Tordesillas-Zaragoza period as the first geopolitical epoch

The purpose of this article is to analyze the genesis, evolution and crisis of the Tordesillass-Zaragoza period in the world political process as a separate geopolitical epoch. The methodological basis of the study is a geopolitical approach, conflict theory and hierarchical approach. The author identifies three phases of the Tordesillass-Zaragoza epoch: genesis, imperial overheating, crisis. The article focuses on the fact that at the end of the 15th century– the first half of the 17th century, dramatic changes occur in the world political system: the totality of regional political systems is transformed into a global system; the foundations of the first colonial empires– Portuguese and Spanish– arise and are laid; the first global thalassocracies arise in the person of Portugal and Spain. Simultaneously, a regulatory framework is drawn up that establishes the monopoly of these states on territorial expansion, and the first global superpower is formed in the person of the Spanish kingdom. The article concludes that the Treaties of Tordesillas and Zaragoza determined the political division of the world over the following centuries, creating an important legal precedent: subsequently, other states began to conclude similar agreements on the division of spheres of influence. Thus, it was in the Tordesillass-Zaragoza geopolitical epoch that the foundations of globalization were laid and a monopoly of Western European states on territorial expansion around the world was established. As a result, the first geopolitical era should not be considered the Westphalian, but the Tordesillass-Zaragoza epoch.