Tatiana Zhidkova* Globalization and the Emergence of Violent Non-state Actors: The Case of Human Trafficking Abstract: This study examines the impact of globalization on the emergence of human trafficking as a transnational security threat. The author discusses the relationship between globalization and violent non-state actors (VNSAs), seeing human trafficking as one of VNSAs threatening the state in the age of globaliza- tion. The erosion of state sovereignty and emergence of transnational organized crime are analyzed in an attempt to understand the role of globalization in transforming human trafficking into a transnational challenge. Keywords: globalization, violent non-state actors, human trafficking, organized crime DOI 10.1515/ngs-2014-0014 Much has been written about the globalization and the demise of state sovereignty that it entailed. Making the line between domestic and international realms of politics increasingly blurred, globalization questioned and challenged the Westphalian order with its priority on sovereign nation-states. As Smith and Guarnizo (1998, 3) note, the discourses on “globalization” and the “crisis of the nation state” have been provoked by the worldwide expansion of transnational capital and mass media. These discourses continue to dominate many of the contemporary theoretical works in the International Relations (IR) field. For exam- ple, Lake (2008, 52) argues that despite the fact that globalization has been created by the states themselves through economic liberalization, this process operates mainly through the activity of non-state actors (NSAs) such as “individuals, firms, sectors, and other nonstate groups, including transnational advocacy networks.” So, what is globalization? To put it in a nutshell, it is “the world-spanning intensification of interconnectedness” (Vertovec 2009, 54). In a more extended way, Keohane (2002, 194) defines it as the “increasing volume and speed of flows of capital and goods, information and ideas, people and forces that *Corresponding author: Tatiana Zhidkova, International Relations, Bilkent University, Bilkent, Ankara 06800, Turkey, E-mail: tatianaz@bilkent.edu.tr New Global Studies 2015; 9(1): 1–25 Authenticated | tatianaz@bilkent.edu.tr author's copy Download Date | 4/23/15 9:37 PM