  Scholarship on global democracy is often charged with failing to deal with issues of power. This is particularly problematic because IR theorists have, for many years, highlighted the anarchical and power-laden nature of international politics (Morgenthau 1954). This view is especially prominent among realists and neo-realists who claim that states are the fundamental units of world politics, and that power—understood as material capabilities—is the main currency of transnational interaction. Drawing parallels with Hobbes’s state of nature, realists argue that anarchy forces states into a situation of self-help which, in turn, creates security dilemmas as states seek to defend their sovereign borders. International institutions, when they do exist, reflect the prevailing distribution of power and the interests of dominant states. Although neo-liberal theorists (such as Robert Keohane) and constructivists (such as Alexander Wendt) have argued that cooperation between states can be attained under anarchy, these camps still agree that power politics dominates transnational affairs.