El Blog de Carlos

I have recently read two interesting pieces on International Relations that while touching very different issues they manage to stir a debate on the realism paradigm on International Relations.

Leslie H. Gelb in The National Interest advocates for realist, from the US Democrat and Republican party, to work together to work towards a new foreign policy post-Bush identifying the humanitarian intervention issue as a possible common ground. Anton Caragea defends an update of the Helsinki Accords of 1975 as a basis for stability in Europe after the independence of Kosovo and the recent conflict in the Caucasus. He emphasises the role of EU in bringing this new Accord as a way for the EU to remain relevant. In my view, Professor Caragea is advocating, mutandis mutandi, for a new realist approach to the problems of minorities and statehood. While the liberals (idealist) would defend the right of self-determination, Prof Caragea is putting the interest of the EU before this right in term of future stability and rightly so, in my opinion.

Where both coincide, in my view, is in the need of finding new approaches to International Relations that keep the basic assumption that States operates in an anarchic environment. In this sense, Gelb’s vindications of the humanitarian intervention or the calling for a new Helsinki by Prof Caragea are ways of reducing anarchy without using the force. Both are calling for a “soft power” for USA and the EU respectively, where the use of military power should be the very last resort.

I find those articles as a good example of realism with a touch of liberalism that are characterising lately the International Relations. After a period where efforts were put in showing that cooperation/globalisation would work, we are back to a view where defending national (or EU) interest is capital. But we cannot go back as far as the classic realist paradigm: Today the globalisation would not allow it. A high degree of cooperation is unavoidable. So, I am interested to see which new formulas are in the making where the best both worlds might be taken into account.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 3rd, 2008 at 1:34 pm and is filed under Pensamientos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.