or almost all elements of national power are called superpowers.

His methodology is considered outdated, however, as he only takes into account "hard" power factors and indicators such as steel production no longer have the same significance as in the early 20th century.

Criticism: CINC suggests, “nonsensically,” that Israel is, and has always been, one of the weakest countries in the Middle East; Russia dominated Europe throughout the 1990s, with more power than Germany, France, and the United Kingdom combined; and China has dominated the world since 1996 and by 2018 twice exceeded the power of the United States.

It divides countries into the categories of economic, military and geopolitical power, which is derived from statistical indicators.

[24] In this way, the WPI contributes to the accurate comparison of the national capacities of States and the study of their position in the international structure.