Politics is said to be about who gets what, when, and how. State preferences are largely taken as given. Yet understanding state interaction and policy divergence requires answering the questions of who wants what, when, and why. In international security, national preferences crucially influence the way states 'fight' contemporary security risks such as terrorism and the smuggling and trafficking of goods and people. To strike back against criminalized non-state actors who, since the end of the East-West conflict, have increasingly formed transnational networks, states have stepped up international police cooperation. To be sure, states often disagree over how far other states and international institutions should be allowed to infringe on the linchpin of state sovereignty and modern statehood, that is, the definition of what is legal and the pursuit of wrongdoers. Still, cooperation has been astounding over recent decades, especially in Europe.
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