State Is the Most Important Actor in World Politics

Although global actors can sometimes have considerable power over states, the extent of this power ultimately depends on the relative power and influence of the state in question. Large developed states, such as the US, are extremely powerful compared to most other global actors and are not often influenced by their actions. However, small and undeveloped states are not always completely powerless. To determine whether states are indeed the most powerful global actors, we must look at the relative powers of trans-national corporations (TNCs), non-government organisations (NGOs) and some of the institutions of global governance.

Realists’ belief that, “war is unavoidable and natural part of world affairs.” According to Bova, there are over 200 sovereign states, and they all interest to gain power to defend themselves. As a result, state’s feeling of insecurity causes it to take any means to feel secure whether it is through the formation of ally with another powerful state or accumulation of military and economic power. Such action threatens other states provoke them take similar actions. This cycle applies to all states, and the feeling of threat and desire to survive is innate in humans In understanding International Relations, McNamara’s lesson is useful in the regards that actions that state takes to protect itself causes the complexity and conflicts of foreign policies that human beings are incapable of

Recently, and especially since the 1990s, a popular conception of the world is that the age of empires and superpowers is waning, rapidly being replaced by a kind of global community made up of interdependent states and deeply connected through economics and technology. In this view, the United States' role following the Cold War is one of almost benign preeminence, in which it seeks to spread liberal democracy through economic globalization, and, failing that, military intervention. Even then, however, this military intervention is framed as part of a globalizing process, rather than any kind of unilateral imperialist endeavor. However, examining the history of the United States since nearly its inception all the way up to today reveals that nothing could be farther from the truth. The United States is an empire in the truest sense of the word, expanding its control through military force with seemingly no end other than its own enrichment. The United States' misadventure in Iraq puts the lie to the notion that US economic and military action is geared towards any kind of global progression towards liberal democracy, and forces one to re-imagine the United States' role in contemporary global affairs by recognizing the way in which it has attempted to secure its own hegemony by crippling any potential threats.

At this point in time, the main actors in the international system are nation-states seeking an agenda of their own based on personal gain and national interest. Significantly, the most important actor is the United States, a liberal international economy, appointed its power after the interwar period becoming the dominant economy and in turn attained the position of hegemonic stability in the international system. The reason why the United States is dominating is imbedded in their intrinsic desire to continuously strive for their own national interest both political and economic. Further, there are other nature of actors that are not just nation-states, including non-states or transnational,

Three levels of analysis, each with its own distinct strength, reveals three different ways of understanding international relations. The first states that all nation-states behave similarly, the second emphasizes the unique internal factors of a nation-state, while the third level of analysis focuses on the individual deciding a state’s course of action. Each level of analysis is useful in the study of international relations. Indeed, used all together, it is not long before arriving at a point where a vast number of explanations for the actions of a country are brought to light. However, to best understand international relations, one level of analysis is more useful than the rest, because it provides the most comprehensive

The first view will be through the current predominant school of thought in international relations, realism. Although there are several different forms of realism the core ideas are that states are the central actors in international politics rather than individuals

Liberalism was previously a projection of how international relations ought to be; now, liberalism is a modern theory towards peace attained with a state’s ambition for dominance. “Self-interest” has two definitions in accordance to liberalism and realism. Liberalism considers the measure of power within states through stable economies, the possibility of peace and cooperation, as well as the concepts of political freedoms (human rights). Realism believes states are driven by competitive self-interest; international organizations hold little to no real influence because states are self-preserved. International relations is governed by states acting in their self-interest through liberalism; states act in their self-interest by cooperating with one another through international organizations, transnational advocacy networks, and non-governmental organizations. International organizations, normative values, and terrorism are all examples of how international relations is progressing into liberalism.

Realism is a theory which believes that sovereign states are the primary actors in the international system. It also believes that the international system has always been anarchic due to the nature of states not trusting each other and each state seeking to gain or maximize its own power capability. The Realist approach to the Cold War was also that of an “anarchical constitutive” and had seen the Cold War as something that was not out of the ordinary. The realists believed that states are always competing to maximize their own power, “the basic premise of its understanding is that the Cold War was not historically unique. the Cold War rather reflected in general terms the ongoing logic of inter-state conflict derived from the anarchical constitutive nature of the international system, and the ‘power maximization’ policies of states” R.Saull (2001:7).

Realism is a theory that depicts world politics as a ceaseless repetitive struggle for power. In other words, political realism seeks to explain international relations between states in terms of power. Realist “views that nation-state as the most important actor…because it answers to no higher authority;” in other words, it is an anarchic system (Kegley, 27). Some traits of realism are that states are sovereign, non-cooperation among states, and the exclusion if morality in policies.

There are two, key conflicting theories in the study of international relations, idealism and realism, known to scholars as the ‘Great Debate’. Realism, offers an account of international affairs through four central ideas; that states are the key players in international relations, the decentralised international stage is anarchic, actors are rational and self-interested

Since International Relations has been academically studied Realism has been the dominant theory of world politics. The theory’s inability to explain the end of the Cold War, however, brought strength and momentum to the Liberalism theory. Today Realism and Liberalism are the two major paradigms of International Relations. The aforementioned theories focus on the international system and the external factors that can lead to two phenomena - conflict and cooperation. Realism believes that as a result of anarchy and the security dilemma, conflict is inevitable. Liberalism argues that this conflict can be overcome through cooperative activities amongst states and international organizations. This paper will explore as well as compare and contrast the strengths and weaknesses of both theories. It will also debate which of the two theories is more valuable in the

After December 26 1991, when the Soviet Union fell, the bipolarity of the international system was effaced. In the post- Cold War era, the United States faced the problem, without a defined enemy, to adopt a new foreign policy. To begin to analyze the political foreign policy of the United States, one must first understand the international system. According to Political Realism, a theory of international thought, the state is the key unit within the acts within the system. These states act according to their key norms, which are allowed by the system. However, these sates are also affected the domestic and external factors which control how they act. The domestic factors include political culture, their economic system, the leadership

IGOs are voluntary associations of sovereign states established to pursue many objectives for which states want to cooperate through sort of formal structure and to which states are unable to realize by themselves (Miller, 1994). There are hundreds of IGOs in today's world which are significant in their respective fields. They are created by treaties and negotiations which mainly reflect preferences of stronger states. Especially stronger states create IGOs because they need them to protect their interests. By and large, decisions made by IGOs are the product of negotiations among the governmental representatives assigned to them. In general, it is not idealism, but the need of states which tend them to cooperate with other states in the context of IGOs. Therefore, they are part of the Westphalia state system in which IGOs are instruments of nation-states (Miller, 1994: 67). Regarding to the function and the purpose of IGOs, the influence of state as an actor in international relation still remains strong but in a different way, IGOs replace the original ideas of individual states but to identify states which have the same normative behavior and same ambitions to form a cooperate with each other so as to achieve the same goal. Even said so, powerful states are less constrained by the principle of IGOs than those who are relatively weak (Ataman, 2000: 152-167). This suggests that state is the key element in

Realism is one of the main theories within International Relations. It provides the view that all actors within the international system act on their own self-interests to gain power. This essay intends to discuss its usefulness as a theory and the reasons for and against it being used to analyse world affairs. Firstly, it shall discuss how the theory is advantageous as it explains how shifts in the balance of power can lead to conflict however it is unable to explain why the distribution of power changes. Second, it will portray how it is useful because states do not need to be labelled as good or bad to fit the theory although it disregards the idea of Natural law and gives a cynical view of human morality. Finally, it will suggest that as the theory is very parsimonious, it can be applied to multiple situations within the world system. On the other hand, it will be said that it fails to look at individuals within a state and their influence on the actions of the state. These costs and benefits will be conveyed through the current tensions between the USA and North Korea to link the theory in with current world politics.

This essay will describe the characteristics of the modern nation-state, explain how the United States fits the criteria of and functions as a modern nation-state, discuss the European Union as a transnational entity, analyze how nation-states and transnational entities engage on foreign policy to achieve their interests, and the consequences of this interaction for international politics.