1 - International relations and international security: boundaries, levels of analysis, and falsifying theories

Summary

Why another book on security?

Security as a Tower of Babel

The shelves of any city or college library are stacked with books about security. A closer look would also reveal that most of the books are out of date – stale reminders of past security issues now overtaken by events rather than compelling volumes speaking to real and urgent security issues. Part of the explanation for these piles of tired texts arises from the rapid changes besetting the world's peoples and states. It's hard for practiced observers and scholars, much more so for an informed, but otherwise preoccupied, public to keep pace with rapidly changing events, notably those impacting security.

Only a decade ago, it seemed a lot easier to make sense of the world. Many believed the globe to be permanently divided between two military blocs led by two superpowers – the United States and the Soviet Union. Few believed that either would be challenged anytime soon. The Soviet Union's unexpected implosion changed all that overnight. With the collapse of the Cold War and bipolar superpower competition, the world today appears much more complex – and decidedly more confusing. The seeming simplicity of the Cold War period, stretching roughly from the end of World War II in 1945 to the sudden demise of the Soviet Union in December 1991, has been replaced by what appears to be a new world that defies easy explanation or understanding.