The Breaking of Nations: order and chaos in the 21st century. By Robert Cooper

Old Europe builds a new order

Robert Cooper is a formidable thinker who, unlike most such individuals, is in just the right job. Formerly a special adviser on foreign affairs to Tony Blair, he now glories in the title of director general of external and politico-military affairs for the Council of the European Union. Among his tasks is to take forward, under the stewardship of Javier Solana, the development of the EU's common foreign and security policy - a Sisyphean task, if ever there was one. The Iraq war has seen the stone that was being pushed slowly uphill fall back down again.

This short and challenging book has a thesis. It is not really about the breaking of nations. Rather, it is about the coexistence on our planet of three kinds of state: first, collapsing postcolonial states which become havens of lawlessness and, through drugs, terrorism and refugees, an acute problem for others; second, so-called "modern" states that seek to strengthen their national independence and to pursue national interest in an old-fashioned but ultimately war-prone way; and third, so-called "postmodern states", such as those of the EU and Japan, that accept a high level of international integration and are more concerned with the well-being of citizens than the pursuit of national grandeur.

Cooper argues that the European liberal model is the way that the world has to move. The European peace and the transatlantic relationship after the Second World War are seen as "the only example of a lasting peace among nations". He argues that within the capacious framework of liberal international institutions, most notably the EU, the state system is "collapsing into greater order rather than disorder". The big question that his book raises is whether this is really so.

Cooper advances his central argument with verve and sophistication. He is right to criticise so-called "realists" in international relations for their dogmatic and inaccurate view that states must pursue objectively determined interests and the aggrandisement of power. He shows brilliantly that states, and the people who compose them, can change radically conceptions of both their interests and their identities.

His argument that today's new security challenges cannot be addressed effectively by yesterday's ideas about the balance of power is convincing. The EU has achieved more by the power of example, and by the magnetic attraction of the promise of membership, than it ever could by force of arms.

Yet Cooper's analysis leaves nagging doubts. His basic description of the world is in a tradition of grand geostrategic generalisation that occasionally rides roughshod over awkward realities. He asserts that "there is a zone of safety in Europe and outside it a zone of danger and chaos". The first obvious objection - that there remain lurking dangers in Europe - is largely hypothetical. However, a second objection - that the rest of the world is far from being in a general condition of danger and chaos - has more substance.

The liberal international order that Cooper presents as essentially European reaches further into some parts of the non-European world than Cooper seems prepared to concede. Further, you don't have to be a flaming third-world radical to want more recognition that Europe and its ally the US have themselves contributed significantly to some problems in the "zone of danger and chaos".

The biggest question left by Cooper's analysis concerns security. His vision is of a Europe gradually integrating, including in the security sphere. He asserts that "we have to forget the security rules of yesterday". Yet it is far from self-evident that all movement in Europe is in the integrationist direction. He does less than justice to the survival, within EU member states, of thoroughly national approaches to security issues. The Iraq war this year showed the depth of the differences.

Against this background, there are dangers in asserting that yesterday's rules are no longer relevant. It is similar to the American, perhaps also British, misconception that accompanied the decision to attack Iraq: that in our enlightened era we do not need to make detailed preparations for the occupation of conquered territory, as nowadays things are different.

Cooper's account of the US role is particularly interesting. Here is a liberal democratic state - but one that rejects many aspects of the interdependence that Europe embraces. Europe, because it has not yet got a convincing security policy of its own, remains uncomfortably dependent on US military support, even in European crises such as those in the former Yugoslavia. Cooper's day job involves getting Europe to agree on at least basic principles of security policy, thereby creating a healthier relationship with the US, but no convincing answer emerges from these pages.

He offers five pithy maxims for understanding the world and acting in it. They sound obvious, but are elaborated in a text that gives them sharpness and significance: 1) foreigners are different; 2) in the end, what matters is domestic poli- tics; 3) influencing foreigners is difficult; 4) foreign policy is not only about interests; 5) enlarge the context.

All are admirable, but perhaps he should add a sixth maxim. Beware of grand generalisation, especially about the extent to which we are in a wholly new era.

Sir Adam Roberts is professor of international relations at Oxford University