As is evident from the earlier discussion, one of the ways in which liberalism has contributed to our understanding of international relations is through various works on the nature of institutions and world order. Obviously, the themes of cooperation and complex interdependence are strongly sugges- tive of how liberals see the regulatory and facilitating role played by institutions in international relations. In more recent years, neo-liberal institutionalists have developed a fairly sophisticated analysis of the nature of world order and the crucial role played by institutions and various regimes in regulating relations between states, as well as other actors. In this section we will discuss liberal ideas that have emerged in this context in more depth. First, however, we need to consider briefly an earlier school of thought, which, while not strictly speaking ‘liberal’, anticipated many arguments about the nature of interdependence and the need for institutions which were later developed by liberal IR theorists.
Like many ideas in International Relations, functionalism has its origins in another branch of the social sciences – Sociology. However, as the idea ‘crossed the boundary’ so to speak, its meaning changed somewhat. Functionalists argued that interaction among states in various spheres created
their operations aimed at disrupting actual whaling operations in the North Atlantic and Southern Oceans. Other groups seek to promote new technologies to reduce the negative environmental impacts human activities can have. For example, Friends of the Earth supports the development of technologies to replace aerosols.
problems which required cooperation to resolve; the most obvious examples being areas like telecommunications and postal services. The positive benefits, and mutual confidence, which arose from cooperation in any one area would likely ‘spill over’, encouraging cooperation in other more significant areas such as trade. Functionalists argued that integration was necessary because states were unable to cope with the effects of modernisation. International institutions were thought to be increasingly necessary as a complement to states, whose individual capabilities to deal with problems generated by new technologies were decreasing. Also, functionalists believed that, as the level of cooperation and integration increased, it would be more and more difficult for states to withdraw from the commitments they had entered into, since their people would be aware of the benefits achieved by cooperation. Such functional interaction would, in turn, have effects on international society, enhancing peace and making war so disruptive and costly that it would no longer be con- sidered a ‘rational’ means for states to realise their aims and interests.
WORLD EXAMPLE BOX
The European Union
Ideas such as functionalism were clearly supported and encouraged by developments in the ‘real world’, such as European integration, which has today reached the stage of a European Union (EU). Indeed, the European Union provides an example of how functionalism can be seen as a prescription for how relations between states should be encouraged as well as an observation about perceived developments in the world of international politics and inter- national economics. The EU is sometimes held up as an example of functionalist theory in practice. The European Communities (the European Atomic Energy Agency, the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community) were seen to be an effec- tive way of achieving ongoing and extensive functional integration across a whole range of policy areas. Such integration would create a situation whereby national antagonism based on historical experience or competing interests, such as Franco-German border disputes, would no longer degenerate into outright conflict. War as a means to settle disputes would not only be disruptive and costly, but increasingly unfeasible since the economies of, in this case, France and Germany would be functionally integrated. From the earliest European agreements on tariff reductions and trade in certain areas, the European Community has developed through a combination of ‘spill-over’, functional integration and political will, to become a unified organisation – the European Union – with common rules and (almost) a common currency. Whereas war was once a regular feature of European international relations, few today expect EU member states to ever fight a war against each other again.
In the 1970s liberal pluralist perspectives began to contribute to our understanding of institutions and world order in international relations. It was clear that states were becoming more interdependent – more sensitive to, or even affected by, the actions of other ‘types’ of actor. In any given issue area in world politics the interaction of states and other actors was in need of, and in many cases subjected to, regulation according to a system of rules and practices (norms). This notion of interdependence continues to have resonance today. For example, many states and non-state actors have an input into the global debate over deforestation through conferences and other regular meetings. In liberal plu- ralist interdependence theory, politics is presented as a mutually beneficial process in which many actors seek to resolve problems in international relations. Furthermore, we are now living in a world where there are multiple linkages between, not just governments, but societies too. NGOs and élite groups are increasingly involved in forging links with like-minded individuals and groups in other countries, which bypass, or perhaps even subvert, state control. In addition, advances in technologies
have made the boundaries of states increasingly permeable. For example, the development of nuclear weapons had profound implications for the security of state boundaries; periodic international reces- sions demonstrate the growing interconnected nature of economic activity across the globe, while, in more recent years, the growth of satellite television and the internet have demonstrated forcibly how quickly ideas and cultural ‘artefacts’ can travel around the world.