A stable world order is a rare thing and it requires skilful statecraft. Maintaining it demands creative diplomacy, functioning institutions and effective action to adjust it.
Eventually, even the best-managed order comes to an end. If the end of every order is inevitable, the timing and the manner of its ending are not. Nor is what comes in its wake.
A parallel to the present is the Concert of Europe, the most important and successful effort to build and sustain world order setting basic rules for international conduct and peaceful co-existence.
After defeating Napoleon, the allies, Austria, Prussia, Russia and the UK came together in Vienna in 1814. They made the wise choice to integrate France. A course different from the one taken with Germany following the First World War and different from the one chosen with Russia at the end of the Cold War.
The concert lasted technically a century, until the First World War. German power was rising, and empires were rotting. This combination set the stage for the First World War and the end of what had been the concert.
What lessons can be drawn from this history?
The rise and fall of major powers determine the prevailing order. Order tend to end with a whimper rather than a bang.
The global order since the Second World War consisted of two parallel orders. The Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union and the other was the liberal order that operated alongside the Cold War order.
The liberal order is deteriorating. Authoritarianism is on the rise in China, Russia, the Philippines, Turkey and eastern Europe.
The WTO is unable to deal with today’s challenges especially non-tariff barriers and the theft of intellectual property. Resentment over the US’ exploitation of the dollar to impose sanctions is growing, as is concern over the country’s accumulation of debt.
The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty allows five states to have nuclear weapons, but there are now nine that do. The EU is struggling with Brexit and disputes over migration and sovereignty.
Today’s world is struggling to cope with power shifts with China’s rise, the appearance of several medium powers such as Iran and North Korea and the emergence of non-state actors from drug cartels to terrorist networks.
Globalisation has had destabilising effects as has climate change and the spread of technology. Nationalism and populism have surged because of greater inequality within countries.
The US has committed costly overreach in trying to remake Afghanistan, invading Iraq and pursuing regime change in Libya. After Libya, a major mistake, was the lack of response when Syria first used chemical weapons.
A new democratic, rules-based order is required. A more likely alternative is a world with little order. Protectionism, nationalism and populism would gain, and democracy would lose.
The First World War broke out some 60 years after the Concert of Europe had for all intents and purposes broken down in Crimea and we are now just over 70 years since the end of the Second World War.
The good news is that it is far from inevitable that the world will eventually arrive at a catastrophe; the bad news is that it is far from certain that it will not.
Gordon is the former president and chief executive of BMMI. He can be reached at gordonboyle@hotmail.com