Sovereignty in Contemporary International Society

We are living in a world where there exist a lot of different ideologies, political orders and religions all of which, more or less, claim to be universal. There is the western world, with its liberal values, market economy, democracy and Christianity. There is a part of world which according to its geographical location is called the eastern world, but is mostly influenced by and follows western ideological, political and cultural values. The eastern world, with its completely different value system yet often with very strong market economies, often boasts bigger economical growth then west. There is a middle-east, highly influenced by religious beliefs and struggling to build up a society where peace and stability finally could be found. There is the so-called third world, what Jackson defines as a world of ‘Quasi-States’, where the majority of states suffer under poverty, and where states have lost their supreme power to control the activities and relations taking place within its territory. It’s not always very easy to tell where one world with its political, social and cultural values ends and another begins.