Simply put, the most powerful state is the one that prevails in a dispute.

China, in short has the potential to be considerably more powerful than even the United States.

Offensive realism predicts that the United States will send its army across the Atlantic when there is a potential hegemon in Europe that the local great powers cannot contain by themselves.

The sad fact is that international politics has always been a ruthless and dangerous business, and it is likely to remain that way.

A state's potential power is based on the size of its population and the level of its wealth.

The liberal tradition has its roots in the Enlightenment, that period in the eighteenth-century Europe when intellectuals and political leaders had a powerful sense that reason could be employed to make the world a better place.

The most dangerous states in the international system are continental powers with large armies.