The National Interest.
THE OLD Order no longer qualifies as an order. The term “world order”
denotes a stable distribution of power across the world. But power
concentration today is in a state of tremendous flux, characterized by
rapid diffusion and entropy toward a broad set of emerging powers that
now share the regional and global stage. Western-centered
multilateralism represents at best a partial component of a world system
that is increasingly fragmented.
Nostalgia for the post–World War II or post–Cold War periods will not
affect this picture. At those junctures, America had an opportunity to
fashion a new world order. After World War II, America capitalized on
this moment; after the Cold War, it squandered it. The world has moved
beyond even the assumptions embedded in President George H. W. Bush’s
famous “new world order” speech to a joint session of Congress two
decades ago in which he envisioned a unipolar order managed through a
multilateral system. Instead, the world has quickly become multipolar,
institutionally polycentric and even “multiactor,” meaning nonstate
groups such as corporations and NGOs are commanding more and more
influence on key issues. This trend seems irreversible, and it needs to
be digested before any kind of new global-governance mechanism can be
formulated, with or without American leadership.
One leading contributor to the demise of the Old Order has been the
so-called rising powers such as China, India, Russia and Brazil. These
states increasingly serve as anchors of regional order and also wield
influence beyond their immediate neighborhoods. By most measures, China
is already a superpower; its presence is factored into diplomatic,
economic and strategic decisions by nearly all countries worldwide.
India, Brazil and Russia lag behind China, but it’s a reality of
geopolitics that states do not need to forge new systems of order to
undermine the existing one.
The set of nations that can influence
global system dynamics and great-power foreign policy is much broader
than just those countries famously labeled the BRICS (short for Brazil,
Russia, India, China and South Africa). What I have called “Second
World” nations coalesce into regional entities of significance—Latin
America, the Middle East, central Asia, Southeast Asia—whose composite
nations and complex regional dynamics will help shape the future of
geopolitics. Second World states are important for their geographic
position, natural resources and regional influence. Some of these states
I have highlighted are Colombia, Algeria, the United Arab Emirates,
Iran, Kazakhstan and Indonesia. All are pivotal Second World players
whose decisions and alignments could affect the balance of power and
influence among the United States, China and the European Union.
