Renaissance legal thinker Hugo Grotius engaged in some groundbreaking thinking during his life.
He saw a world governed by law and not by brute force, as he was the progenitor of the idea of international law. What do we have today? Writers Dan Rodrick and Stephen Walt give us the answer in their story “How to Build a Better Order: Limiting Great Power Rivalry in an Anarchic World.” The world order is deteriorating before our eyes, and Roderick and Walt correctly give us a picture of what’s emerging: “the relative decline of United States power and the concomitant rise of China have eroded the partially liberal, rules-based system once dominated by the United States and its allies. Repeated financial crises, rising inequality, renewed protectionism, the COVID-19 pandemic, and growing reliance on economic sanctions have brought the post-Cold War era of hyperglobalization to an end.” Shifting domestic priorities in many countries and increasingly competitive geopolitics have halted the drive for greater economic integration and blocked efforts to address looming global dangers.
What will emerge out of the current state of international relations? It is easy to imagine a less prosperous and more dangerous world characterized by an increasingly hostile US and China, a remilitarized Europe, inward-oriented regional economic blocs, a digital realm divided along geopolitical lines, and the growing weaponization of economic relations for strategic ends. However, there is an alternative vision – one where the US and China and other world powers compete in some areas and cooperate in others. It would be a world where great powers observe norms designed to preserve the main elements of an open world economy and prevent armed conflict while allowing other countries greater leeway to address economic and social priorities at home. Then there is a more optimistic vision – a world where the leading powers actively work together to limit the effects of climate change, improve global health, reduce the threat of weapons of mass destruction, and jointly manage regional crises.
Moving in a different direction is not as challenging as some think. Let’s look at the efforts of the U.S.-China Trade Policy Working Group—a forum convened in 2019 by New York University legal scholar Jeffrey S. Lehman, Chinese economist Yang Yao, and Dani Rodrik to map out a more constructive approach to bilateral ties— a simple, four-part framework to guide relations among major powers, as suggested by Rodrick and Walt.
This framework includes only minimal agreement on core principles and acknowledges that there will be enduring disagreements about how many issues should be addressed. Rather than imposing a detailed set of prescriptive rules (as the World Trade Organization and other international organizations do), this framework would function as a device for guiding a process through which rival states or even adversaries could seek agreement or accommodation on a host of issues. When they do not agree, adopting the framework can still enhance communication among them, and offer them incentives to avoid inflicting harm on others, even as they pursue their own interests.
This framework could be put in place by the United States, China, and other major powers themselves, as they deal with a variety of contentious issues – climate change and global security. As has already been shown on several occasions, the approach could provide what a single-minded focus on great-power competition cannot: a way for rival powers and even adversaries to find common ground. Incentives to compete are ever present in a world lacking a central authority, and the strongest powers will flex their muscles. If the major powers make economic and geopolitical dominance their overriding goal, the prospects for a more orderly world are slim. However, political leaders can still decide whether to support all-out rivalry or strive for something better. Rodrick and Walt made a wonderful analogy in their story: “human beings cannot suspend the force of gravity, but they eventually learned to overcome its effects and took to the skies.”
The deterioration of the post-Cold War rules-based order need not result in great-power conflict. Although the United States and China both want security, that goal does not mean the two countries can’t have national and international goals. A country that invested all its resources in military capabilities and neglected other objectives—such as an equitable and prosperous economy or the climate transition—would not be secure in several years. The great powers’ main concern should be the way security is pursued and the tradeoffs states face when balancing security and other important goals.
Rodrick and Walt point to a possible future: “a future world order will need to accommodate non-Western powers and tolerate greater diversity in national institutional arrangements and practices. Western policy preferences will prevail less, the quest for harmonization across economies that defined the era of hyperglobalization will be attenuated, and each country will have to be granted greater leeway in managing its economy, society, and political system. International institutions such as the World Trade Organization and the International Monetary Fund will have to adapt to that reality. Rather than more conflict, however, these pressures could lead to a new and more stable order.” The two go on to address the interactions between nation states: “those that are prohibited, those in which mutual adjustments by two or more states could benefit all parties, those undertaken by a single state, and those that require multilateral involvement. This four-part approach does not assume that rival powers trust one another at the outset or even agree on which actions or issues belong in which category, but over time, successfully addressing disagreements within this framework would do much to increase trust and reduce the possibility of conflict.”
What is the future of the US and the world? Do we follow a diplomatic path or not?
Jason Sibert is the Lead Writer for the Peace Economy Project
