ABSTRACT
The western intervention in Kosovo for many is still rather paradoxical. It remains “one of the paradoxes of modern international politics” according to Roland Dannreuther, that “an economically impoverished territory, in a littleknow part of Europe with a population of only two million” would become the focal point for the most serious international conflict in the late twentieth century.1 Although many observers still seem bewildered by the motives behind it, the intervention in Kosovo by NATO was anything but paradoxical. While an operation like that in Kosovo does not compute according to traditional IR theory and models, it makes a world of sense according to the logic of the risk society. The catalyst for the intervention in Kosovo is more evident if one looks at the situation through the prism established by Tony Blair in his 1999 speech at the Economic Club of Chicago. In that address Prime Minister Blair delivered one of the most compelling cases for the war in Kosovo. His logic is already articulated in his title, “Doctrine of the International Community”.2 It is the logic of the world risk society – to achieve security, all states must confront the problems that face them as a community, not alone.
