The idea of competition in international political theory: some current aspects of the discussion

Introduction. The article presents an attempt to identify the origins as well as the immediate causes of the diversity of interpretations of the concept of “competition” in modern political theory through a comparative analysis of the results of discussions of foreign scientists adhering to utterly diversified methodological, philosophical, and ideological positions. Methods and materials . The analysis of these discussions is carried out from an interdisciplinary perspective, combining the methodologies of modern political theory, political economy, political ethics and psychology, the methodology of history, the theory of international relations, and other scientific areas. More than 60 works by prominent foreign experts, published mostly in the last decade, were used as source materials for the study. Many of them are openly polemical and controversial. Analysis. A noteworthy moment in theoretical debates at the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries is the desire of many specialists to distance themselves from traditional neoliberal rhetoric and explore the latest trends and modifications of competition at the levels of world and national politics from fundamentally new methodological positions. The ideas of creating alternative theoretical models that ensure harmony between competition and cooperation and thereby help overcome almost half a century of dominance of the neoliberal world order paradigm have a wide resonance. Their immediate consequence is the emergence of new conceptual interpretations that characterize the specific features of the formation of the idea of the new international order, with corresponding changes in the field of political terminology.