Document Actions
Nonstate Actors: Impact on International Relations and Implications for the United States
Title: Nonstate Actors: Impact on International Relations and Implications for the United States
Date: March 2008
Author: National Intelligence Council
Bibliographic Entry: National Intelligence Council. “Nonstate Actors: Impact on International Relations and Implications for the United States.” Institution. March 2008. http://www.dni.gov/nic/PDF_GIF_confreports/nonstate_actors_2007.pdf (Accessed April 7, 2008).
Electronic Link: http://www.dni.gov/nic/PDF_GIF_confreports/nonstate_actors_2007.pdf
Key Words: international, homeland security strategy, United Kingdom, nonstate actors
Summary of Key Points, Issues, Conclusions:
Participants in a series of NIC-Eurasia Group seminars in late 2006 and early 2007 discussed how the proliferation of nonstate actors in recent years —primarily multinational corporations, non-governmental organizations, and super-empowered individuals—is transforming international relations. The conference concluded that globalization has indeed enabled nonstate actors to encroach on the functions of the nation-states, but very few are completely independent. The most benign nonstate actors originate in the developed world, but modernizing states such as China and Russia—home to the bulk of the world’s population—have been highly effective in suppressing them and in creating their own substitutes. The key conclusion of the conference is that these actors have become too powerful, but that in many parts of the world their influence is limited—a factor that is contributing to the tilting of the global playing field away from the United States and its developed-world allies
Name of Researcher: Katie Stout
Institution: Integrative Center for Homeland Security, Texas A&M University
Date Posted: April 9, 2008