Theoretical schools of international relations and their reflection in the typologies of strategic approaches to violent nonstate players
Abstract
The violent non-state players are not a homogeneous group, which would always and under all circumstances exclusively represents security threat to its surroundings. On the contrary, in some cases, the violent non-state players are able to provide security.
This fact should be consistent with the strategies used by states against the violent non-state players. This paper classifies these strategies and hierarchizes their wide range which has been described in professional and academic literature.
It does so with the help of the concept of the player's interaction and the possibility of its change as a key substantial feature of the international system. It shows how this substantial feature is seen in three important paradigms of international relations - (neo)realistic, neoliberal and constructivist - and demonstrates how fundamentally the theoretical thinking of the academic field has been reflected when the strategies against the violent non-state players are being conceived.
In conclusion, the paper outlines the perspective of the necessity of adopting a wider spectrum of strategies against the violent non-state players by states in their political practice in order to achieve a systemic and sustainable solution of this issue; but it also points out to a number of pitfalls that will need to be tackled in this multi-strategic approach.