Experts from the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), have conducted an analysis of geopolitical, military and technological trends in global security, and prepared a final report, identifying the overall shape of the emerging world order and analyzing the dynamics of the processes under way in order to develop recommendations on the formation of “the most effective pathways for US engagement” in this new order.
It is now a matter of course that the current transition to a multipolar world order in the ideological sphere is accompanied by efforts from Western and, above all, American experts to justify the inviolability of the United States’ hold on the elusive position of global leader.
In this regard, attempts to define the real place of the United States in the dynamically changing power balance of today’s world cannot fail to attract notice, especially when they come from one of the most unbending “ideological pillars” of Pax Americana.
Such an attempt was made not so long ago by experts from the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a leading think tank that helps to define US political thinking.
The final report is the result of a series of discussions, publications, and expert analyses by leading global specialists, conducted by the Center in order to identify overall shape of the emerging world order, analyze the dynamics of the processes underway and make recommendations on how to shape “the most effective pathways for US engagement” in this new order.
Configuration of the new world order
What does the emerging configuration of the new world order look like according to the views of the Center’s experts? In their discussion of the mechanisms of change, they first of all admit that the world today is fragmented, faces multiple challenges and threats, and that the result of the current changes is a global shift in the balance of power.
The main result of the ongoing structural changes is that the so-called Global South nations are seen as playing the main role in global politics and economics in the emerging world order. The CSIS experts highlight the significant economic potential of this group of countries compared to the bloc of Western developed and industrialized nations. They recognize that while in the 1990s the G-7 countries represented 12 percent of the world’s population and 50 percent of the global economy, by 2030 they are projected to represent 17 percent of the world’s population and about 40 percent of the global economy. During the above period, the focus of their report, the Global South, despite the far from homogenous, highly diverse and generally tentative nature of this grouping, is expected to experience significant growth in terms of its total population, economic power and influence in the world.
Radical changes are required in the system of global political governance
Given the above background, the CSIS document sees as inevitable the coming change in the system of global political governance, which in its current form has existed since the late 1940s and which, according to the states of the Global South, needs to undergo radical change in order to reflect current conditions. In particular, the report stresses that one of the priority tasks facing the US should be to initiate a reform of the UN Security Council, significantly expanding its composition by including more states from the Global South, and, possibly, to agree to the demands to revise the role played in this global governance body by Great Britain and France, given their status as former colonial powers.
Another important aspect of the formation of a new world order highlighted in the Center’s report is the ongoing shift in the focus of the traditional rivalry between the superpowers towards the Global South. The authors of the report admit, with undisguised regret, that China and Russia are shrewdly taking advantage of the “anti-imperialist” sentiments in the states of the Global South.
US leadership is no longer unconditional
A telling example in this regard is the outcome of the vote at the UN General Assembly of a resolution initiated by the United States proposing the removal of Russia from the UN Human Rights Committee, which was supported by only 24 partner states and allies of the United States, while the delegations of 58 states, mostly from the Global South, abstained. The shock for the authors was not so much the figures themselves, but the processes they reflect. The vote clearly showed that while the US and its allies still believe in a “rules-based” world order, the global majority sees the world differently. Highlighting this divergence, the report quotes India’s Minister of External Affairs Subrahmanyam Jaishankar: “Europe has to grow out of the mindset that Europe’s problems are the world’s problems, but the world’s problems are not Europe’s problems.”
Thus, unlike the majority of their colleagues, who seek to “ignore” the ongoing loss of the United States’ leadership position, the experts from the CSIS call on the US to recognize the ongoing changes in the world and adapt to them. Nevertheless, the authors of the report are unable to overcome the biases of the traditional Western “liberal” paradigm. As a consequence, the CSIS recommendations for the Washington administration include a call for a determined effort to identify “like-minded ideological thinkers” among the nations of the Global South, to take into account the disunity of these countries, and their continued adherence to Western values, and in strategic terms, to focus on the transformation of existing military and political blocs and economic alliances and the formation of new ones under the auspices of the United States as a basis of the coming global world order. However, it seems that in the eyes of the states of Asia, Africa and Latin America, such initiatives have long since lost their appeal and it is unlikely that they will meet with the hoped-for response.
Leonid Gladchenko, expert political scientist, member of the Association “Analytica” exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.