"balance of power" as an emergent phenomenon is entirely fake, protracted peace in multipolar world invariably coordinated agreement between individual men with shared goals, change my mind
You might be interested in these pieces Competitive Landscape https://medium.com/@samo.burja/empire-theory-part-1-competitive-landscape-b0b1b3bbce9e … Power Dynamics https://medium.com/@samo.burja/empire-theory-part-ii-power-dynamics-864b9eef4200 … They describe my current understanding of the expansion and contraction of such zones of coordination.