Military and political cooperation in the institutional concepts of the theory of international relations

Abstract

Military-political cooperation in the institutional concepts of the theory of international relations is considered. The retrospective analysis of the existing concepts of representatives of the main scientific schools and directions in the theory of international relations, primarily supporters of «institutionalism» and political realism regarding the basic principles and mechanisms of military-political cooperation have been done. Comparative analysis of the main scientific schools and approaches in the paradigm of globalization has been accomplished. Possibilities and prospects for changes in views on the principles of military-political cooperation in the international arena are outlined. Principled positions on the issue of deepening and improving the mechanisms of military-political cooperation are formulated. It was found out, that the central problem of the military- political union is the reliability of guarantees that the allied states will come to the rescue and act together. In weakly institutionalized unions, their members cannot trust others because states retain virtually unlimited freedom of action in foreign policy. Therefor their members need guarantees and confidence that the allied states will come to the rescue at the appropriate moment, acting in solidarity to achieve such a goal. In the opposite case, the union will be unable to act as an effective means of uniting the military potential of the member countries, and will remain an empty paper document. Solving the problem of the effectiveness of the union is possible only by building a system of mutual obligations. It was determined, that an essential point for clarifying the criteria for the internal viability of military-political alliances is the ability of the leaders of the member-states to fulfil the alliance obligations to act in spite of strong internal opposition to the country’s foreign policy course or its change. It was concluded that military-political alliances can act as providers of international security and stability not only for their members, but also for the international community as a whole. It was found out, that confidence-building measures proved to be quite effective tools to prevent war. In the absence of trust, it is impossible to build a stable and safe world, and the best embodiment of trust in practice is a military-political union in which the mutual trust of the member-states reaches the highest possible level. If such an alliance is capable of acting as a stabilizer of the system of international relations, deterring its members and other states from aggressive actions and depriving them of reasons to count on victory «at a small price», then its activity strengthens the security of all countries without exception.