NATIONAL SCHOOL OF POLITICAL SCIENCE AND PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

Department of International Relations and European Integration

Masters Degree Program: Security and Diplomacy

Theory of International Relations

- World Politics Professor Vasile Secre, Ph.D.

SNSPA
Bucharest, 2010

III. The Nation-State:

National Interest and National
Security

1. The main realist and neorealist assumptions on

how IR work:
a) The state-centric assumption: the nation-state is

the most important actor

b) The unitary rational-actor assumption: the
nation-state behavior is based on the rational
pursuit of self-interest (the national interest)
c) The anarchy assumption: no supra-national
authority; sovereignty and non intervention are
major boundary conditions; the nation-state has
the monopoly of the legitimate use of violence;
the offensive capacity of states and the security
dilemma

2. The role of the nation-state as the fundamental

political unit of current IR has been seriously
questioned
The impact of globalization: new challenges and new

actors
The right of peoples to self-determination and political
fragmentation; ethnic boundaries never coincide with
political ones
The replacement of westphalian sovereignty: the
sovereignty as responsibility and the right to intervention
The failed state: the threat of anarchy and human values
under threat
Military technology and terrorism

3. Still: IR are dominated by the nation-state and

its foreign policy
The foreign policy of the nation-state as a public policy:

the role of the government

What kind of public goods? Sovereignty and national
identity: protection, support and security
The foreign policy as a political process: the
government and the political pluralism; the need for
public support
The starting point of foreign policy: the national interest
The instruments and resources of foreign policy: power
and influence

4. The National Interest:

Definition: fundamental conditions for the independent

and sovereign existence of a community and its nationstate

Survival and independence; material and status
conditions; protection and support
The National Interest and power status: the imperial
dimension
The National Interest and the hegemonic structure of the
international system (the power ratio)
The National Interest and the membership in the EU and
NATO

5. The National Security as a critical dimension of

the sovereign independence of the nation-state
The anarchy assumption: the security dilemma as a

fundamental dimension
The state-centric approach versus human security
approach: how to operationalize the new perspective;
collective or individual security?
From the military definition of security to a multilevel/dimension approach: B. Buzan et al. (1998)
Sustainable security and cooperative security
What kind of threats to security: domestic and external
risks and threats; from military to systemic risks; diffuse
and opaque risks
Security and violence (the use of force): the lethal
dimension of foreign policy

6. The National Security: reality and

perception
Security and insecurity: vulnerabilities and risks;

capabilities and intentions = threats

Security and perception: cognitive structures, concepts and
images
Security and securitization: security issues are made
security issues by acts of securitization (Buzan et al.,
1998); the raison dtat factor: the starting point of a
special policy, with special rules and prescriptions
New security risks and challenges, transcending national
borders and capabilities: the preemptive approach and the
international dimension
Security and the RMA

7. National Security and the Euro-Atlantic

integration
The EU as a political entity and the autonomy of

the EU member states foreign policy: the semifailure of European political unification
The ineffectiveness of the EU decision-making
mechanism and the emergence of the EU-3
(Germany, France, Great Britain): in some cases
they play as national driven realists
The Euro-Atlantic frontier and the Euro-Atlantic
security and defence policy
The shifting of the US priorities