World Order
World order in this article is defined as “rules that govern albeit in a messy and ambiguous way — the most important relation-ships of the interstate system in general, and the world’s great powers in particular’.”
Concept of Nation States and Polarity
Nation-states are political organizations responsible for maintaining and sustaining community life. People historically expect their nation-state to provide them with security and certain inalienable rights such as life, liberty, and property. Citizens also expect their leaders to protect them from threats emanating from outside their borders. The origins of the modern international system can be traced back to the Treaty of Westphalia’ in 1648. Consequently, the international system is comprised of sovereign nation-states, not tribes, clans, city-states, or empires. As a result, each nation-state had to understand not only its own internal security issues, but also the dynamic relationship established between the components of the international system and the delicate balance of power maintained by hundreds of sovereign national entities. James Roberts and Alan Rosenblatt con-tend that international political systems are normally characterized by the number of system poles (polar powers) present at any given time. “A system pole, like a magnetic pole, is a nation-state with enough influence to attract or repel the interests of other nation-states in a way that affects the entire (international) system”. For example, during the Cold War Era (1946-1990), the international system was bipolar and its two poles were the United States and the Soviet Union. Both of these world powers had enough influence and power to attract and repel smaller nations.
History of World Order
The history of world order high-lights a handful of important concepts. Analysis can be separated into two categories: pre AD 1000′ and post ‘AD 1000. Pre AD 1000 Japan experienced numerous factionalized conflicts between tribes, the indigenous civilization, and the expanding influence of Korea and China. A plethora of Chinese dynasties flourished engendering centralized control over cyclical periods of transition and conflict from one leader to the next (the tensions between Taoism, Buddhism, and Confucianism symbolically represent these conflicts over order in Asia including the development of the Great Wall). The Warring States 5 period in China is often referred as evidence of a trend toward increasing centralized authority and order (even though the larger States still fought with each other). In South Asia, epicenters of power and order emerged in India in conjunction with the Hindu caste system and inter-acted with Mongols, Turks, and expanding Arab influence. In Africa, the Kingdom of Ghana functioned as a model of order while tribal groups competed over resources and land in the South. The Middle East experienced significant fluctuations of order in Mesopotamia, Egypt, Arabia, and Persia interspersed with the tension between Jews, Christians, Muslims: and Greek / Roman influence (with particular emphasis on Alexander the Great, the Abbasids, and the Umayyad, not to mention the Turks and other Islamic regional powers). In Western Europe, ancient Greece then the Roman Empire exerted significant control while interacting with the Vikings, the Germanic tribes, and early versions of feudalism and the Holy Roman Empire. In Russia and Eastern Europe, the Khazars exerted regional influence and order while in North America pre-agricultural groups interacted with an expanding Mayan Empire from Latin and South America.
Overall, this time period under-scores the historical reality of a ragmented world, disconnected for the most part into regional enclaves of conflict and interaction where typically, one Empire maintained order with minor exceptions where regional powers maintained a sense of multi-polar order concerning trade, cultural exchange, and communication. The areas excluded from such influence were characterized by competing tribes and local systems of power.
Post AD 1000′ world order evolved in similar ways with accelerated trends during the 1500-2005 timeframe. In Japan, the samurai and shoguns pre-dated the Tokugawa dynasty which later led to the Meiji restoration, conflicts with China and then WWII. In China, one dynasty after another rose and fell (Sung, Mongol, Ming, Manchu) followed by European colonialism then the communist revolution under Mao. In South Asia, India exerted regional dominance while the mughals ruled until European colonialism.
In Africa, the Yoruba, Mali, Benin, Congo, Zimbabwe, Buganda, and Ashanti kingdoms rose and fell followed by massive European colonialism which later led to independence and self-deter-mination. Various Muslim Caliphs and Sultans ruled the Middle East until the Ottoman Empire estab-lished dominant regional control th.at was dismantled after WWI, fol-lowed by European colonialism, Arab nationalism, and the formula-tion of various Arab sheikhdoms. In Western Europe, religious wars plagued the various countries with shifting alliances leading up to the American and French revolutions, WWI and WWII, and decolonization followed by the emergence of the EU. In Russia and East Europe Genghis Khan dominated the region followed by Ivan the Terrible and Russian czars later supplanted by the communism (Lenin and Stalin in particular followed by WWI, WWII, the Cold War. and the expansion then crumbling of the Soviet Union. In North America, European colonization was pre-dated by tribal and regional powers that were subsumed by the expansion of America over the continent followed by WWI and WWII, the Cold War, then the emergence of US hegemonic power. In Latin and South America the Aztecs and Incas dominated followed by European. colonization later leading to independence then numerous wars, dictators, coups, and revolutions (similar to Africa).
Major alliances dominated this time-period starting with religious violence characterized by Muslim v. Christian nations (with violent and oppressive conflicts within Muslim and Christian nations against their own dissidents), followed by the Hapsburgs (Austria-Spain) v. France, Britain, Netherlands, and Sweden, then France v. Britain, followed by France v. Britain and the Netherlands, followed by the World War and Cold War alliances. During this time, the Ottoman Empire, Genghis Khan, the Aztecs and Incas, Britain, and at one point the Netherlands, extended order across significant portions of the world. Regional, multi-polar, and bi-polar order also characterized this time-period in other areas such as Europe where alliances shifted .to maintain balance of power (against the Pope, Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin) or to counter-balance the influence of the other “group” (Catholics v. Protestants). The various Chinese dynasties exert-ed dominant regional influence, while smaller Asian countries tried to wield power in their spheres (there also existed a bi-polar order between China and Japan over control of East Asia and continues today in some respects). India and Pakistan also play off alliances with China, Russia, the EU, and the US to maintain power in South Asia while numerous dictators or regimes have attempted to exert more prominent influence in their spheres (numerous conflicts in South America. the Iran v. Iraq war, numerous wars and revolutions in Africa, and the role of Israel in the Middle East as supported by the US).
Overall, post-AD 1000 with particular emphasis on 1500-2005 world order has been characterized’ by the following: dominant Empires with regional order some-times dictated by shifting multi-polar or bi-polar relations then a shift toward balance of power order in Europe specifically, followed by a bi-polar order during the Cold War.
The world’s two ‘remaining superpowers, the Soviet Union and the United States, were creating a new international order dominated by two very rigid alliance systems, with very little diplomatic maneuvering room between them, facing off against each other all over the world.
For the next two decades (1960 — 1980) an arms race, surrogate wars, and détente dominated the Bipolar Era’s Cold War. Unable to attack each other directly because of the proliferation of nuclear weapons, the US and the Soviet Union instead sponsored surrogates who fought in wars all over the globe for power, prestige, and influence’.
The world saw a new type of superpower conflict, one fought by every means possible except military. Robert Libbon creatively uses a sports analogy to describe this new international order. “The inter-national balance of power, once an intricate system of alliances, ententes and state systems, had become part of a global skins-and-shirts game, you either played for the Soviet Union or the United States; it was a very small league’).”
In 1991, the international system’s Bipolar Era and its balance of terror stand off between the United States and the Soviet Union ended peacefully and not as the result of a cataclysmic war. The Soviets and their allies eventually succumbed to the economic bur-dens of competing in an arms race with the West for nuclear superiority. When the dust cleared, the Soviet Union disintegrated into six-teen independent nations and the iron curtain they threw over Eastern Europe disappeared. For the two decades, the United States has dominated a new world order as a unipolar power. Political scientists, system theorists, and military leaders from nation-states in all corners of the globe are currently analyzing whether or not this US led international system will last much longer. If it changes, what will take its place, another unipolar system, a bipolar system, or perhaps, a multipolar system? The analysis that follows suggests a multipolar world, albeit one still dominated by the United States, will eventually replace the current unipolar system.
Emerging Multipolar World
With too few Americans taking notice, history has entered a new era. The “Unipolar Moment’ created by the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 has passed. To refer to the United States today as the world’s “sole superpower” makes about as much sense as General Motors bragging that it’s the world’s No.1 car company: Nostalgia ill-befits an enterprise beset with competitors breathing down its neck. Similarly, to call Barrack Obama the most powerful man in the world” is akin to curtsying before Elizabeth II as “Queen of Great Britain, Ireland and British Dominions beyond the Seas”: Although a nice title, it confers little by way of actual authority”.
The last two decades witnessed the expression of unipolarity in terms of unilateralism with invasions of Iraq, Afghanistan and endemic Global War on Terror (GWOT). We are now in a new, fast-evolving multipolar world in which some developing countries are emerging as economic powers; others are moving towards becoming additional poles of growth; and some are struggling to attain their potential within this new system-where North and South, East and West, are now points on a com-pass, not economic destinies.
A new global order is rapidly emerging where United States will no doubt remain a very important player. Yet alongside the U.S. will be several others. By 2025, six emerging economies – Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, South Korea, and Russia – will collectively account for about one-half of global growth. For now, the US dollar remains the most important international currency. In Global Development Horizons 201112, the World Bank presents what it believes to be the most probable global currency scenario in 2025, a multicurrency arrangement centred on the dollar, euro, and renminbi (Chinese Yuan). This scenario is buttressed by the likelihood that the US, the euro zone, and China will constitute the three major growth poles at that time. It is believed that the world economy is on the verge of a transformative change- the transition to a multipolar world economic order.
China is only the largest part of a bigger story about the rise of new economic and political players. America’s traditional allies in Europe – Britain, France, Italy, even Germany are slipping down the economic ranks. New powers on the rise are India, Brazil and Turkey. They each have their own foreign-policy preferences, which collectively constrain America’s ability to shape the world. How India and Brazil sided with China at the glob-al climate-change talks or the votes by Turkey and Brazil against America at the United Nations on sanctions against Iran and veto by Russia and China on US resolution regarding regime change in Syria, all are signs and symptoms of changing unipolar world into multi-polar and interdependent world.
Identifying Players in the New World Order
The world is changing. It is becoming increasingly multipolar with the emergence of China, India, Brazil, and with the resurgence of Russia — forming the so-called BRIC13. The world is also becoming increasingly interdependent, not only economically as recently illustrated with the US financial crisis turning into a global economic cri-sis, but also regarding the threats and challenges our societies face, such as terrorism, climate change, and poverty and energy scarcity. This multipolarity in the age of inter-dependence, or interpolarity” as Giovanni Grevi names it, will most likely shape the 21st century.
The American unipolar moment has ended. Yet, it seems too early nonetheless to evoke true multipolarity. Indeed, the US remains the dominant power, or the “lonely superpower’, and is likely to maintain its status for years and probably decades to come. America’s decline is not an illusion, but it must be understood in relative terms. US global influence is fading because it contrasts with the rise of the ‘rest’, i.e. the empowerment of other actors at the local, regional and global level.
There is a great uncertainty as regards to who will emerge as a major power and when the US dominance will become definite history. In fact, it is very likely that only few countries will emerge as centra hubs of the system in the 21st century, creating a sort of asymmetrical multipolarityls with a distinction between dominant or central powers, major powers, regional powers and local powers.
Based on the analysis of sever-al indicators”, Thomas Renard18 has identified that the “BRIC dream” has turned into a more realistic BR-I-C scenario in which China appears to be the real story and the only emerging power that can challenge the US in the coming years. India will follow the path of China but its emergence will be slower and in all less impressive. Brazil and Russia are probably the least emergent among the emerging powers, but this is not to say that they are not emerging. What place will be left for the EU in this coming interpolar order? According to most indicators, Europe has the appearance of a global power. However, there is a natural reluctance to join the words Europe’ and ‘global power’ together. Indeed, the EU is not a power in the classical sense of the term for the very good reason that it is not a state in the classical sense of the term either. But if global power is defined as the capacity to have an influence at the global level, then the EU has certainly some global power, for it is a leading voice in many important affairs, such as the fight against climate change. To become a true global power or even a great power, i.e. a major pole in the coming order, the EU will need a more coherent approach and a more integrated strategy. On a global scale, all European countries are now small states. They are less and less capable of defending their vital interests on their own against rising powers and are even less capable of achieving major ambitions. Nevertheless, when the capabilities of the 27 member states are joined together, the EU becomes a significant power.
Based on the success of BRIC dream, in late in 2005 Goldman Sachs introduced the concept of the Next Eleven (N-11)19. Purpose was to identify those countries that could potentially have a BRIC-like impact in rivaling the G7. Their main common ground and the reason for their selection was that they were the next set of large-population countries beyond the BRICs. The result was a very diverse grouping that includes Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Korea, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Turkey and Vietnam. The N-11 weight in the global economy and global trade has been slowly increasing, with a contribution to global growth of around 9% over the last few years.
Apart from Goldman Sachs concept of N-11, where seven out of eleven emerging economies are Muslim states, George Friedman20 has identified Turkey as the stable Muslim country amidst chaos created by the Balkans, the Caucasus, and the Arab world. Turkey is also strategically located among Europe, Middle East and Russia and it is the most modern economy in the entire Muslim world. Turkey’s economy and military are already the most powerful fin the region, so Turkish influence will increase forming it the most powerful state in Muslim world in 21st century’.
To sum up it is inferred that alongwith US, China and India are progressing rapidly on the ladders of international power stature whereas Brazil and Russia are also rising slowly. Among the Muslim world, Turkey is the emerging Muslim power of the 21st century.
End Notes
1J. Goldstein, International Relations (sixth edition) (New York: Longman, 2002), p 43 quoted in The Concept of World Order by Tyler Moselle June 19, 2008, p1. Tyler Moselle is Research Associate at Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, Harvard Kennedy School.
2The Treaty of Westphalia of 1648, bringing an end to the Thirty Years War, which had drowned Europe in blood in battles over religion, defined the principles of sovereignty and equality in numerous sub-contracts and in this way became the constitution of the new sys-tem of states in Europe. Pierre Beaudry. The Economic Policy That Made the Peace of Westphalia, May, 2003 avail-able \http://www.schillerinstitute.org/strate-gic/treaty of westphalia.html acessec on 14 Feb 2012.
3James C. Roberts and Alan J Rosenblatt, International Relations Using Microcase Explorit (Toronto Wadsworth Thomas Learning, 2002) p24, quoted in A Newer World Order -The Return To A Multipolar Era Lieutenant Colonel Robert L. DeYeso Jr United States Army, Mar, 2006.
4J. Roberts, New History of the World (Oxford University Press, 2002) Also: R. Overy, The Times Complete History of the World (New York: Barnes and Noble publishing, 2004) quoted in The Concept of World Order by Tyler Moselle June 19, 2008, p2.
5The period of the Warring States (Zhanguo or Chan-Kuo) refers to the era of about 475 BCE to 221 BCE when numerous petty city-state king-doms of the Spring and Autumn perioc had been consolidated into sever major contenders and a few minor enclaves. The Warring States period is usually interpreted as a time of end-less brutal wars that came as a rest of friction among the seven states an: that this unfortunate state of affairs could end only with one state bringin: all into one empire. This interpretatio-is probably propaganda for the “One China” policy. http://www.sjsu.edu/fac-ulty/watkins/warringstates.htr-acessed on 14 Feb 2012.
6J. Roberts, New History of the World (Oxford University Press, 2002. Also: R. Overy, The Times Complete History of the World (New York: Barnes and Noble publishing, 2004) quoted in The Concept of World Order by Tyler Moselle June 19, 2008, p2.
7P. Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of Great Powers: Economic Change and Military Conflict from 1500-2000 (New York: Vintage Books, 2000) quoted in The Concept of World Order by Tyler Moselle. June 19, 2008, p3.
8Robert L. DeYeso Jr, A Newer World Order – The Return To A Multipolar Era, Mar, 2006.
9Robert P. Libbon, Instant European History (New York: Fawcett Columbine, 1996), 209 quoted in A Newer World Order – The Return To A Multipolar Era by Lieutenant Colonel Robert L. DeYeso Jr. United States Army 15 Mar 2006.
10Charles Krauthammer coined the term “unipolarity” to describe the world structure that was emerging with the fall of the Soviet Union. Conventional wis-dom of the late 1980s was that the bipolar world of the Cold War would give way to a multipolar world in which the U.S. was one of many centers of power, co-equal to the European Union, Japan, China, and others. Krauthammer predicted that instead, a unipolar world would emerge dominated by the United States with a power gap between the most powerful state and the second-most powerful state that would exceed any other in his-tory. He also suggested that American hegemony would inevitably exist for only a historical “moment”, lasting at best for three or four decades. See Charles Krauthammer, “The Unipolar Moment”, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 70, (1990/1991), pp. 23-33. http://www.jstor.org/sta-ble/20044692
11Andrew J. Bacevich, “Shaping a New World Order” August 17, 2011, http://arti-des.latimes.com/2011/aug/17
12Justin Yifu Lin and Mansoor Dailami, Are We Prepared for a Multipolar World Economy? June 2, 2011. http://www.projectsvndicate.org/commentary/lin3/English
13Global Development Horizons 2011, Multi-polarity: The New Global Economy. 2011. www.worldbank.org
14BRIC acronym and concept was coined in 2001 by Goldman Sachs analyst James O’Neill in order to encourage investment in emerging economies, without any idea that his concept would turn into a real diplo-matic forum almost eight years later. On 16 June 2009, the heads of state of the four BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) held their first official summit in Yekaterinburg, Russia, at the end of which they claimed “a more democratic and just multipolar world order”.
15Based on a diagnosis of current developments, Giovanni Grevi argues that many factors point to the emergence of an Interpolar world. Interpolarity can be defined as multipo-larity in the age of interdependence. The redistribution of power at the global level, leading to a multipolar international system, and deepening interdependence is the two basic dimensions of the transition away from the post-Cold War world. See Giovanni Grevi, The Interpolar World: A New Scenario, Occasional Paper – No. 79, June 26, 2009. http://www.iss.europa.eu/publica-tions/detail/article/the-interpolar-world-a-new-scenario/
16According to Samuel P. Huntington, “There is now only one superpower. But that does not mean that the world is unipolar. A unipolar system would have one superpower, no significant major powers, and many minor powers.” Huntington thinks, “Contemporary international politics” … “is instead a strange hybrid, a uni-multi-polar system with one superpower and several major powers.” Samuel P Huntington, The Lonely Super Power, April 1999. http://www.iss.europa.eu/publications/detail/article/the-interpolar-world-a-new-scenario/.
17Asymmetrical Multipolarity signifies the scenario when one of the powers becomes markedly stronger than others and if its decision-making elite internalizes an ideology that demands or at least justifies hegemony, the inherently unstable system. In all three such instances known to history —Napoleonic France after 1799, the Kaiserreich from around 1900, and the Third Reich after 1933—the challenge could not be resolved without a major war. Srdja Trifkovic. Unstable Multipolarity. Chronicles, November, . 2008. http://www.mailarchive.com/serbiagooglegroups.com /msg00075.html
18Traditionally, seven major dimensions of power have been identified. These are divided between natural determinants (geography, population and resources) and social determinants (economy, military, diplomacy and culture). Recently soft power is being considered more important than hard power. It depends upon quantity of natural resources, level of urbanization or level of technological advancement, perception of comfort and human resource development.
19Thomas Renard, A BRIC In The World: Emerging Powers, Europe, And The Coming Order, Egmont Paper 31, October, 2009. Published by The Royal Institute for International Relations. www.egmontinstitute.be
20The N-11: More Than an Acronym, Goldman Sachs Economic Research. Global Economics Paper No: 153, March 28, 2008. https://portal.gs.com
21George Friedman, The Next 100 Years : A Forecast For The 21st Century, (New York.2009) pp77-88
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