Multilateralism and the Absence of Disapproval

Multilateralism and unilateralism constitute attitudes towards the external world.  It is interesting to see how these fit with other characterizations.  Jeff Legro presented a paper at UCLA’s international relations workshop and he distinguished three types of states: trustees, hermits, and rebels.  Rebels are states interested in upending the established order (a revolutionary Soviet Union was one example).  Hermits are isolationists interested in separating themselves from the world (Tokugawa Japan, for example).   Trustees are states who are neither hermit nor rebels, but are integrated into the international community and upholders of the existing order.

How does Legro’s typology map onto the multilateralism/unilateralism dichotomy?  Hermits are certainly not multilateralists, but isolationism would not qualify as unilateralist if the latter presumes some degree of involvement in Continue reading

Defining Disapproval and Looking at Reform

So Art has now clarified his thinking on the unilatreral/multilateral disjuncture.  It is clear that Art avoids looking just at acting alone in the case of unilateral.  So the distinction – or in otherwords legitimate action –  is embedded in  the absence of disapproval by other states rather than the number of countries that join in and/or how much these states contributed to the action.  In this view then legitimacy is the “critical” states not opposing (this is actually a  form of consent where parties are not willing to stand in the way even where they are unhappy with the action) presumably Gulf War I and where states will stand in the way of action e.g. France and Germany standing in the way of the second resolution and American action in Iraq – Gulf War II this is then unilateralism. Now if unilateralism concerns state action in the face of ‘significant’ disapproval and multilateralism is action without disapproval what then is the distinction as the disapproval of one or Continue reading