OF DUCKS AND NATIONS AND DESTINIES: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS THEORIES AND THE CRITICISM OF THE UNITED STATES’ COLD WAR POLICIES IN CARL BARKS’ DONALD DUCK COMICS

Abstrakt

The main objective of this paper is to analyze classic Disney comic book stories by writer/artist Carl Barks and to determine how their author emphasized issues and theories related to international politics of the 20th century such as the Cold War, colonialism, dependency theory, etc. Because Barks’ works focused on developing countries and political and economic relations of societies and nations, certain parallels between US politics and comic plots can be found. In order to determine what issues were reflected and how they were was presented, plots of selected comics were analyzed through a set of questions about Donald Duck, his family and their role in the world where one can find communist countries, developing societies and dependencies between men, corporations, national identities and post-colonial states.