The redefinition of relations of force within the international system that has resulted from the exhaustion of bi-polar arrangements brings significant implications for the Atlantic Alliance. Based on a model of collective defense prioritizing geo-strategic variables, the Alliance was not able to deal with security imperatives within the new systemic configuration. In 1991, when this incompatibility was recognized, members of the Alliance moved to redefine their strategic plan and to identify the possible political, economic and social instabilities emerging primarily within Eastern Europe as the greatest threat. In 1999, through the practices of intervention and greater U.S. committment that had begun in the middle of that decade, NATO went on to hone its new criteria by harmonizing use of force and detection of threats to security within its normative precepts.
security; NATO; international regimes