The Marxist approach contributes to the understanding of international relations and the role of IOs by critically assessing realism and liberalism, which are the dominant theoretical approaches to international relations. Marxism primarily focuses on the role of economic power in international affairs. Marxism criticizes capitalism as the main mode of production on the grounds that it causes inequalities among nation states and thus destabilizes the world order and increases the possibility of a conflict among states. Marxism regards IOs as tools and/or influence mechanisms of capitalism that widen the gap between the developed nations and the developing/ underdeveloped nations.