ABSTRACT
With the twentieth century drawing to a close, the discipline of international relations is still struggling to come to terms with the profound changes that have shaken the field since the early 1980s. In that struggle intergovernmental organizations have become a neglected topic of research.1 At least three developments have challenged traditional approaches to world politics: first, intensified economic, social and cultural interdependence, often labelled globalization; second, a profound change in the nature of regional cooperation because of the development of what is now called ‘the European polity’ and regional efforts elsewhere; third, a sense of uncertainty because the end of the Cold War has removed old assurances that any matter would be defined and treated in terms of the security conflict between East and West. Basically, the debate within the discipline focuses on the question of whether international relations are still a struggle for territorial security or whether they have transformed in a struggle for wealth that can no longer be acquired simply by the threat of the physical occupation of land (cf. Rosecrance 1986; Strange 1992). The former vision portrays nation-states as dominant actors, while the latter includes numerous types of non-state actors.
