The State as an International Actor: Crisis and Consolidation of the States System

Abstract

The state occupies a privileged place in the typologies of International Actors. The elements of the state -territory, population and govemment- are analyzed in this article in terms of criterion of a political legal concept of sovereignity which stablishes equality between states is substituted in this article by the concept of capacity. As a result this article deals with the state not so much as the sole subject of law but the state in terms of plurality with different capacities. In this sense a comparative revision -in terms of demography, territory, economics and the military among others, of some of the one hundred and eighty-one member states in the present moment of the United Nations- repects the existing hierarchy in the system of states. Hierarchy is developped on a tangible basis (resources), which is more and more diffuse, an intangible basis and the political will of the respective states. In the article the broad definition a/this hierarchy is summarised: Superpowers, Great Powers, World Powers, Medium Powers and Regional Powers, among others.