Accidental Power: How Non-State Actors Hijacked Legitimacy and Re-Shaped the International System

This book is a collection of essays that examines different perspectives on how non-state actors, be it irregular armed groups or civil society, have rejected the modern Westphalian system and acquired sufficient power to re-shape it. The authors argue that the acquisition of this power was accidental. Moreover, it is suggested that the international system unintentionally enabled non-state actors to challenge one another and the concept of the state within the existing rules and norms. In particular, the book looks at the possibility that democracies will increasingly be unable to fulfill the expectations of their populations, and provide the obligations of the social contract.