International System and the Role of Actors and Non-State Actors – Peu Ghosh

INTRODUCTION

• The present international system consists of 192 states who are members of the United Nations and 6 non-member entities, namely Kosovo, Palestine, Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (Western Sahara), Turkish Cyprus, Taiwan, and the Vatican City.

• Along with the growth in the number of states, there has been a parallel increase of other kinds of actors besides states, who are also challenging the power and dominance of the state.

• Due to the increase in interdependence among all these actors, the international system has become more extensive and is no longer limited only to states and their activities.

• To understand the complexities and functioning of the international system, it is necessary to identify the major actors and their crucial roles in international politics.

• Consequently, there has been an increasing interest among scholars in assessing the changing patterns of the international system along with its component units.

THE INTERNATIONAL SYSTEM

• The present-day international system has a complex structure which is becoming increasingly more complex due to significant changes in the nature of its component units.

• Traditionally, states were considered the vital and primary actors, but there is now growing recognition of non-state actors as important agents in international relations.

• The international system now combines several kinds of actors with varying degrees of autonomy, where states retain a leading but not exclusive role.

• Some scholars define the international system as a complex set of states and other actors interacting with each other, and any system is shaped by the attributes of its units and the nature, pattern, and number of their interactions.

• Applied to the international system, the key determining factors are the number of state actors, the relative size of various actors, the number and types of non-state actors, the linkages or interactions among states, and the interdependence among system units.

• As pointed out by Frankel, the international system lacks two essentials of domestic political systems: the social basis of a community and the political structure of a government.

• There is no unconditional agreement on cooperation or on the priority of common good over individual or subgroup interests, and cooperation remains limited and conditional, often leading to anarchy.

• In the absence of a hierarchical government, there is no central authority to define jurisdictions or enforce norms and laws, resulting in only a loose structure and weak norms regulating state behaviour.

• Despite this, the international system is characterized by the presence of sovereign states and features such as anarchy, security dilemma, balance of power, hegemony, alliances, regional alignments, international regimes, collective security, conflict and conflict resolution.

• In the contemporary international system, there is a growing crisis of territorial states due to increasing challenges posed by non-state actors.

ACTORS IN INTERNATIONAL SYSTEM

• In the theatrical sense, actors mean the lead roles in a play or movie, and when this idea is applied to the international system, world politics becomes an arena of dramatic politics where roles are performed by several actors.

• These actors may be individuals, groups or organizations, and include both states (personified) and non-state actors.

• As stated by Frankel, by viewing international society as a system and its major components (states and non-state actors) as subsystems, the reality of world politics can be understood in a more sensible way.

• This reality is fundamentally about influencing and getting influenced, which can be understood by analysing the behavioural patterns of the actors.

• Dominant actors occupy an advantageous position and possess greater capabilities to influence and manipulate the behaviour of less powerful actors.

• Bargaining and leveraging are the core processes through which actors extend their influence over one another, although force continues to retain its importance even in the present time.

STATES AS ACTORS

• Despite arguments about the crisis of the territorial state in an era of global interdependence and the spread of nuclear and space technologies, the state remains the primary and dominant actor in the international system.

• Most scholars trace the birth of the state system to 1648 and the Treaty of Westphalia, though some argue that the seventeenth-century state was the result of processes developing over more than 500 years before this treaty.

• Historically, the period from about 1450 to 1650 marked the evolution of the territorial state system.

• The Treaty of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years’ War in Europe and enabled European rulers to free themselves from the authority of the Church and the Roman Empire.

• The central principle of the treaty was that “the ruler of the territory would determine the religion of that territory,” which broke the religious and political unity of Europe and dispersed authority among kings and princes, thereby laying the foundation of sovereign nation-states.

• From this period, the essential elements of statehood were defined as a people, a territory, and a government, with the government acting as an agent of the state, and the state recognized as a legal entity enjoying sovereignty.

• Over time, the state system has further evolved due to the increase in the number of states, growing interdependence (especially economic), technological development, rise of democratic institutions, growth of international law, international regimes, regional alliances, and advances in military warfare and weaponry.

• Nevertheless, states continue to be the dominant actors, and as noted by Palmer and Perkins, although the state-system may be in its “sunset period,” its basic design persists, marked by the coexistence of many states, the presence of pre-eminent military powers, universal adherence to sovereignty, and the continuous effort to develop national power to pursue national interests and policies.

Elements of Statehood

• According to L. Oppenheim, a British authority on international law, in his work International Law (1905), a state exists when “a people is settled in a country under its own sovereign government.”

• This definition highlights four distinct elements of statehood, namely a people, a territory, a government, and sovereignty, and a careful analysis of all four elements is necessary to understand the concept of the state.

The People:

• A commonly used definition of a state describes it as “any body of people occupying a definite territory and politically organized under one government.”

• The first vital requirement of statehood is population, as it is impossible to conceive of a state without people living together in an associated life, since the state is a form of social organization.

• The number of people in a state is important, but there is no fixed or exact population requirement, and most scholars emphasize the quality and character of the population rather than mere numbers.

• The quality of population is judged through factors such as age and sex distribution, birth rate trends, standards of living, health, literacy, productive capacity and skills, customs and beliefs, moral standards and morale, and national character.

Territory:

• The second vital element of statehood is territory, and there can be no state without a fixed and definite territory.

• Nomadic tribes wandering from place to place cannot be considered a state, as the modern state requires undisputed authority over a definite portion of the earth.

• There is no fixed limit to the size of territory, and states may range from very large (e.g., the Soviet Union) to very small (e.g., Tuvalu, Nauru, Vatican City, Monaco, Maldives, Malta).

• What is most important is not size but the geographical and strategic location of the state.

• For example, Great Britain, though a small and foggy Atlantic island, held global power for centuries due to its location.

• Similarly, the United States enjoyed a unique strategic position, which earlier enabled a policy of isolationism.

• The United States is also less vulnerable to land and naval attacks because it is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, allowing the powerful US Navy to intercept enemies in the mid-seas.

• Therefore, size does not really matter; what matters is the degree of vulnerability or security, which depends on geo-strategic calculations and political, economic, and military factors, especially in the nuclear and space age.

Government:

• The third important element of statehood is the government, which represents the political organization of the state, and through which the state wills and acts.

• The government is indispensable, as the sovereign will of the state is expressed through it, regardless of the form of government.

• Although the nature of government influences foreign policy orientation, there is no agreed model form of government, a problem debated from Aristotle to the present day.

• Consequently, the world contains democratic as well as authoritarian regimes, and what ultimately matters is whether a government is recognized by other states.

• Once recognized, the government becomes the legal representative of the country, as illustrated by the People’s Republic of China, which was founded in 1949, but recognized by the United States only in 1971, when it also obtained the permanent seat in the UN Security Council, replacing Nationalist China (Taiwan).

Sovereignty:

• The most important element of statehood is sovereignty, derived from the Latin “status” meaning the position or standing of the ruler, signifying the supremacy of the state in both internal and external affairs.

• As noted by Hedley Bull (The Anarchical Society, 1977), sovereignty consists of internal sovereignty (supremacy over all authorities within the territory and population) and external sovereignty (independence from outside authorities), implying supreme control over land, resources, and population, and freedom in external relations except for self-accepted restrictions.

• In international relations, sovereignty is accepted as a fact, and governments act as representatives of sovereign states, making sovereignty a special theoretical relationship between each state and all other states.

• Although all states are considered sovereign and equal, this equality is legal, not factual, as states differ greatly in size, power, and capabilities.

• States exist as major powers, middle powers, small and weak states, and the interplay of sovereignty becomes crucial because the pursuit of national interests requires adjustments, compromises, and accommodations, thereby limiting absolute sovereignty.

• International law and international regimes impose further restrictions, and as stated by Clyde Eagleton (1945), sovereignty cannot be absolute, nor should it be eliminated, since both extremes are unrealistic.

• States often voluntarily limit sovereignty through international agreements and membership in international institutions, making the principle of consent central to binding obligations.

• Participation in bodies like the United Nations or the Commonwealth of Nations does not eliminate sovereign status, and despite debates on limited sovereignty in a globalized world, sovereignty remains as long as the nation-state system exists.

• The UN Charter, Article II, affirms the principle of sovereign equality of all Members, which is legally valid but factually inaccurate due to inequalities in resources, economic development, and power.

• As observed by Palmer and Perkins, states are conventionally classified as great or major powers, middle powers, and small or lesser powers, with an additional category of weak states.

• Consequently, great powers possess greater leverage in bargaining and the ability to use rewards and punishments over small and weak states, leading to the importance of national power in international relations.