International Security in the Global Era - Essay Example

The more popular of these theories, the realist and the neoliberal, however, have failed to provide a comprehensive understanding, or interpretive guideline, for state behaviour or, in fact, articulate a workable methodology for the enhancement of global security. Given the fact that both schools provide partial answers to the question at hand, one may argue that a more comprehensive understanding of the componential elements of global security is predicted upon the amalgamation of their arguments and interpretations.

Neoliberals/liberals and realists/neorealists are locked in a perennial debate over the manner in which states define global/national security and the motivators for state behaviour within the international context. As Jervis (1999) notes, the primary area of contention between realists and liberals pertains to the source of inter-state conflict and whether it is engendered by relative or absolute gains. Identifying the state as a sovereign actor and the most important unit within the global context, realists maintain that states act towards the fulfilment of absolute gains.

Within the parameters of the articulated understanding, realism assumes that conflict, rather than cooperation, is the distinguishing feature of inter-state relationships (Jervis, 1999).Concurring with Jervis' (1999) assessment of the neorealist/realist school's perception of the motivators for state behaviour, Wendt (1992) adds that the explicated perception is fundamentally predicated on the realist conceptualisation of both the international order as anarchic and of human nature as predatory.

The realist tradition quite simply maintains that within the absence of a supra-state global institution as would govern state behaviour, states act towards the fulfilment of their self-defined interests, often operating in a predatory fashion, because they can (Wendt, 1992). Accordingly, and as Wendt (1992) states, realists primarily define the global order as a "self-help" system (p. 392) insofar as state actors therein are largely free to fulfil, or at least attempt to fulfil, their ambitions, often to the detriment of other states.

The liberal/neoliberal tradition is, seemingly, sharply distinguished from the above insofar as it tends towards the assumption that global system is institutionalised and that state behaviour therein is not only governable but is naturally inclined towards cooperation. Both Jervis (1999) and Wendt (1992) highlight this particular neoliberal assumption and, to a degree, are supportive of it. Wendt (1992), for example, notes that the neoliberal school is fundamentally realist and rational insofar as it recognises the existence of anarchy, contrary to the neorealist assumption that neoliberals dispute this particular characteristic of the global order but, maintains that this does not function as an obstacle towards cooperation.

In fact, those realists who concede to the anarchic nature of the global order contend that this functions as a motivator for cooperation and the creation of global institutions, insofar as rationality dictates that the former and the latter combine to enhance