Alliance Systems
In general, leagues of states were the most effective means of upholding treaties and the rules of interstate law. The first league of Zhou states was founded in 680 BC. Throughout the next several centuries, two alliance systems existed, that of the Zhou states in the north and the southern states which united under the banner of Chu. Qin was a consistent leader of a league in the west and in the latter half of the Spring and Autumn period, Wu headed a league of states in the southeast. Although when one league confronted another wars became larger in scope, they also occurred less frequently because members were obliged to maintain security and solidarity within their area.
Read more about this topic: Interstate Relations During The Spring And Autumn Period
Famous quotes containing the words alliance and/or systems:
“An alliance is like a chain. It is not made stronger by adding weak links to it. A great power like the United States gains no advantage and it loses prestige by offering, indeed peddling, its alliances to all and sundry. An alliance should be hard diplomatic currency, valuable and hard to get, and not inflationary paper from the mimeograph machine in the State Department.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“The skylines lit up at dead of night, the air- conditioning systems cooling empty hotels in the desert and artificial light in the middle of the day all have something both demented and admirable about them. The mindless luxury of a rich civilization, and yet of a civilization perhaps as scared to see the lights go out as was the hunter in his primitive night.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)