Technological Cooperation and the Nation-State

Abstract

N K 1 O PROBLEM in the study of international politics has been more persistent or perplexing than the problem of international conflict, or its converse, international cooperation. Many studies in this century have suggested that the nation-state lies at the root of international conflict and that its weakening, circumvention, or transcendence is necessary to strengthen international cooperation. Early proponents of international organization, writing around the turn of the century, advocated the direct transfer of national authority to international institutions, codified in various international legal instruments such as the Conventions of the Hague Conference and the Covenant of the League of Nations (Claude 1971: chs. 2, 3). Functionalists subsequently foresaw the gradual circumvention of the nation-state through the growth of international tasks and organizations which dealt with practical rather than political issues (Mitrany 1966). Neofunctionalists identified an inexorable logic and mechanism (spillover) whereby functionally related activities would eventually alter national attitudes and institutions and create new supranational political authorities (Haas 1958). Most recently, transnational and interdependence theorists have emphasized the role of nonnation state actors and new international circumstances which constrain and limit the authority and options of national governments (Keohane and Nye 1972, 1977). All of these approaches share the view that the nation-state obstructs the growth and development of international cooperation. In an historical sense, this view is not difficult to understand. The nation-state originated in Europe in part as a reaction to centralized international authority. Its establishment, which many writers date from the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, constituted a rejection of the universalist pretentions of the Holy Roman Empire and created an international system whose primary purpose (as its name implies) was to defend the sovereignty and independence of separate states. Paradoxically, the purpose of international relationships became to minimize the significance of such relationships. Both conflict (i.e., balance of power) and cooperation served this end; and since the costs of conflict were tolerable and the benefits of