realism approach

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Recommended: Challenges of global governance

The U.N.’s efforts in creating effective treaties dealing with environmental issues have not been successful because member states fail to cooperate. The U.N. is comprised of 193 states that work together in fixing different issues affecting them. The issues they handle range from world peace to environmental problems. Environmental issues have become more of a concern in the past 50 years (United Nations). There have been treaties created aimed to try to fix and/or maintain the environment, such as the Kyoto Protocol. The research topic will be explaining the reasons behind the U.N.’s deficiency in effectiveness of treaties focused on helping the environment. Applying the realist theory will explain why the U.N. is unable to create successful treaties because member states do not fully cooperate with the treaty’s guidelines. States exist in an anarchic international system and behave according to their self-interests because there is no global authority (Stanford University).

This case will focus on explaining the lack of success of U.N. environmental efforts on passing treaties due to the fact that member states fail to comply with the guidelines. Enforcement of the treaties is something that the U.N. struggles with because of its lack of power. Each member state does not have to abide by the guidelines because there will be no enforcement of them through punishment, such as sanctions. The need of enforcement when trying to have self-interested states abide by regulations is vital. In addition, the U.N. does not have the power to punish the member states because there is no Hegemonic Power. A Hegemonic Power in the U.N. would be able to assist in enforcing the regulations by having the power to punish uncooperative member stat...

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...on: Analysis with an Amended Prisoner's Dilemma Model." The Journal of Politics 50.3: 600-24. Cambridge University Press. Web. Nov. 2013. .
Grieco, Joseph M. (1988) "Anarchy and the Limits of Cooperation: A Realist Critique of the Newest Liberal Institutionalism." International Organization 42.3: 485-507. The MIT Press. Web. Nov. 2013. .
Grieco, Joseph M. (1993) "The Relative-Gains Problem for International Cooperation." American Political Science Review 87.3: 729-41. Http://www.jstor.org. Web. Nov. 2013.
United Nations. UN.org. Global Issues. The United Nations. Web. Nov. 2013. .
Stanford University. "Political Realism in International Relations." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Web. .

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