What or who do we mean when we talk about states e.g US wanting this, that, etc. This is IR shorthand, useful, but also distorting. States are aggregated populations in the hundreds of millions. IL be

What we mean by State
Name:
Institution:
What we mean by State
International law binds the states that consent to the International agreements involved. The states may sign a treaty to delegate authority to an international body. However, the question lies as to who or what the state is in this context. According to Hathaway (2008), consent in International agreements brings the question of who gives the consent to them. He further deduces that states are not unitary actors. In fact, several individuals are formed in signing international consent. The individuals make decisions for the millions of the people making up that state. Therefore, since states are not unitary actors, few people are mandated to make critical decisions that limit the autonomy of the state and subsequently, affect the citizens of the state in question.
The international agreements are a result of the domestic politics, “Decisions to ratify (formally consent to) treaties and the regimes that they create are the end result of domestic politics …” (Hathaway, 2008). Therefore, politicians, usually the ruling ones filter the issues of conflict in the state through the various political institutions. Thus, the decision to ratify an international treaty depends on the politicians and often considers a part of the population. In most cases, the ratified international agreements only have the support of a part of the population. The process may pass the laws that favor the minority in the state depending on their end-result.

Considering the question of who consents to what the states want, only a few individuals, mostly politicians are in charge of the decisions to determine what millions of the citizens want. However, the treaties may appease some of the aggregates in the population and conflict the interest of others in the same state.
References
Hathaway, O. A. (2008). International delegation and state sovereignty. Law and Contemporary Problems, 71(1), 115-149.