Prezenta lucrare este o analiza a evenimentelor care au aparut dupa sfarsitul razboiului rece in spatiul european si in special in relatia dintre cele doi actori principali ai scenei europene – NATO si Rusia. Lucrarea incearca sa analizeze aceste evenimente prin prisma unui curent al Teoriei Relatiilor Internationale – neorealismul – aparut in aceasta stiinta inca din timpul razboiului rece si sa observe obiectiv valabilitatea notiunilor construite in cadrul acestui curent in circumstantele modificate ale acestui ultim deceniu al secolului.
Lucrarea este impartita in doua parti majore. Prima parte constituie o analiza a principiilor si conceptelor emise de ganditorii acestui curent. Analiza se vrea una nepartinitoare – conceptele analizate fiind descrise in comparatie cu concepte similare construite de autori ai altor curente ale acestei discipline de studiu.
In a doua parte a studiului este analizata functionalitatea conceptelor descrise in prima parte. Baza empirica care a stat la baza acestei analize este consitutita de evenimentele care au avut loc dupa caderea Zidului Berlinului si pana la inceputul razboiului din Kosovo. Intrucat unele dintre evenimente erau in derulare la data scrierii acestei lucrari nu s-au luat in calcul decat datele disponibile la data scrierii ei, ignorand eventualele dezvoltari ulterioare. Modul de folosire a bazei empirice este unul limitativ, fiind prezentate exclusiv evenimentele considerate a avea relevanta pentru prezentul subiect. Ca instrument de lucru pentru culegerea datelor empirice a fost folosit internetul in marea majoritate a cazurilor.
Concluziile arata ca in perioda de dupa razboiul rece, politica internationala in Europa poate fi explicata cel mai bine prin prisma curentului neorealist. In pofida multor evenimente de natura neoliberala, a dovezilor de cooperare intre actorii de pe scena internationala, si a aparentului multipolarism instalat dupa caderea Uniunii Sovietice, istoria acestor ani arata ca pe termen lung politica internationala evolueaza iminent catre un nou sistem, chiar daca schimbat, de echilibru de putere, evenimentele actuale furnizand argumente care sa sprijine previziunile neorealiste cu privire la schimbarea conditiei de hegemonie a sistemului.
Pentru a obtine documentul cu intreaga lucrare trimiteti un e-mail la adresa petrescu@telebot.com .
The aim of this research is to examine the extent to which the political interaction between NATO and Russia after the end of the Cold War was the result of rationally driven policy making processes on behalf of both Russia and NATO member states and leadership, explainable in terms of neorealism.
Most of the policies that were designed in the nineties in Europe can be explained using the neorealist perspective on international politics. Concepts such as balance of power or threat, or hegemonic change have continued to be employed of a neorealistic manner by policy-makers in constructing the post Cold War security configuration. For example, evidence shows that even though the Cold War balance of power was broken, the system moved slowly toward a new balance of power configuration. Some Central and Eastern European nations looked for an alliance with NATO in order to balance against Russia and others got into closer ties with Russia. More than that, NATO was eager to affirm its new role in Europe, frequently showing its "former" enemy, Russia that the time has come for Westerners to take up the hegemonic role Russia was stubbornly willing to keep.
The research uses a qualitative approach in a search to identify the factors that determined the evolution of the European security over the last years.
The research is structured in two main parts with the intention to provide information about the concepts designed and utilized by the neorealists as well as bout the possible ways of employing these concepts to explain occurences of nowadays politics.
The first part – Theoretical Background – describes the concepts utilized by the neorealists in giving their explanation of international politics. The presentation is two-sided – not only we describe the neorealist conception but we also provide the reader with information regarding other currents of international affairs. For an improved understanding, the information is provided by contrast, emphasising the neorealist pluses or minuses by comparing the theory with alternative theories furnished by other international affairs theorists.
The second part is meant to observe how the neorealist conception can be applied to real-life, nowadays politics. The database used for the testing covers the period of time from the end of the Cold War to to Kosovo War. The research is limitative – we have chosen to use only those events that seemed relevant to our purpose – to see if the neorealist conceptions can be successfully employed to explain post-Cold War international politics. The data used in the research have been obtained from varios sources – yet, concerning the empirical data, the main instrument used to collect it was the Internet. Even if some relevant events were stories in the making when this paper was writen (such was Kosovo War), a conclusion was made using the incipient phases of these events, ignoring the developments that took place after a certain date.
Findings show that the neorealist theory can successfully be employed to explain events taking place in International Politics in the ten years that followed the fall of the Berlin Wall, providing, on the long term, the best explanation possible to these events.
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