The International Society Approach

Abstract

The “world society” approach had presented an image of a world in which relations between individuals were more important than those between states. To some extent this appeared to reflect a moral attitude. Relations between states included the worst features of the international scene — warfare, imperialism, economic exploitation, domination and dependence — and so were seen as bad. Therefore, it was implied, relations between individuals and groups, which lacked these features, were good (“legitimate”). But this raised the underlying question: did this approach, whether or not it conjured up a picture of a more attractive world, accurately describe the reality of the world as it exists today? In other words, was the power and influence of states perhaps greater in the real world than some of these writings suggested?