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Advances in Politics and Economics 
ISSN 2576-1382 (Print) ISSN 2576-1390 (Online) 

Vol. 4, No. 4, 2021 
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125 
 

Original Paper 

A Study on Robert Keohane’s Idea of “Power” 

Wang Sheng1 & Pan Ziyang1 
1 School of Politics and Public Management, Xinjiang University, Urumqi, Xinjiang, China 
 

Received: December 9, 2021  Accepted: December 19, 2021  Online Published: December 24, 2021 

doi:10.22158/ape.v4n4p125        URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.22158/ape.v4n4p125 

 

Abstract  

Robert Keohane is a leading contemporary international relations scholar. His ideas and doctrines are 

important parts of neoliberal institutionalism. In his books Power and Interdependence, and After 

Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy, he has a unique perspective on 

power, a core concept of international relations, that differs from realism and constructivism. This 

paper uses documentary analysis to distill and summarize the discussion of power in Robert Keohane’s 

work, which helps to systematically study the neoliberal institutionalist view of power and to make the 

classic theory show its charm beyond its time. 

Keywords 

Robert Keohane, Power, Neoliberal Institutionalism 

 

1. Introduction 

Robert Keohane is a leading political scientist, international relations scholar, and educator. He also is a 

leading figure in neoliberal institutionalism. Keohane entered Sumner College where his father taught 

to study political science in 1957. He obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree and graduated with honors in 

1961. After, he studied at Harvard University. When he was at Harvard, he was taught and instructed by 

Stanley Hoffman, a master of international relations theory, and received his Master of Arts and 

Doctoral degrees in 1964 and 1966 respectively. He later taught at several prestigious institutions, 

including Harvard University (1985-1996) and Duke University (1996-2005). 

Neoliberal institutionalism is one of the three paradigms of international relations and benefited from a 

reinterpretation of many of the foundational concepts in the realist paradigm that provides a more 

explanatory framework for the intense changes in the world’s political economy in the 1960s and 1970s. 

The realist view of power as the essence of international relations. Robert Keohane, an icon of 

neo-liberal institutionalism, rethought this view in his co-authored book Power and Interdependence 

published in 1979, in After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy 

published in 1984, and in his personal collection of essays International Institutions and State Power 



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published in 1989. In contrast to the realist focus on material power, Keohane added a conceptual 

approach to power and expands the boundaries on the concept of power to create a clear logical 

relationship between power, interdependence, international institutions, and national interests. 

Keohane’s ideas of power established the foundations of the neo-liberal institutionalist’s view of power 

and exerted a great influence on international relations. 

Good theories can survive time, and the reflection would better help people understand the 

circumstances they are in. In the 1970s and 1980s, when Keohane presented his interpretation of world 

politics, the Soviet Union still existed as a powerful state in the international community. Today, forty 

years later, the Soviet Union no longer exists, and the international political and economic situation has 

changed dramatically. Ideas that were once expected, such as globalization, multipolarity, 

democratization, etc. have been gradually resisted in various degrees and even many of the ideas 

themselves are alienated. The serious divisions and defective responding capacity of the international 

community when facing the COVID-19 once again raises attention about international cooperation.As 

Keohane argued in After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy, 

international cooperation can sustain and develop when hegemony no longer existed. Therefore, it is 

beneficial to revisit Keohane’s ideas of power to understand international cooperation in the 

post-epidemic era. 

 

2. A Discussion of Robert Keohane’s Idea of “Power” 

2.1 The Nature, Sources, and Hierarchy of Power 

Power is often seen as a relationship, the ability of a person to influence the behavior of others in the 

ways that people have no freedom to choose by their willingness. The crucial power in the traditional 

realist discourse was military power, and only states with great military power were able to dominate 

world affairs. However, a series of international events in the 1970s changed the single attribute on the 

source of power and made it more complex. 

Keohane viewed power as the ability of an actor to induce other actors to do things that they would not 

otherwise do and could also be seen as the ability to exercise control over outcomes. But Keohane 

adopted a theoretical assumption that differs from realism. He proposed asymmetric interdependence as 

the source of power and argued that actors could be seen as having stronger resources of power when 

they are less dependent compared to other actors. However, the hypothesis does not ignore the 

differences and similarities between the source of power and power itself. The hypothesis also divides 

the method to measure power into two categories. One is based on resources and potential, and the 

other is based on influence on outcomes. Therefore, he emphasized the importance of the uncertainty of 

the transformation process and argued that “There is rarely a one-to-one relationship between power 

measured by any type of resources and power measured by effects on outcomes.” 

Keohane, in an original move, linked liberal interdependence with realist power politics. To understand 

power and interdependence, he introduced the concepts of sensitivity and vulnerability. In short, 



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“sensitivity describes the speed and depth with which a country perceives external change, and 

vulnerability reflects a country’s ability and difficulty to make policy adjustments and changes” and 

“Sensitivity involves degrees of responsiveness within a policy framework—how quickly do changes 

in one country bring costly changes in another, and how great are the costly effects?” Sensitivity is 

measured not only by the scale of cross-border interactions but also by the cost of changes in 

interactions to society and government. The cost of sensitivity is “sensitivity means liability to costly 

effects imposed from outside before policies are altered to try to change the situation.” It is important to 

note that interdependence of sensitivity’s premise is a fixed policy framework, “a policy framework 

that should be based on the domestic policy arrangements of countries and related international 

institutional arrangements based on existing interdependencies.” And sensitivity interdependence is not 

limited to economic aspects but also encompasses social or political aspects. 

“Vulnerability can be defined as an actor’s liability to suffer costs imposed by external events even 

after policies have been altered.” It is important to note that “policy changes” refer to adverse changes 

in the country caused by changes in other countries, and the policy framework is changed to respond to 

them to reduce the country’s losses. The “cost of policy adjustment” refers to the cost of responding to 

such adverse changes. Interdependence of vulnerability is measured as “the cost over time of adjusting 

to effectively adapt to the changed environment.” In addition, vulnerability can be applied to the 

analysis of both socio-political and political-economic relations. 

Sensitivity and vulnerability are Keohane’s micro-explanations on the sources of power, and they have 

three main differences. First, “Interdependence sensitivity reflects the price to be paid for maintaining 

interdependence, while vulnerability emphasises the price to be paid for breaking it.” Second, the 

former is within the policy framework and the latter emphasizes the spillover effects of policy, which 

means that sensitivity does not bring about a change in policy, while vulnerability implies a change in 

policy. At the same time, there is a temporal succession between the two, with sensitivity emerging 

before vulnerability. “Since it is usually difficult to change policies quickly, immediate effects of 

external changes generally reflect sensitivity dependence.” As sensitivities cause damage to national 

interests, the responding costs incurred to mitigate or eliminate such adverse effects are vulnerabilities. 

Third, “Clearly, it indicates that sensitivity interdependence will be less important than vulnerability 

interdependence in providing power resources to actors.” Vulnerability interdependence is more 

strategically important than sensitivity interdependence, or it can be argued that vulnerability plays a 

more fundamental role in the analytical framework of asymmetric interdependence as a source of 

power. In some cases, even though actors enjoy the power advantages of sensitive interdependence, 

they are at a disadvantage in vulnerability interdependence, and the difference between the two will 

affect the outcome of the application of asymmetric interdependence as a power tool. 

Keohane further constructed a composite interdependence model based on interdependence, which is 

different from realism. The basic features of composite interdependence lie in the rejection of three 

important assumptions of realism, namely that interstate links are no longer the only links between 



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societies; that the hierarchy of the international relations agenda cannot be easily divided; and that the 

prevalence of composite interdependence will inhibit the use of force by states. Three basic features of 

composite interdependence imply differences in the neoliberal institutionalist and realist perceptions of 

power. The first is the difference in the importance they attach to the power of different actors. Realism 

assumes that the state is the most important actor, and interstate links are therefore the most meaningful 

links in international relations. Moreover, it is often to downplay the non-state actors such as 

transnational organizations and transnational links between non-governmental elites. The assumption of 

realism implies that the state is important because it holds the most important power, and tacitly 

assumes that even in complex international societies, the power of the state far exceeds that of other 

actors in most areas, which, while not implying an absolute negation of the power of other actors, is at 

least a choice of indifference at the heart of the paradigm. 

From the end of the Cold War until today, the active borders of non-state actors are continuously 

expanding, and the importation of influence into new areas has meant a reconstitution of power 

between different actors. The emphasis of composite interdependence on the multiple channels of 

contact between the different actors of the international community reflects more scientifically the 

reality of international relations. The timing of the new epidemic outbreak was exceptional, as the brief 

post-Cold War detente between the major powers of the East and the West had terminated completely. 

It is replaced by a new form of competition, and world politics was at a delicate point, the direction of 

it is unpredictable. While this is very much in line with the logic of realist power struggles, it also 

demonstrates, to a certain extent, that when international cooperation becomes a much-needed public 

good, inter-state contact as the only important channel of communication does not guarantee that the 

needs of the international community are met. Even when there are national actors that are not 

sufficient to serve the full function of governance, transnational organizations take on part of the task of 

communicating to the international community the assistance needed to respond to new coronaviruses, 

acting as coordinators in the process of connecting the national and international communities. For 

example, the COVAX regime led by the World Health Organization was established to improve the 

underproduction and uneven distribution of vaccines on a global scale. The changing power of 

non-state actors should receive more attention to reflect the real picture of world politics as closely as 

possible. 

Next, the issue of hierarchy in the international relations agenda implies the hierarchy between different 

kinds of power. Keohane revisited a particular but crucial resource of power, namely military power. In 

doing so, he not only refuted the realist assumption of force as an effective policy instrument but also 

against the realist hierarchy of the international relations agenda. Although he continued part of the 

realist view of military power, euphemistically expressing its distinctive character. When actors face 

conflicts, the advantages of military interdependence are hardly offset by the advantages of 

interdependence in other spheres, and military power can still be a crucial presence in exercising 

decisive influence. However, military matters are not considered to be highly political, while issues of 



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economic and social matters are necessarily classified as less political than military matters. 

In addition to military power, Keohane was particularly concerned with information power. He argued 

that with the information revolution, the cost of processing and transmitting information would fall 

dramatically. He argued against the idea that the small states will diminish the power of major power 

countries and increase their own power because of the information revolution. He also cited four 

reasons for this: the barriers to market entry and economies of scale associated with information, the 

huge investments required for the collection and production of new information, the startup advantage, 

and the greater benefits that military powers will enjoy. In addressing the question of how information 

generates power, Keohane still substituted the analytical framework of interdependence, suggesting that 

trust is a key resource when measuring information power, and asymmetric trust is a central source of 

power. 

In short, in Robert Keohane’s system of power, the concept of power still follows the classical 

definition and interdependence is the source of power. It is important to note that the source of power is 

different from the resource of power, which can be a material existence, such as military power relying 

on the number of nuclear weapons, the number of soldiers, etc., while the source is the transformation 

of the resource, and power is derived from the comparison of differences in sensitivity and 

vulnerability between interdependent actors, whose outcomes control is stronger than the “statistics” of 

resources. On this basis, the categories of power are in fact divided into two categories: 

interdependence of sensitivity and interdependence of vulnerability. The hierarchy of power then 

becomes an issue to be understood dynamically, it contrasts with realism’s static hierarchy of power, 

making neoliberal institutionalism more explanatory of policy than realism. 

2.2 Power and the National Interest 

In addition to the development and even reconstruction of sources, hierarchies and categories of power, 

the neo-liberal institutionalist understanding of power fills some theoretical gaps left unanswered by 

realism. The first is what is the relationship between rights and the interests of the state? Hans 

Morgenthau, a representative of classical realism, postulated the following main points about the 

relationship between power and national interest: (1) International politics is defined as a struggle for 

power between states in pursuit of their interests and sees national interest as a compromise following 

domestic political competition, views power as a supporting element in the pursuit of national interest. 

(2) The most fundamental national interest is the survival and security of the state, also is the most 

basic goal served by the struggle for state power. (3) There are three main manifestations of the state’s 

struggle for power, namely the status quo policy, imperialism, and prestige policy. Offensive and 

defensive realism have diverged in their views on whether the state’s fundamental task is to pursue 

power without limits. Overall, realism as a theoretical cluster does not give a coherent answer to the 

question of whether power is an integral part of the national interest. 

Keohane, on the other hand, clearly outlined the interests of the state as wealth and power, as he wrote 

in After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy, “Reflections on wealth 



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and power as goals of state action lead us to the conclusion that the two concepts are complementary,” 

and argues that “power is a necessary condition for the endowment of the state and vice versa.” 

Keohane juxtaposed the juxtaposition of wealth and power, which are jointly subsumed in the national 

interest, and wealth and power are complementary, which allows for mutual transformation. Keohane 

argued that there is still an inherent coherence between the political economy of the world today and 

that of the 17th century, citing four propositions made by Jacob Wiener, (1) wealth is the basic means 

of acquiring power; (2) power is the basic and valuable means of acquiring and maintaining wealth; (3) 

both wealth and power are the ultimate ends of state action; (4) one may be sacrificed for the other 

under particular circumstance in the short term, but in the long term, wealth and power are in harmony. 

What is unique about Keohane is using the concepts of wealth investment and consumption to describe 

power, which leads to the permanent question in foreign policy of how to balance the state’s investment 

and consumption of power. 

Next, the duality of Keohane’s idea of the “national interest” implies that the power of the state is also 

dualistic. On the one hand, the state is egoistic and therefore its interests are exclusive and cannot be 

shared. “States are egoists, rational actors acting on the basis of their own conceptions of self-interest,” 

and state power is likewise egoistic and often manifests itself through its preoccupation with the service 

of the state. On the other hand, because Keohane believes that there is a common interest between 

states, the interests of the state are also altruistic that leads to the fact that state power should also be 

altruistic. In neoliberal institutionalism, the altruism of power is reflected in transnational and 

inter-governmental relations in the context of complex interdependence, where economic and social 

interactions between countries imply a flow of wealth and power and ultimately establishes a stable 

network in which different organizations, such as business groups, which gain more benefits. 

2.3 A Critique of the Hegemonic Stability Thesis 

Hegemony is a particular form of power. Robert Keohane argues that hegemony is a single dominant 

force. Any state entity that exists in the sense of international law has a certain amount of power, but 

hegemony is clearly not universally possessed by all state actors. In 1973, Charles Kindleberger linked 

hegemony to the stability of the international order and formally put forward the theory of hegemonic 

stability. He argued that the existence of a hegemonic state can maintain the international order and 

ensure the stability of the international system. The influence of the United Kingdom and the United 

States on the international system when they were hegemonic powers was a typical historical example 

used by proponents of the hegemonic stability theory to support their views. Robert Keohane’s critique 

of the hegemonic stability thesis is not based on a critique of hegemony, but rather on a critique of the 

hegemonic model and more precisely the basic power model. 

Robert Keohane argues that there are three models of hegemony: the basic power model, the 

power-action model and the Marxist model. First, the basic power model, also known as the “unrefined 

hegemonic stabilising power,” “refers to the need for a country to have free access to key raw materials, 

control major sources of capital, maintain a large import market, and have comparative advantage in 



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the production of high value-added goods.” The theory assumes that the greater the hegemon’s control 

over the world’s political economy, the greater the cooperation between countries, and vice versa. But 

this crude model of hegemony, which focuses only on having an advantage in the control of material 

resources, views the hegemon as a necessary and sufficient condition for cooperation in the 

international system. On the one hand, it ignores the domestic factor, on the other, where the hegemon 

is dependent not only on the preponderance of power but also on the will to become hegemonic. For 

example, during the international strife of World War I and World War II, Britain lacked sufficient 

resources to maintain free trade, while the United States had powerful economic resources but lacked 

the will to lead the world’s political economy. Second, a distilled hegemonic stability theory, which is 

the power in action model, argues that power does not automatically produce leadership and that 

“hegemony is defined as a state in which ‘a state is strong enough to maintain the ground rules 

governing relations between states and it is willing to do so.’” Although the theory is more focused on 

domestic characteristics than the basic power model, domestic attitudes, political structures, and 

decision-making processes are all important. The country with superior resources will inevitably 

become the hegemon unless it is unwilling to lead the world, but it is still impossible to answer what 

factors lead to the country’s unwillingness to take on the responsibility of leading the world. Third, the 

Marxist model, “Marxists often use the concept of hegemony, implicitly defined simply as a dominant 

position, as a way of analysing the political phenomenon of the capitalist world. For Marxists as well as 

mercantilists, wealth and power complement each other; they depend on each other.” Typical figure of 

this, Wallerstein, who replaces the analysis of class with a state-centric analysis that recognizes the 

important role of hegemony and military power. Wallerstam argued that three hegemonic states 

emerged in the capitalist world system, the Netherlands in the mid-17th century, Britain in the mid-19th 

century and the United State in the mid-20th century. 

After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy opens with a critique of the 

basic power model or “unrefined hegemonic stabilising power”, which argues that the hegemonic 

powers have created international institutions that will collapse once the hegemon’s power declines, 

and it is unable to provide the public goods to maintain the stability of the international system. In 

contrast, Keohane’s major doctrinal contribution lies in arguing that post-hegemonic international 

cooperation is possible and well-documented. First, because international regimes are difficult to 

establish and the cost of maintaining them is much less than the cost of reestablishing them. “Because 

international regimes have the effect of reducing transaction costs, providing transactional information, 

changing actor preferences, and reducing uncertainty, the international regimes that a hegemonic state 

establishes may still continue to exist after its decline, and cooperative relations between states can be 

sustained.” Second, there is a “time lag” between the decline of hegemony and the collapse of 

institutions. “The decline of hegemony does not necessarily imply a corresponding decline of the 

established regimes created under the leadership of the hegemonic state; the inertia of their 

maintenance allows them to remain independent in their ability to ensure cooperation and peace in a 



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post-hegemonic world.” Thus, Keohane’s neoliberal institutionalism is also known as the ‘supply’ 

doctrine of international institutions. 

Robert Keohane’s perceptions and reflections on hegemony are an important part of his thought on 

power. If hegemony is the central variable that sustains international cooperation, then hegemony and 

international cooperation give each other legitimacy to exist, constitute an unbreakable logical loop and 

are self-referential. It can be argued that After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World 

Political Economy provides the doctrinal underpinning for world politics to break the limits of 

hegemony and to achieve international cooperation through multiple channels. 

2.4 Power and International Regimes 

International regimes were first proposed by John Rudge in the 1970s, meaning the implicitly explicit 

principles, norms, rules and decision-making procedures that emerge from a given field of international 

relations to which the expectations of a range of actors converge. Comparing world politics to 

imperfect markets, Keohane argued that international regimes could overcome their shortcomings and 

thus replace hegemony to achieve cooperation. 

In Robert Keohane’s idea of power, the relationship between power and international regimes focuses 

on three aspects. First, the common good has the potential to enable the creation of international 

regimes, and the common good reflects the shared pursuits of state actors. States tend to behave in their 

national interests, and through the brief analysis of Keohane’s view of national interests in the 

foregoing, it can be assumed that there is a common pursuit whereby multiple states seek a 

simultaneous increase in power, such as those benefiting from global trade and payment facilitation, 

which can be seen as a simultaneous increase in power for all members. The second is that changes in 

power can explain changes in international regimes. There are five explanatory frameworks for 

international institutional change: the economic process explanatory model, the overall power structure 

explanatory model, the problem structure explanatory model, the international organization explanatory 

model and the integrated explanatory model. The core of this theory is that the competition between 

states provides the basic driving force for institutional change. The specific path of action lies in the 

fact that the structure of the international system (the distribution of power between states), which is 

regarded as the overall power structure, determines the nature of international regimes, and that 

changes in the overall power structure provide the driving force for changes in the rules of international 

regimes. Following the logic of the general power structure explanatory model, it is possible to deduce 

the plausibility of the hegemonic stability theory, and the stability of the world financial system, which 

was governed by British power in the 19th century, and the Bretton Woods system, which was led by 

the United States after the Second World War, is often used as a representative example to demonstrate 

that power influences international regimes. Keohane argues that the limitations of the overall power 

structure explanatory model are (1) a lack of simplicity, (2) an inability to provide a good basis for 

prediction, (3) a reluctance to distinguish between problem areas, and (4) an ignorance of the 

complexity of multi-channel linkages between countries. Finally, in some cases international regimes 



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are even avenues for power to operate. In the process of shaping the norms of international regimes, 

actors can make arrangements that serve national interests. In particular, “the principles of a regime 

define the goals that its members aspire to pursue.” With the globalization of non-traditional security 

issues such as ecological crises, mass infectious diseases and cyber security threats, the ability of major 

powers to respond to the risks of globalization can be greatly reduced if they only rely on a single 

traditional power and do not seek international cooperation and create a response agenda from multiple 

levels and directions. International regimes enable the participation of as many actors as possible in 

global governance. International regimes are one of the non-traditional power resources of the great 

powers, relying on political negotiations to transform power. Moreover, international regimes need a 

certain degree of legitimacy and authority to fulfil their functions of determining legal responsibilities, 

reduce transaction costs and provide information. In addition, states’ cede initiatively some of its power 

to international regimes by negotiation and make the international regimes become a source of 

legitimacy and authority. 

 

3. A Review of Robert Keohane’s Ideas on Power 

The neo-liberal institutionalist paradigm constructed by Robert Keohane, while downplaying realist 

power politics, does not deny the important role of power for state actors. Instead of focusing too much 

on material power, as classical realist scholars did, Keohane divides the types of power into two 

categories: the number of resources held and the control of outcomes, and places emphasis on the 

transformative process by which power produces substantive effects, a dynamic theory of power that is 

more scientific and possesses greater explanatory power than the static realist theory of power. Instead 

of a long, independent analysis of power, Keohane combines it with discourses of interdependence, 

international cooperation, and international regimes. Not all the criticisms to which Keohane’s thought 

on power has been subjected are direct; many of the criticisms of concepts central to the neoliberal 

institutionalist paradigm can be derived from the doctrinal challenges to Robert Keohane’s thought on 

power and constitute an insidious and indirect critique. 

Take Power and Interdependence as an example,the masterpiece of interdependence theory, which 

provides a solid theoretical foundation for the theory of “international regimes” in After Hegemony: 

Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy and they lay the cornerstone of neoliberal 

institutionalist theory together. However, interdependence itself has certain explanatory limitations. 

Increasing interdependence does not necessarily lead automatically to a harmony of interests, but rather 

more cross-border interaction may lead to suspicion and antagonism between the interests of both 

parties. Although this problem has been recognized and a “composite interdependence” combining 

power politics and interdependence has been proposed, it applies more to the sphere of economic and 

ecological interdependence, and disputes in the higher political sphere inevitably. For example, as the 

strategic rivalry between the United States and China in the political sphere extends to trade wars and 

decoupling in the economic sphere, and as the two countries could have cooperated in non-traditional 



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security areas, such as health care but ended up in bitter confrontation. All three features of compound 

interdependence fail, in other words, world politics seems to have reverted to the power politics 

assumed by realism. In particular, under the law of imbalance in the power growth of the great powers, 

the gap between the comprehensive power of China and the United States continues to narrow. At a 

time when the United States, despite the sensitivity and vulnerability of both China and the United 

States, is suppressing and sanctioning Chinese high-tech companies such as ZTE, Huawei and Jitterbug. 

China is adjusting its economic policy under heavy pressure, moving towards a combination of internal 

economic circulation and international circulation. The tug-of-war between the two sides in the field of 

power politics and the neglect of compound interdependence, which not only reflect the limitations of 

the theoretical practice of composite interdependence in the context of Sino-American strategic 

competition, but also represent another validation of the realist idea of power. 

Next, the idea of hegemony is not dispensed with in Keohane’s power ideology, but rather packaged. 

Although Keohane’s doctrine of the “provision” of international regimes, which argues for the 

possibility of international cooperation after hegemony, reflects to a certain extent the democratic 

nature of international society. However, there is a certain theoretical bias in Keohane’s theory. First, 

his starting point is how to continue to defend United States hegemonic interests and reduce the costs 

of United States hegemony through the existing international regimes established by the United States 

in the face of the decline of United States hegemony, rather than actually establishing a set of 

international regimes that reflect international democracy and justice. Second, the class nature of 

international regimes has been ignored or even rationalized. In the post-Cold War international regime, 

for example, although the voice of emerging countries such as China has increased in important 

international organizations such as the IMF and the World Bank, it has not fundamentally changed the 

“centre-periphery” or “centre-semi-periphery-periphery” structure. The imbalance in the distribution of 

power has a significant impact on the inherent inequality of the international system, although 

Keohane’s idea of power downplays power politics and at the same time the role of hegemony, it is still 

a hierarchical idea of power, and the status of the actors involved in the regime is strongly influenced 

by this. 

Last, there are significant theoretical limitations to Keohane’s idea of power. On the one hand, it 

downplays the important role of state power in international regimes. Even though the element of state 

power is downplayed in the theoretical derivation process, in the practice of international relations, 

state power is still indispensable for the proper functioning of international regimes once they are 

formed, as international society still conforms to the realist assumption of anarchy. On the other hand, 

Keohane does not delve into the timeliness of the common pursuit. The fact that international regimes 

are formed based on a common pursuit between states, which must remain generally stable over a long 

period and not change fundamentally in nature, means that only certain issues, which are often 

transnational in nature and difficult for a single state to solve on its own, can meet this requirement, and 

that such issues are also practically solvable, rather than being some kind of over-advanced utopianism. 



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They are also practical and not some kind of utopianism. Thus, once the common quest is concretized, 

there may be more counter examples to Keohane’s theory of the international regimes of 

decentralization. 

 

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