Question 1:  Can all non-state actor threats be addressed unilaterally as a non-traditional threat to only one country?  Do some of these non-traditional threats span borders and require international cooperation to counter the threat?  If so, why? What problems might such cooperation bring? Of course, it is possible for state actors to unilaterally address non-state actor threats. Whether it is advisable for state actors to unilaterally address non-state actor threats is a matter of debate. While it may be tempting to point out the inherent weaknesses in the United Nations policies as an excuse for state actors to use unilateral responses as part of their national security strategies, doing so will have detrimental effects in the long run. The reasons why unilateral action has detrimental long-term effects include undermining the trust needed for efficient and reliable intelligence sharing and resource pooling. Responses to non-state actors need to be intelligent, strategic, and longitudinal rather than the types of knee-jerk and short-term methods that state actors have resorted to in response to terrorism and organized crime.

The United Nations remains one of the most important examples of international organizations designed to encourage and implement multilateral responses to global threats. However, the United Nations was created in a historical era in which the threat of non-state actors was minimal. As non-state actors have increasingly undermined geo-political stability and the predictability of old models of warfare. While the nation-state is still relevant, it is certainly a less relevant geo-political standard than it was fifty years ago. The Charter of the United Nations establishes the ground rules of international warfare, with the primary goal of promoting peace, global stability, and international security (Gorman). According to the Charter of the United Nations, threats to any member state are to be resolved ideally through peaceful means including economic sanctions and international diplomacy. When peaceful measures fail, there are specific protocols in place whereby state actors can use military responses to threats, but those responses must be in keeping with the multilateral principles of the United Nations.

Terrorist acts are considered criminal offences, not military offences, within the provisions of the United Nations Charter (Gorman). As such, acts of terror and perpetrators of terror are deferred to the International Criminal Court at the Hague. The United Nations has yet to update its Charter to reflect the realities of terrorism and non-state actor methods to fund terrorism such as organized crime syndicates. In reaction to these inherent weaknesses, state actors have begun using unilateral means to subvert the United Nations. Using unilateral responses to non-state actors allows the state to temporarily take control and act without the impediments of global consensus and collaboration. Unilateral responses also offer the benefit of being quick and easy to implement, relative to multilateral responses. In some cases, responses to non-state actors are unilateral and yet still involve the collaboration between more than one state actor, as with the...

As Sidhu points out, there has been “a greater impetus to develop ad hoc, short-term, unilateral or multilateral responses to addressing the immediate challenges posed by proliferation among non-state actors” (6).
Tempting and alluring as quick, unilateral responses to non-state actors can be, these types of responses are detrimental to international peace, stability, and security for several reasons. For one, violating international treaties and the United Nations Charter is technically illegal, and certainly unethical. In addition to clearly violating the sanctity of international treaties and the tenets of international law, acting unilaterally also undermines the efficacy of international cooperation by undermining trust. Trust building is one of the most important reasons to support and promote multilateralism in international counterterrorism efforts. Multilateral consensus promotes the safety of the global community and undermines the efforts of non-state actors, by enhancing trust because trust promotes information and intelligence sharing, and enables pooled resources. By sharing resources and intelligence, multiple state actors can prevent the proliferation of terrorist cells and the black market businesses—and legitimate businesses—that are being used to support and fund those cells.

In the long run, the cultivation of international coalitions will facilitate a comprehensive strategy for dealing with non-state actors. Sidhu goes so far as to suggest total ban on nuclear weapons, to set an international standard and marginalize states who proliferate. Also, as Sidhu points out, unilateral responses are often reflexive and short-term in scope, leading to “grave danger” of weakening potentially valuable long-term strategic alliances (6). Likewise, Weller states that unilateral responses to non-state actor threats will “undermine, rather than strengthen, the existing structures of international law and organization,” and are therefore “counterproductive” (177).

Another reason why unilateral responses are less beneficial to the goals of international security is that multilateralism is required for global coalitions against other non-state threats from cyber threats to environmental degradation. As Srikanath points out, cyber threats, cyber warfare and cyber espionage make international cooperation even more important because these are non-state threats that demand multilateral responses. The nature of the digital landscape is such that it has no geo-political boundary. The global banking system is similarly vulnerable to non-state actors; unilateral responses to threats to global banking systems are bound to be either ineffective or even dangerous (Srikanath). Similarly, international collaboration enables comprehensive action taken against some of the financial tactics used by non-state actors, primarily via organized crime, human trafficking, and the global trade in weapons, drugs, and other contraband. Multilateral coalitions also enable strategic responses to environmental threats.

Thus, in spite of the potential problems and…