States Role In The 20th Century

In the twentieth century it has been argued that on the international stage, states were the dominant actors. Donelan in the late 1970s writes that “‘State’ is central to sovereignty, war, intervention and the rest of the old list” which suggests that states were very important, fundamental even to international society. Some such as Lacher suggest that “globalisation… [is] deeply implicated in (though not solely responsible for) the undermining of the state’s previously sovereign place in humanity’s social and spatial organisation” which would suggest that states are no longer as important. However, no one can deny that states play a role in international society so they are definitely not unimportant but the question is whether they are …show more content…
Huntington’s argument that “clashes of civilizations are the greatest threat to world peace” is suggesting that major conflict now will not be state against state but civilization (like the West) against civilization. This is the idea that people are no longer identifying themselves with a nation state but with a larger group of people with like-minded beliefs. This can be seen with terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda which are not nation states but separate non-state actors waging war against states. Members of terrorist cells are not members of the same state but identify with something more broad such as religion. So, states struggle to define what the threat is and find it difficult to negotiate or deal with them. The current situation with the hostages and IS show this, states are struggling to find a solution to the hostage crisis because they do not know how to deal with IS and they also do not want to recognise them, thereby giving them some form of legitimacy. Therefore, states play a less pivotal role in conflict which is a major part of international society and so this could suggest that they are not as