Упрощенная HTML-версия
Author : T. Kirabaev
Second Secretary, General Secretariat, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, Candidate
of Science (Political Science)
GLOBAL TRANSFORMATIONS of the last few decades
have affected, to a great extent, international space: global-
ization which added mobility to global population and
vagueness to national borders; information technologies and
transport infrastructure which are developing by leaps and
bounds, etc. are changing the nature of human contacts and
the relationships between transnational companies, organi-
zations and states.
Today, the states previously described as "periphery" have
moved to the fore; the "code of behavior" on the interna-
tional political scene has acquired new positive trends and
also retreated, in many respects, to the conservative models of the past.
This article is an attempt at analyzing the main theoretical approaches to the studies of re-
gional integration and differentiation of the types of "security communities."
Not infrequently, functionalism is presented as a universal and politically neutral trend of
studies of international integration while in fact it rests on the liberal utilitarian political
values. This explains why its positive impacts do not stretch beyond those parts of the
world where people share the values of welfare society which functionalism supports and
spreads.
Neorealists have developed a theory of hegemonic stability based on the argument that
international regimes develop and continue living when the state possesses dominating
power resources, the United States after World War II being one of the examples.
Today, the studies of foreign policy and the theory of international relations look at re-
gionalism and regional integration as the key indicators of international changes which ap-
peared in the post-Cold War period when the world was entering the post-bipolar
polycentric development stage.
The concept of security communities by E. Adler and B. Crawford regards security com-
munities not so much as groups of people which cooperate on the basis of common values
and mutual understanding as social structures which constitute the interests and identities
of their members.
Strange as it may seem, power plays a major role in the creation of security communities.
This role may be understood as a "magnetic attraction" of periphery states to the core.
Электронное приложение к журналу «
Международная жизнь
»
Theoretical Approaches to Regionalization and Regional Integra-
tion