International cooperation: a means to achieving global security?

Nuclear Security Summit 2014: 24 - 25 March, The Netherlands (Source: DutchNews)

The world’s third Nuclear Security Summit was held in The Hague last month, in The Netherlands, bringing together 53 national leaders from around the world, along with representatives from four international organisations, namely the European Union, International Atomic Energy Agency, INTERPOL and United Nations.

After the U.S. President, Barack Obama, declared nuclear terrorism as one of the greatest threats to international security back in 2009, the vision of the Nuclear Security Summit's have been to ultimately combat this threat. Its key objectives include reducing the amount of dangerous nuclear material in the world, improving the security of all nuclear material and radioactive sources, and improving international cooperation.

The mere existence of the Nuclear Security Summit itself, which facilitates the interaction of state actors and international organisations, along with the final objective of the summit - to improve international cooperation - has evident neoliberal underpinnings.

Back in 1977, neoliberal institutionalists Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye, emphasized the increasing importance of non-state actors in the international system, demonstrated by the growing strength of cooperative international institutions, which were facilitating the potential for states to achieve mutual gains. 

Conversations with History: Robert O. Keohane critiques realism (10-14 minute period) 

(Source: YouTube)

Furthermore, neoliberal institutionalists critiqued neo-realists, by claiming that states are concerned with maximizing their absolute gains, as opposed to their relative gains. In this sense, if states find themselves in a position where cooperation will in fact benefit them, then this will be enough of a motivation to cooperate.

Keohane & Nye point out that through participating in international institutions, states are able to expand their notions of ‘self-interest’ to allow more scope for cooperation to occur. In the case of the Nuclear Security Summit, states have demonstrated a commitment to marginalizing their selfish and narrow security interests, in recognition that non-proliferation is in the best interest of the entire international realm, and that each state can cooperate to improve international security. In this sense, their conceptions of national security have broadened to capture a transnational 'security community'.

In doing so, decisions regarding security “have become internationalized, rendering national administration less important than transnational political cooperation”. Transnational regimes and institutional cooperation are seen as bringing higher levels of regulation, stability, predictability and trust to the anarchical international system, whereby the state is of less importance. For example, in co-binding collective security arrangements, such as NATO, there is a recognition that transnational agreements and institutions can provide states with greater protection, as opposed to the realist self-help mentality, whereby states are solely responsible for their own national security measures.

In relation to the Nuclear Security Summit, it is evident that Barack Obama, and many other world leaders, see the potential for cooperation between states in addressing the threat that nuclear terrorism poses to international security. It is important to emphasize that states are willing to cooperate due to the recognition of wider mutual benefits that can be achieved through cooperating. In the case of the Nuclear Security Summit, this ‘greater good’ is embodied in the notion of preventing nuclear terrorism worldwide.

U.S. President, Barack Obama, and the Dutch Prime Minister, Mark Rutte, at the Nuclear Security Summit 2014 in The Hague (Source: Freek Van Den Bergh/AFP/Getty Images)

As a direct result of the Nuclear Security Summit 2014, states such as Japan, Belgium and Italy, are prepared to reduce their nuclear stockpiles, providing sound evidence that international cooperation and international summits can have a strong impact on the actions and decisions of states. Furthermore, the BBC reported that “thirty-five out of 53 nations taking part in a summit on nuclear security have pledged to turn international guidelines into national laws”.

However one must question just how representative and widespread international summits, such as the Nuclear Security Summit really are. Although 53 countries were represented, the exclusion of nuclear powerhouses, Iran and South Korea, must be noted, along with the significant absences of small developing countries in this particular international conversation. This then brings about questions regarding whose interests are being served by summits like the NSS and more specifically, whether American hegemony underpins many of the issues that are brought to the agenda.

Furthermore, if we take the current global issue regarding Russia’s annexation of Crimea, which has led to G7 leaders threatening to permanently expel Russia from the G8, it is evident that cooperative ties can rapidly dismantle in the face of rising conflict. This leads us to believe that perhaps the international system is not quite as secure, stable or predictable as neoliberals like to claim it is.

While neoliberal institutionalism is by no means a sound worldview by which to understand the complexities of the international system, it does provide a useful lens through which we can analyse global issues, to deepen our understanding of the role, and impact, of cooperation and transnational institutions in the international system.

Whichever way we look at it, international security, even when limited to the threat posed by nuclear terrorism, is still far beyond our current reach.