Resolving security dilemmas

The neorealist explanation of the end of the Cold War is limited by its rationalist understanding of security dilemmas. Rationalist models inadequately explain the coordination of action because they obscure actors’ interpretive abilities, the context of the interaction, and the binding force of language. To better understand the processes by which states resolve security dilemmas, we need to conceptualize security dilemmas as a set of linguistically constructed social rules. Onuf's linguistic understanding of social interaction can more adequately explain the coordination of action. By applying Onuf's constructivist theory of world politics to the end of the Cold War, the superpower reconceptualization of security requirements challenge the socially constructed rules of that security dilemma.