  The realist assumption was that the state is the key actor in international politics, and that relations among states are the core of actual international relations. However, with the receding of the Cold War during the 1970s, one could witness the growing importance of international and non-governmental organizations, as well as of multinational corporations. This development led to a revival of idealist thinking, which became known as neoliberalism or pluralism. While accepting some basic assumptions of realism, the leading pluralists, Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye, have proposed the concept of complex interdependence to describe this more sophisticated picture of global politics. They would argue that there can be progress in international relations and that the future does not need to look like the past.