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This article explains why self-identified great powers seek to provide a ‘sphere of influence meaning’ to geographical space when such narratives have the potential to insult the smaller actors in the space over which such powers seek exclusive influence. The article draws and expands on the ‘physical turn’ in ontological security studies by introducing the notion of a ‘geographical here’ as key to a great power that perceives its status as threatened. The argument is illustrated through a comparative analysis of three US presidential administrations. The article analyses (i) how the US’ status is perceived and narrated, and (ii) what meaning officials assign to the ‘geographical here’. 

The 2025 United States’ National Security Strategy and the 2026 US intervention in Venezuela have increased the significance of questions regarding spheres of influence in world politics. Once banished to Cold War geopolitics, spheres of influence have re-emerged as a key concept in the study of contemporary international security politics. However, the concept remains somewhat analytically underdeveloped in the existing literature. To address this gap, this article examines the United States’ “sphere of influence practices” towards Latin America, with a particular focus on notable variations across presidential administrations in the first three decades of the Cold War. In so doing, it makes two principal contributions: first, it contributes to the literature on US-Latin American relations; second, it contributes to theoretical frameworks analysing spheres of influence in world politics. Drawing on declassified archival materials from the US Department of State and building on Van Jackson’s conceptualisation of spheres of influence as “hierarchical practices of exclusion and control”, the article develops a 2x2 analytical matrix applicable to the study of spheres of influence across different geographical contexts. It contributes to the literature by adding another dimension to the understanding of spheres of influence, detailing whether the practices of control and exclusion are coercive or non-coercive. 

This article investigates Australia’s relationship with the ‘Territory Papua New Guinea’ (TPNG) (today’s Papua New Guinea, PNG) to, in turn, shed light on why non-great powers seek to establish or maintain spheres of influence. Constellations where strong states wield exclusive control, or ‘predominant influence’, over external geographical space or smaller states, are frequently referred to as ‘spheres of influence’ (Bull 2002, 314; Kaufman 1976, 11; Keal 1983, 15; Resnick 2022, 566), which, despite its wide use in political discourse is an under-researched and ‘essentially contested concept’ in International Relations (IR) literature (Costa Buranelli 2018, 380). The phenomenon has competing conceptualisations, but this article defines spheres of influence as ‘hierarchical constellations characterised by practices of exclusion and control’ (Jackson 2020, 257). Despite suffering from under-theorisation (Etzioni 2015, 118; Hast 2014, 1; Jackson 2020, 255), it is quite well-established in the IR literature that great powers engage in sphere-of-influence practices and policies. Different traditions emphasise different things. In the constructivist tradition, for instance, ‘spheres of influence’ are considered a part of ‘great power identity’ (Murray 2019, 63–64; Recchia 2020, 515; Zala 2020). But upon closer scrutiny, this picture is somewhat incomplete. There are other states, not belonging to the category of ‘(self-identified) great powers’ which also articulate a desire to have some degree of exclusive control over adjacent external geographical space and pursue such policies.

Although there are disagreements regarding what type of country Australia is (Fern 2020), it has been identified as a ‘middle power’ by both scholars (Beeson 2011; Harijanto 2024; Widmaier 2019) and its own leaders (see Albanese 2024). Concomitantly, some of its leaders have also expressed views of its neighbouring region as Australia’s ‘patch’ (John Howard, quoted in McDougall 2019); an Australian sphere of influence (White 2019). There are two tensions one must keep in mind concerning Australia and spheres of influence. First, there is the one between the identification as a ‘middle power’ and the notion of spheres of influence. Second, there is the tension between Australia’s self-professed liberal principles and the notion of spheres of influence. These tensions have implications for two major IR schools of thought: constructivism and liberalism. Australia is a vocal advocate of the liberal (US-led) international order. Canberra frequently takes a stand in favour of a rules-based system and the self-determination of small states. However, as will be illustrated in a subsequent section, there is a parallel tendency in Australian foreign policy, as it simultaneously asserts that it has a special role in the region, the South Pacific, when it comes to maintaining order and its national interests.

Based on these insights, this article problematises the notion that a ‘sphere of influence’ primarily is an attribute for (self-identified) ‘great powers’. In problematising this ‘conventional wisdom’, the article sets out to address the following research problem: why do states which do not identify as great powers pursue spheres of influence in their geographical vicinity? To address this research problem the article investigates the case of Australia, seeking to answer the question: what explains Australian policy towards TPNG in the 1960s? By utilising digitalised archival material from Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (henceforth ‘DFAT’), this article explores Australia’s view on TPNG/PNG which gained its recognition as independent and de facto self-determination from Australia in 1975 (Denoon 2012, 4–5). The period covered is from 1966 to 1969, and I use thematic analysis to establish prevailing perceptions.

The large schools of thought in IR simplify spheres of influence to the extent that they risk giving inadequate accounts of the phenomenon. Instead, I argue that an ‘actor-centric foreign policy’ approach is a more beneficial way of analysing spheres of influence and states’ motivations for establishing them. Importantly, however, the article does not analyse foreign policy outcomes per se. Instead, it focuses on what Gideon Rose calls the ‘intervening variables’; a state government’s perception of its surroundings and the origin of these (1998, 157–161), which in turn inform the government’s foreign policy.

The article’s study unearths that several actors within the Australian government perceived the maintenance of Australian exclusiveness over PNG as central to the national defence. These findings lead the article to suggest that Australia’s experiences from the world wars contributed to specific perceptions of PNG that subsequently were applied to the context of the Cold War. However, the article also shows that within the same foreign policy establishment, there was a wide range of perceptions of the strategic environment, informing different policy preferences. From this, a wider theoretical suggestion is derived: states, regardless of their (self-perceived) ‘identity’, pursue spheres of influence depending on the prevailing perceptions of and meaning ascribed to their strategic environment as shaped by previous experiences. The main contribution, outside the purely empirical, is that the article problematises the utility of the structural IR schools of thought in understanding why and how states seek to establish spheres of influence. Instead, it suggests an actor-centric to understand and explain this phenomenon of states seeking to establish and/or maintain exclusivity over geographical space external to their territory.

While spheres of influence have regained prominence amid contemporary developments in world politics, the foreign policy dimension of the phenomenon remains underexplored. In order to generate new theoretical insights, this article addresses that gap by exploring how governments in different historical contexts perceived the benefits of their respective spheres of influence. Through a paired comparative analysis of the British government in the late 1940s and the US government in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the article examines how each perceived the value of its respective sphere of influence—in the Middle East and Latin America (specifically the case of Chile)—amid diverging material capabilities and geopolitical trajectories. Specifically, this article analyses these perceived benefits based on discussions within the US and UK governments of what were to be sacrificed if the great power accepted a loss of control over the sphere of influence. The article shows that government officials of the US and UK perceived their respective spheres of influence as instruments with both symbolic and functional benefits when practicing foreign policy. The perceived benefits were, however, contingent upon historical and geographical context. Perceived functional benefits concerned maintenance of balance of power, control of resources and strategic chokepoints, protection of communication lines, bargaining position, as well as ability to project power. Perceived symbolic benefits, meanwhile, concerned prestige, the status as a major power, as well as credibility vis-à-vis allies and adversaries.