At this stage, it will be useful to briefly outline the neoliberal ideas. Liberal institutionalists (another name for neoliberal thinkers) believe that states can seek security through construction of international agreements, regimes and structures such as arms control agreements (like START I and START II)
and multilateral economic institutions like the WTO. States can engage each other through these structures, learning norms of peaceful cooperation and developing a common interest in the status quo. Liberalism is most closely associated with the work of Immanuel Kant who argued that peace is achieved through international institutions andthe spread of democracy.
Realists considered states as the main players in international politics and their relations as the substance of international affairs. However, the Cold War between USA and USSR ebbed in the 1970s, and new actors becameimportant. These are: international agencies, non-governmental organizations, and multinational corporations (MNCs). In fact, these developments led to doctrines of neoliberalism and pluralism. The concept of complex interdependence is used to describe this emerging state of global politics. They argued that there can be progress in international relations and that the future does not need to look like the past.
Forsometime,neorealismbecameinfluentialininternational relations – at the expenseof realism.But major international developments weakened it greatly. To Waltz it seemed that in the nuclear age the international bipolar system, based on two superpowers—the United States and the Soviet Union—was not only stable but likely to persist. The fall of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent disintegration of the USSR disproved this belief. The end of the bipolar world ushered in new opportunities and challenges connected with globalization. Many critics began to argue that neorealism, like classical realism, cannot adequately account for changesin world politics.
Questions of human nature and morality disappeared from the debates between international (neo) realists and (neo) liberals. They now discuss two main issues. Are states influenced in their international policies mainly by the anarchic structure of the international system? Or are they influenced by institutions, learning, and other factors that are conductive to cooperation? Robert Keohane, in his book International Institutions and State Power, accepts Waltz’s emphasis on system-level theory and his general assumption that states are self-interested actors that rationally pursue their goals. However, by employing game theory he shows that states can widen the perception of their self-interest through economic cooperation and involvement in international institutions. Patterns of interdependence can thus affect world politics. Keohane calls for systemic theories that would be able to deal better with factors affecting state interaction, and with change.