风萧萧_Frank
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自由国际秩序的兴衰注定会失败
约翰·米尔斯海默 17 of 50
Bound to Fail, The Rise and Fall of the Liberal International Order
John J. Mearsheimer Sept 11, 2018
到了 2019 年，自由国际秩序显然陷入了严重的麻烦。 支撑它的地壳板块正在移动，修复和拯救它的努力微乎其微。
事实上，这个秩序从一开始就注定要失败，因为它包含着自身毁灭的种子。 自由国际秩序的崩溃让建立这一秩序并在许多方面从中受益的西方精英感到恐惧。
这些精英坚信，这一秩序过去是、现在仍然是促进全球和平与繁荣的重要力量。 他们中的许多人将其垮台归咎于唐纳德·特朗普总统。 毕竟，他在2016年竞选总统时表达了对自由主义秩序的蔑视； 自上任以来，他推行的政策似乎旨在推翻它。 然而，如果认为自由国际秩序仅仅因为特朗普的言论或政策而陷入困境，那就错了。
事实上，更根本的问题正在发挥作用，这就是特朗普能够成功挑战几乎得到西方外交政策精英普遍支持的秩序的原因。 本文的目的是确定自由主义世界秩序为何陷入大麻烦，并确定将取代它的国际秩序。 我提供三组主要论点。
首先，由于现代世界的国家以多种方式紧密相连，因此秩序对于促进高效、及时的互动至关重要。 国际秩序有多种类型，哪种类型的出现主要取决于全球权力的分配。 但当体系是单极时，唯一一极的政治意识形态也很重要。 自由国际秩序只能在主导国家是自由民主国家的单极体系中产生。
约翰·J·米尔斯海默 (John J. Mearsheimer) 是芝加哥大学政治学 R. 温德尔·哈里森 (R. Wendell Harrison) 杰出服务教授。 作者感谢匿名审稿人 Olafur Bjornsson、Joshua Byun、Michael Desch、Charles Glaser、Nicolas Guilhot、Jack Jacobsen、Robert Keohane、Do Young Lee、Jennifer A. Lind、Nuno Monteiro、Paul Poast、Barry Posen、Burak Tan ，尤其是 Eliza Gheorghe、Mariya Grinberg、Sebastian Rosato 和 Stephen Walt 的深刻评论。 他还感谢许多个人在他在柏林的欧洲外交关系委员会、圣母院国际安全中心和芝加哥大学国际安全政策项目上发表本文的早期版本时提供了富有洞察力的评论。
其次，美国自二战以来主导了两种不同的秩序。 冷战秩序有时被错误地称为“自由国际秩序”，它既不是自由的，也不是国际的。 这是一个主要限于西方的有界秩序，并且在所有关键方面都是现实主义的。 它具有某些也符合自由主义秩序的特征，但这些属性是基于现实主义逻辑的。 另一方面，美国领导的冷战后秩序是自由主义和国际性的，因此与美国在冷战期间主导的有界秩序有根本的不同。
第三，冷战后的自由国际秩序注定要崩溃，因为它所依赖的关键政策令人深感敬畏。 在全球范围内传播自由民主对于建立这样的秩序至关重要，不仅极其困难，而且常常毒害与其他国家的关系，有时甚至导致灾难性的战争。 目标国内部的民族主义是推进民主的主要障碍，但均势政治也是重要的阻碍力量。
此外，自由主义秩序倾向于优先考虑国际机构而不是国内考虑，以及它对漏洞百出的（如果不是开放的）边界的坚定承诺，在包括美国单极国家在内的主要自由主义国家内部产生了有毒的政治影响。
这些政策在主权和民族认同等关键问题上与民族主义发生冲突。 由于民族主义是地球上最强大的政治意识形态，每当两者发生冲突时，民族主义总是会战胜自由主义，从而破坏其核心秩序。 此外，试图最大限度地减少全球贸易和投资壁垒的超全球化导致整个自由世界失业、工资下降和收入不平等加剧。 它还使国际金融体系不稳定，导致金融危机反复发生。 这些麻烦随后演变成政治问题，进一步削弱了对自由秩序的支持。
超全球化经济还以另一种方式破坏秩序：它帮助单极以外的国家变得更加强大，这可能会破坏单极并终结自由主义秩序。 这就是随着中国的崛起而发生的事情，它与俄罗斯力量的复兴一起结束了单极时代。 新兴的多极世界将由基于现实主义的国际秩序组成，它将在管理世界经济、处理军控问题以及处理气候变化等全球公域问题方面发挥重要作用。 除了这一新的国际秩序之外，美国和中国还将主导有界秩序，在经济和军事领域相互竞争。
本文的其余部分组织如下。 首先，我解释“秩序”一词的含义以及为什么秩序是国际政治的一个重要特征。 其次，我描述了不同类型的秩序以及自由国际秩序出现的环境。
与此相关的是，我在第三部分研究了国际订单上升和下降的原因。 在第四部分中，我描述了不同的冷战秩序。 在接下来的三节中，我将回顾自由国际秩序的历史。 然后，在接下来的四节中，我解释了它失败的原因。
在倒数第二节中，我讨论多极化下的新秩序会是什么样子。 结论部分简要总结了我的论点和一些政策建议。 什么是订单以及为什么订单很重要？ “秩序”是一个有组织的国际机构团体，有助于管理成员国之间的互动。3秩序还可以帮助成员国与非成员打交道，因为秩序不一定包括世界上的每个国家。 此外，命令可以包括具有区域或全球范围的机构。
大国创造并管理秩序。 国际机构是秩序的基石，实际上是大国制定并同意遵守的规则，因为它们相信遵守这些规则符合它们的利益。 这些规则规定了可接受的行为类型，并禁止了不可接受的行为形式。4毫不奇怪，大国制定这些规则是为了满足自己的利益。 但当规则不符合主导国家的切身利益时，这些国家要么忽视它们，要么重写它们。 例如，乔治·W·布什总统在2003年伊拉克战争前多次强调，即使美国的入侵违反了国际法，“
美国将采取必要措施确保我们国家的安全……我不会等待危险聚集的事态发展。”5 一项命令可以包含不同类型的机构，包括北大西洋公约组织 (NATO)、 《核不扩散条约》（NPT）或《华沙条约》，以及国际货币基金组织（IMF）、北美自由贸易协定、经济合作与发展组织和世界经济组织等经济机构 银行。
它还可以包括处理环境问题的机构，例如应对气候变化的《巴黎协定》，以及更多层面的机构，例如欧盟 (EU)、国际联盟和联合国 (UN)。 秩序在现代国际体系中不可或缺，原因有二。 首先，它们在高度相互依存的世界中管理国家间关系。6 国家从事大量的经济活动，这导致它们建立可以规范这些互动并提高其效率的机构和规则。
但这种相互依存不仅限于经济事务；还包括经济事务。 它还包括环境和健康问题。 例如，一国的污染必然会影响邻国的环境，而全球变暖的影响是普遍的，只能通过多边措施来应对。 此外，正如 1918-20 年致命流感大流行所表明的那样，致命疾病不需要护照就能跨越国际边界。 各国在军事领域也相互联系，这导致它们结成联盟。 为了给对手带来强大的威慑力，或者在威慑力失效的情况下进行有效的战斗，盟国可以从制定规定每个成员的军队如何运作以及如何相互协调的规则中受益。 由于现代军队拥有大量武器，但并非所有武器都与其盟友的武器兼容，因此协调的必要性被放大。
考虑一下北约和华沙条约组织军队中的武器种类繁多，更不用说协调这些联盟内各战斗部队行动的困难了。
毫不奇怪，两个超级大国在冷战期间维持了高度制度化的联盟——实际上也是高度制度化的秩序。 其次，秩序在现代国际体系中不可或缺，因为它有助于大国以符合其利益的方式管理弱国的行为。
具体来说，最强大的国家设计机构来限制较弱的国家的行为，然后对它们施加巨大压力，要求它们加入这些机构并无论如何遵守规则。 然而，这些规则往往有利于体系中较弱的国家。 这种现象的一个很好的例子是超级大国在冷战期间建立防扩散制度的努力。 为此，苏联和美国于 1968 年制定了《不扩散核武器条约》，实际上规定任何没有核武器的成员国获取核武器都是非法的。 自然，莫斯科和华盛顿的领导层竭尽全力让尽可能多的国家加入《不扩散核武器条约》。
超级大国也是 1974 年核供应国集团成立的主要推动力，该集团旨在严格限制向不拥有核武器但可能试图在世界范围内获取核武器的国家出售核材料和技术。 市场。 然而，如果强国认为这样做不符合自己的利益，那么制定秩序的机构就无法强迫这些国家遵守规则。 换句话说，国际机构没有自己的生命，因此无权告诉主要国家该做什么。 它们只是大国的工具。 尽管如此，规则是任何机构的本质，有助于管理国家行为，而大国在大多数时候都会遵守规则。
最重要的是，在一个多方面相互依存的世界中，规则体系对于降低交易成本并帮助进行国家之间发生的多种互动是必要的。 太平洋美军前司令哈里·哈里斯上将抓住了这一点，他将自由国际秩序称为“全球操作系统”。
指令类型 国际体系中的指令之间存在三个重要区别。 第一个区别是国际订单和限界订单之间的区别。 一个国际秩序必须包括世界上所有的强国。 理想情况下，它将包含系统中的每个国家。
相比之下，有界订单由一组成员有限的机构组成。 它们并不包括所有大国，而且通常是区域性的。 在大多数情况下，它们由一个大国主导，尽管两个或多个大国也有可能形成一个有界的秩序，前提是至少有一个大国处于该秩序之外。 简而言之，国际秩序和有界秩序是由大国创造和运行的。
国际秩序主要涉及促进国家之间的合作。 具体来说，它们有助于促进体系内大国之间或世界上几乎所有国家之间的合作。 另一方面，有界秩序的主要目的是让敌对大国之间进行安全竞争，而不是促进它们之间的合作。
然而，领导有界秩序的大国努力促进成员国之间的合作，并在必要时对其进行胁迫。 有界秩序内的高水平合作对于与敌对大国开展安全竞争至关重要。 最后，国际秩序是当代国际政治的一个持续特征，而有界秩序则不然。 只有现实主义的国际秩序才会伴随有界秩序。 第二个主要区别涉及大国可以组织的不同类型的国际秩序：现实主义的、不可知论的或意识形态的（包括自由主义的）。
哪种秩序主要取决于大国之间的权力分配。 关键问题是这个体系是双极、多极还是单极。 如果是单极国家，主导国家的政治意识形态对于决定所形成的国际秩序类型也很重要。 然而，在两极和多极中，大国的政治意识形态在很大程度上是无关紧要的。 现实主义秩序 如果体系是两极或多极的，国际秩序及其组成机构将是现实主义的。
原因很简单：如果世界上存在两个或两个以上的大国，它们别无选择，只能按照现实主义的指令行事，相互进行安全竞争。 他们的目标是以牺牲对手为代价来获得权力，但如果这是不可能的，也要确保权力平衡不会对他们不利。
在这种情况下，意识形态考虑服从于安全考虑。
即使所有大国都是自由国家，情况也是如此。9然而，竞争的大国有时有合作的动机。 毕竟，他们在一个高度相互依赖的世界中运作，他们肯定有一些共同利益。 在现实世界中并行运作的有界秩序和国际秩序有助于敌对大国之间的竞争与合作。 具体而言，大国建立自己的边界秩序，以帮助彼此进行安全竞争。 相比之下，它们组织国际秩序是为了促进它们之间的合作，并且通常也促进与其他国家的合作。 当大国拥有共同利益时，构成国际秩序的机构非常适合帮助它们达成协议。 尽管存在合作问题，大国仍然是竞争对手，其关系的核心是竞争。
即使大国通过国际机构相互合作，权力平衡的考虑也始终在发挥作用。 特别是，任何大国都不会签署削弱其实力的协议。 构成这些现实主义秩序的机构——无论是国际性的还是有界的——有时可能具有与自由主义价值观相一致的特征，但这并不能证明该秩序是自由主义的。 从权力平衡的角度来看，这些功能恰好也有意义。
例如，有界秩序内的关键经济制度可能旨在促进成员国之间的自由贸易，这不是因为自由主义的计算，而是因为经济开放被认为是在该秩序内产生经济和军事力量的最佳方式。
事实上，如果放弃自由贸易并转向更加封闭的经济体系具有良好的战略意义，那么这将按照现实主义的顺序发生。 不可知论和意识形态秩序 如果世界是单极的，国际秩序就不可能是现实主义的。 单极只有一个大国，因此根据定义，大国之间不存在安全竞争，而这是任何现实主义世界秩序的必要条件。
因此，唯一的极点没有理由创建有界秩序。 毕竟，有界秩序主要是为了与其他大国进行安全竞争而设计的，这与单极无关。 然而，非现实主义国际秩序中的一些机构可能是区域性的，而另一些机构的成员资格则真正是全球性的。 然而，这些区域机构都不会捆绑在一起形成有界秩序； 相反，它们将与现行国际秩序中的其他机构或松散或紧密联系。 在单极状态下，国际秩序可以采取两种形式之一——不可知论或意识形态——取决于主导国家的政治意识形态。 关键问题是单极国家是否拥有普世意识形态，即认为其核心价值观和政治制度应该输出到其他国家。 如果单极做出这一假设，世界秩序将是意识形态的。
换句话说，唯一的一极将试图广泛传播其意识形态，并按照自己的形象重塑世界。 它将处于有利位置来实现这一使命，因为它没有必须与之竞争的竞争对手。 当然，自由主义包含强大的普遍主义倾向，这源于它对个人权利重要性的强调。 自由主义的故事以个人主义为核心，认为每个人都拥有一系列不可剥夺的或自然的权利。
因此，自由主义者往往深切关注世界各地人民的权利，无论他们生活在哪个国家。因此，如果单极是一个自由民主国家，那么几乎可以肯定的是，他们会试图建立一个旨在实现以下目标的国际秩序： 按照自己的形象重塑世界。10 自由国际秩序是什么样的？ 该体系中的主导国家显然必须是自由民主国家，并且必须在构成该秩序的关键机构中拥有巨大影响力。
此外，该体系中必须存在大量其他自由民主国家，并且世界经济基本开放。 这些自由民主国家，尤其是领先的自由民主国家的最终目标是在全球范围内传播民主，同时促进更广泛的经济交流并建立日益强大和有效的国际机构。 从本质上讲，其目标是建立一个完全由自由民主国家组成的世界秩序，这些国家在经济上相互接触，并通过一套共同规则结合在一起。
基本假设是，这样的秩序将基本上没有战争，并将为其所有成员国带来繁荣。 共产主义是另一种普遍主义意识形态，可以作为建立意识形态国际秩序的基础。 事实上，马克思主义与自由主义有一些重要的相似之处。 正如约翰·格雷所说，“两者都是期待普世文明的开明意识形态。”
换句话说，自由主义和共产主义都致力于改变世界。 共产主义的普遍主义维度是基于阶级概念，而不是权利。 马克思及其追随者认为，社会阶级超越民族群体和国界。
最重要的是，他们认为资本主义剥削有助于在不同国家的工人阶级之间建立强大的联系。 因此，如果苏联赢得了冷战，并感受到了1989年美国对自由民主的热情，那么苏联领导人肯定会试图建立共产主义国际秩序。 如果单极国家没有普遍主义意识形态，因此不致力于将其政治价值观和治理体系强加给其他国家，那么国际秩序将是不可知的。
主导大国仍将针对挑战其权威的政权，并将深入参与管理构成国际秩序的机构和塑造世界经济以使其符合其自身利益。 然而，它不会致力于在全球范围内塑造地方政治。 相反，唯一的一极在与其他国家打交道时会更加宽容和务实。
如果俄罗斯以其目前的政治体系成为单极国家，那么国际体系将是不可知论的，因为俄罗斯不受普遍主义意识形态的驱动。 中国也是如此，其政权的主要合法性来源是民族主义，而不是共产主义。 这并不是否认共产主义的某些方面对中国统治者仍然具有政治重要性，但北京的领导层几乎没有表现出共产主义通常伴随的传教士热情。
厚订单和薄订单
到目前为止，我已经区分了国际秩序和有界秩序，并将国际秩序分为现实主义秩序、不可知论秩序和意识形态秩序。
对订单进行分类的第三种方法（无论是国际订单还是有限订单）是关注其覆盖国家活动最重要领域的广度和深度。 关于广度，核心问题是命令是否对其成员国的关键经济和军事活动产生一定影响。
关于深度，主要问题是秩序中的机构是否对其成员国的行动产生重大影响。 换句话说，该秩序是否拥有强大而有效的机构？ 考虑到这两个维度，我们就可以区分粗订单和细订单。
厚重或稳健的秩序包括对经济和军事领域的国家行为产生重大影响的制度。 这样的秩序是广泛而深刻的。 另一方面，精简订单可以采用三种基本形式。 首先，它可能只涉及经济或军事领域，但不能同时涉及两者。 即使那个领域有强大的机构，它仍然会被归类为薄秩序。 其次，一项命令可能涉及一个甚至两个领域，但包含薄弱的机构。
第三，秩序有可能（但不太可能）涉及经济和军事事务，但仅在其中一个领域拥有强大的机构。 简而言之，薄秩序要么不广泛，要么根本不深入，要么只深入两个关键领域之一。 图 1 总结了本文中使用的不同类别的订单。
国际秩序的兴衰 没有任何国际秩序能够永远存在，这就提出了一个问题：如何解释现有秩序的消亡和新秩序的兴起？ 权力的分配和领导国家的政治意识形态这两个因素解释了现行秩序，也解释了现实主义和不可知论秩序的衰落以及取代它们的秩序类型。 虽然这些因素也有助于解释意识形态秩序的解体，但另外两个因素，民族主义和均势政治，通常在导致意识形态秩序崩溃的过程中发挥着核心作用。 当潜在的权力分配发生根本性变化时，基于两极或多极的现实主义秩序就会崩溃。
如果国际体系从两极转向多极，或者反之亦然，或多极体系中大国的数量减少或增加，所产生的秩序仍然是现实主义的，尽管其结构有所不同。
无论体系中有多少大国，它们仍然必须相互竞争权力和影响力。 但如果两极或多极让位于单极，新秩序要么是不可知论的，要么是意识形态的，这取决于唯一的一极是否致力于普遍主义意识形态。 现实主义秩序往往具有显着的持久力，因为力量平衡的重大变化通常是大国之间长期经济增长差异的结果。 然而，大国战争有时会导致全球权力分配的迅速变化，尽管这种事件很少见。 15 例如，二战后，体系从多极转向两极，很大程度上是因为大国的彻底失败。 德国和日本以及战争给英国和法国带来的可怕代价。
苏联和美国成为两极。 此外，当现实主义秩序发生变化时，它们通常会让位于新构建的现实主义秩序——就像二战后发生的那样——仅仅是因为单极很少见。 不可知论秩序也往往具有强大的持久力，因为单极接受政治和社会生活固有的异质性，并且不会试图对地球上几乎每个国家的政治进行微观管理。 这种务实的行为即使不能增强霸权，也有助于保持其权力。 当单极性让位于两极性或多极性时，不可知论秩序可能会走向终结，从而使秩序变得现实； 或者，如果唯一的一极在国内经历一场革命并采用普遍主义意识形态，这肯定会导致它形成一种意识形态秩序。
相比之下，任何基于普遍主义意识形态的意识形态国际秩序，例如自由主义或共产主义，注定寿命很短，这主要是因为单极国家试图按照自己的形象重塑世界时会出现国内和全球困难。 。 民族主义和均势政治破坏了政权更迭国家所必需的社会工程，同时民族主义也在后方给唯一的极点及其意识形态盟友制造了重大问题。 当这些问题出现时，单极国家可能会放弃按照自己的形象重塑世界的努力，实际上放弃将意识形态输出到国外的努力。 它甚至可能完全放弃这种意识形态。 当这种情况发生时，秩序就不再是意识形态的，而变得不可知论。
Bound to Fail, The Rise and Fall of the Liberal International Order
John J. Mearsheimer 17 of 50
By 2019, it was clear that the liberal international order was in deep trouble. The tectonic plates that underpin it are shifting, and little can be done to repair and rescue it.
Indeed, that order was destined to fail from the start, as it contained the seeds of its own destruction. The fall of the liberal international order horriªes the Western elites who built it and who have benefited from it in many ways.
These elites fervently believe that this order was and remains an important force for promoting peace and prosperity around the globe. Many of them blame President Donald Trump for its demise. After all, he expressed contempt for the liberal order when campaigning for president in 2016; and since taking ofªce, he has pursued policies that seem designed to tear it down. It would be a mistake, however, to think that the liberal international order is in trouble solely because of Trump’s rhetoric or policies.
In fact, more fundamental problems are at play, which account for why Trump has been able to successfully challenge an order that enjoys almost universal support among the foreign policy elites in the West. The aim of this article is to determine why the liberal world order is in big trouble and to identify the kind of international order that will replace it. I offer three main sets of arguments.
First, because states in the modern world are deeply interconnected in a variety of ways, orders are essential for facilitating efficient and timely interactions. There are different kinds of international orders, and which type emerges depends primarily on the global distribution of power. But when the system is unipolar, the political ideology of the sole pole also matters. Liberal international orders can arise only in unipolar systems where the leading state is a liberal democracy.
John J. Mearsheimer is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. The author is grateful to Olafur Bjornsson, Joshua Byun, Michael Desch, Charles Glaser, Nicolas Guilhot, Jack Jacobsen, Robert Keohane, Do Young Lee, Jennifer A. Lind, Nuno Monteiro, Paul Poast, Barry Posen, Burak Tan, an anonymous reviewer, and especially Eliza Gheorghe, Mariya Grinberg, Sebastian Rosato, and Stephen Walt for their incisive comments. He also thanks the many individuals who offered insightful comments when he presented earlier versions of this article at the European Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin, the Notre Dame International Security Center, and the Program on International Security Policy at the University of Chicago.
Second, the United States has led two different orders since World War II. The Cold War order, which is sometimes mistakenly referred to as a “liberal international order,” was neither liberal nor international. It was a bounded order that was limited mainly to the West and was realist in all its key dimensions. It had certain features that were also consistent with a liberal order, but those attributes were based on realist logic. The U.S.-led post–Cold War order, on the other hand, is liberal and international, and thus differs in fundamental ways from the bounded order the United States dominated during the Cold War.
Third, the post–Cold War liberal international order was doomed to collapse, because the key policies on which it rested are deeply ºawed. Spreading liberal democracy around the globe, which is of paramount importance for building such an order, not only is extremely difficult, but often poisons relations with other countries and sometimes leads to disastrous wars. Nationalism within the target state is the main obstacle to the promotion of democracy, but balance of power politics also function as an important blocking force.
Furthermore, the liberal order’s tendency to privilege international institutions over domestic considerations, as well as its deep commitment to porous, if not open borders, has had toxic political effects inside the leading liberal states themselves, including the U.S. unipole.
Those policies clash with nationalism over key issues such as sovereignty and national identity. Because nationalism is the most powerful political ideology on the planet, it invariably trumps liberalism whenever the two clash, thus undermining the order at its core. In addition, hyperglobalization, which sought to minimize barriers to global trade and investment, resulted in lost jobs, declining wages, and rising income inequality throughout the liberal world. It also made the international ªnancial system less stable, leading to recurring ªnancial crises. Those troubles then morphed into political problems, further eroding support for the liberal order.
A hyperglobalized economy undermines the order in yet another way: it helps countries other than the unipole grow more powerful, which can undermine unipolarity and bring the liberal order to an end. This is what is happening with the rise of China, which, along with the revival of Russian power, has brought the unipolar era to a close. The emerging multipolar world will consist of a realist-based international order, which will play an important role in managing the world economy, dealing with arms control, and handling problems of the global commons such as climate change. In addition to this new international order, the United States and China will lead bounded orders that will compete with each other in both the economic and military realms.
The remainder of this article is organized as follows. First, I explain what the term “order” means and why orders are an important feature of international politics. Second, I describe the different kinds of orders and the circumstances under which a liberal international order will emerge.
Relatedly, I examine in the third section what accounts for the rise and decline of international orders. In the fourth section, I describe the different Cold War orders. In the next three sections, I recount the history of the liberal international order. Then, in the subsequent four sections, I explain why it failed.
In the penultimate section, I discuss what the new order will look like under multipolarity. The conclusion provides a brief summary of my argument and some policy recommendations. What Is an Order and Why Do Orders Matter? An “order” is an organized group of international institutions that help govern the interactions among the member states.3 Orders can also help member states deal with nonmembers, because an order does not necessarily include every country in the world. Furthermore, orders can comprise institutions that have a regional or a global scope.
Great powers create and manage orders. International institutions, which are the building blocks of orders, are effectively rules that the great powers devise and agree to follow, because they believe that obeying those rules is in their interest. The rules prescribe acceptable kinds of behavior and proscribe unacceptable forms of behavior.4 Unsurprisingly, the great powers write those rules to suit their own interests. But when the rules do not accord with the vital interests of the dominant states, those same states either ignore them or rewrite them. For example, President George W. Bush emphasized on numerous occasions before the 2003 Iraq War that even if a U.S. invasion violated international law, “
America will do what is necessary to ensure our nation’s security...I will not wait on events, while dangers gather.”5 An order can contain different kinds of institutions, including security institutions such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), or the Warsaw Pact, as well as economic institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the North American Free Trade Agreement, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, and the World Bank.
It can also include institutions that deal with the environment, such as the Paris Agreement to tackle climate change, and more multifaceted institutions such as the European Union (EU), the League of Nations, and the United Nations (UN). Orders are indispensable in the modern international system for two reasons. First, they manage interstate relations in a highly interdependent world.6 States engage in enormous amounts of economic activity, which leads them to establish institutions and rules that can regulate those interactions and make them more efficient.
But that interdependence is not restricted to economic affairs; it also includes environmental and health issues. Pollution in one country, for example, invariably affects the environment in neighboring countries, while the effects of global warming are universal and can be dealt with only through multilateral measures. Moreover, deadly diseases do not need passports to cross international boundaries, as the lethal inºuenza pandemic of 1918–20 made clear. States are also interconnected in the military realm, which leads them to form alliances. To present an adversary with a formidable deterrent or to fight effectively should deterrence break down, allies beneªt from having rules that stipulate how each member's military will operate and how they will coordinate with each other. The need for coordination is magniªed because modern militaries possess a vast array of weapons, not all of which are compatible with their allies’ weaponry.
Consider the wide variety of weapons in the militaries that made up NATO and the Warsaw Pact, not to mention the difªculty of coordinating the movements of the various fighting forces inside those alliances. It is unsurprising that both superpowers maintained heavily institutionalized alliances—and indeed heavily institutionalized orders—during the Cold War. Second, orders are indispensable in the modern international system be cause they help the great powers manage the behavior of the weaker states in ways that suit the great powers’ interests.
Specifically, the most powerful states design institutions to constrain the actions of less powerful states and then put signiªcant pressure on them to join those institutions and obey the rules no matter what. Nevertheless, those rules often work to the beneªt of the weaker states in the system. A good example of this phenomenon is the superpowers’ efforts during the Cold War to build a nonproliferation regime. Toward that end, in 1968 the Soviet Union and the United States devised the NPT, which effectively made it illegal for any member state that did not have nuclear weapons to acquire them. Naturally, the leadership in Moscow and Washington went to great lengths to get as many states as possible to join the NPT.
The superpowers were also the main driving force behind the formation of the Nuclear Suppliers Group in 1974, which aims to place signiªcant limits on the sale of nuclear materials and technologies to countries that do not possess nuclear weapons, but might attempt to acquire them in the market. The institutions that make up an order, however, cannot compel powerful states to obey the rules if those states believe that doing so is not in their interest. International institutions, in other words, do not take on a life of their own, and thus do not have the power to tell the leading states what to do. They are simply tools of the great powers. Still, rules, which are the essence of any institution, help manage the behavior of states, and great powers obey the rules most of the time.
The bottom line is that in a world of multifaceted interdependence, a system of rules is necessary to lower transaction costs and help carry out the multitude of interactions that take place among states. Adm. Harry Harris, a former commander of U.S. military forces in the Paciªc, captures this point when he referred to the liberal international order as the “Global Operating System.”
Types of Orders There are three important distinctions among the orders that populate the international system. The ªrst difference is between international orders and bounded orders. For an order to be international, it must include all of the world’s great powers. Ideally, it would contain every country in the system.
In contrast, bounded orders consist of a set of institutions that have limited mem bership. They do not include all of the great powers, and they are usually regional in scope. In most cases, they are dominated by a single great power, although it is possible for two or more great powers to form a bounded order, provided at least one great power remains outside of it. In short, international and bounded orders are created and run by great powers.
International orders are concerned mainly with facilitating cooperation between states. Speciªcally, they help foster cooperation either among the great powers in the system or among virtually all the countries in the world. Bounded orders, on the other hand, are designed mainly to allow rival great powers to wage security competition with each other, not to advance cooperation between them.
Nevertheless, great powers that lead bounded orders work hard to foster cooperation among the member states, coercing them if necessary. High levels of cooperation within the bounded order are essential for waging security competition with opposing great powers. Lastly, international orders are a constant feature of contemporary international politics, whereas bounded orders are not. Only realist international orders are accompanied by bounded orders. The second major distinction concerns the different kinds of international orders that great powers can organize: realist, agnostic, or ideological (to include liberal).
Which order takes hold depends primarily on the distribution of power among the great powers. The key issue is whether the system is bipolar, multipolar, or unipolar. If it is unipolar, the political ideology of the dominant state also matters for determining the kind of international order that forms. In bipolarity and multipolarity, however, the political ideology of the great powers is largely irrelevant. realist orders The international order—and the institutions that make it up—will be realist if the system is either bipolar or multipolar.
The reason is simple: if there are two or more great powers in the world, they have little choice but to act according to realist dictates and engage in security competition with each other. Their aim is to gain power at the expense of their adversaries, but if that is not possible, to make sure that the balance of power does not shift against them. Ideological considerations are subordinated to security considerations in these circumstances.
That would be true even if all the great powers were liberal states.9 Nevertheless, rival great powers sometimes have an incentive to coop erate. After all, they operate in a highly interdependent world, where they are sure to have some common interests. Bounded and international orders, which operate side by side in a realist world, help opposing great powers compete and cooperate among themselves. Speciªcally, the great powers establish their own bounded orders to help wage security competition with each other. In contrast, they organize international orders to facilitate cooperation between themselves and often with other countries as well. The institutions that make up an international order are well suited for helping great powers reach agreements when those states have common interests. This concern with cooperation notwithstanding, the great powers are still rivals whose relationship is competitive at its core.
Balance of power considerations are always at play, even when great powers work through international institutions to cooperate with each other. In particular, no great power is going to sign an agreement that diminishes its power. The institutions that make up these realist orders—be they international or bounded—might sometimes have features that are consistent with liberal values, but this is not evidence that the order is liberal. Those features just happen to also make sense from a balance of power perspective.
For example, the key economic institutions inside a bounded order might be oriented to facilitate free trade among the member states, not because of liberal calculations, but because economic openness is considered the best way to generate economic and military power inside that order.
Indeed, if abandoning free trade and moving toward a more closed economic system made good strategic sense, that would happen in a realist order. agnostic and ideological orders If the world is unipolar, the international order cannot be realist. Unipolarity has only one great power, and thus by deªnition there can be no security competition between great powers, which is a sine qua non of any realist world order.
Consequently, the sole pole has little reason to create a bounded order. After all, bounded orders are mainly designed for waging security competition with other great powers, which is irrelevant in unipolarity. Nevertheless, some of the institutions in that nonrealist international order might be regional in scope, whereas others will be truly global in terms of their membership. None of those regional institutions, however, would be bundled together to form a bounded order; they would instead be either loosely or tightly linked with the other institutions in the prevailing international order. In unipolarity, an international order can take one of two forms—agnostic or ideological—depending on the political ideology of the leading state. The key issue is whether the unipole has a universalistic ideology, one that assumes that its core values and its political system should be exported to other countries. If the unipole makes this assumption, the world order will be ideological.
The sole pole, in other words, will try to spread its ideology far and wide and remake the world in its own image. It would be well positioned to pursue that mission, because there are no rival great powers with which it must compete. Liberalism, of course, contains within it a powerful universalistic strand, which stems from its emphasis on the importance of individual rights. The liberal story, which is individualistic at its core, maintains that every person has a set of inalienable or natural rights.
As such, liberals tend to be deeply concerned about the rights of people all around the world, regardless of which country they live in. Thus, if the unipole is a liberal democracy, it is almost certain to try to create an international order that aims to reshape the world in its own image.10 What does a liberal international order look like? The dominant state in the system obviously must be a liberal democracy and must have enormous inºuence within the key institutions that populate the order.
Furthermore, there must be a substantial number of other liberal democracies in the system and a largely open world economy. The ultimate goal of these liberal democracies, especially the leading one, is to spread democracy across the globe, while promoting greater economic intercourse and building increasingly powerful and effective international institutions. In essence, the aim is to create a world order consisting exclusively of liberal democracies that are economically engaged with each other and bound together by sets of common rules.
The underlying assumption is that such an order will be largely free of war and will generate prosperity for all of its member states. Communism is another universalistic ideology that could serve as the basis for building an ideological international order. Indeed, Marxism shares some important similarities with liberalism. As John Gray puts it, “Both were enlightened ideologies that look forward to universal civilization.”
Both liberalism and communism, in other words, are bent on transforming the world. Communism’s universalistic dimension is based on the concept of class, not rights. Marx and his followers maintain that social classes transcend national groups and state borders.
Most importantly, they argue that capitalist exploita tion has helped foster a powerful bond among the working classes in different countries. Hence, if the Soviet Union had won the Cold War and had felt the kind of enthusiasm for Marxism in 1989 that the United States felt for liberal democracy, Soviet leaders surely would have tried to build a communist international order. If the unipole does not have a universalistic ideology, and therefore is not committed to imposing its political values and governing system on other countries, the international order would be agnostic.
The dominant power would still target regimes that challenged its authority and would still be deeply involved in both managing the institutions that make up the international order and molding the world economy to ªt with its own interests. It would not, however, be committed to shaping local politics on a global scale. The sole pole would instead be more tolerant and pragmatic in its dealings with other countries.
If Russia, with its present political system, were ever to become a unipole, the international system would be agnostic, as Russia is not driven by a universalistic ideology. The same is true of China, where the regime’s principal source of legitimacy is nationalism, not communism. This is not to deny that some aspects of communism still have political importance for China’s rulers, but the leadership in Beijing displays little of the missionary zeal that usually comes with communism.
thick and thin orders
So far, I have distinguished between international and bounded orders, and I have divided international orders into realist, agnostic, and ideological kinds.
A third way to categorize orders—be they international or bounded—is to focus on the breadth and depth of their coverage of the most important areas of state activity. Regarding breadth, the central question is whether an order has some effect on the key economic and military activities of its member states.
Concerning depth, the main question is whether the institutions in the order exert signiªcant inºuence on the actions of its member states. In other words, does the order have strong and effective institutions? With these two dimensions in mind, one can distinguish between thick or ders and thin orders.
A thick or robust order comprises institutions that have a substantial effect on state behavior in both the economic and military realms. Such an order is broad and deep. A thin order, on the other hand, can take three basic forms. First, it might deal with only the economic or military domain, but not both. Even if that realm contained strong institutions, it would still be categorized as a thin order. Second, an order might deal with one or even both realms, but contain weak institutions.
Third, it is possible, but unlikely, that an order will be involved with economic and military matters, but will have strong institutions in only one of those areas. In short, a thin order is either not broad, not deep at all, or deep in only one of the two crucial realms. Figure 1 summarizes the different categories of orders employed in this article.
The Rise and Decline of International Orders No international order lasts forever, which raises the question: What explains the demise of an existing order and the rise of a new one? The same two factors that account for the prevailing order, the distribution of power and the leading state’s political ideology, explain the fall of realist and agnostic orders as well as the kind of order that replaces them. While those same factors also help explain the dissolution of ideological orders, two other factors, nationalism and balance of power politics, usually play the central role in causing their collapse. Realist orders, which are based on either bipolarity or multipolarity, collapse when the underlying distribution of power changes in fundamental ways.
If the international system shifts from bipolarity to multipolarity or vice versa, or if the number of great powers in a multipolar system decreases or increases, the resulting order remains realist, although different in its conªguration. Regardless of the number of great powers in the system, they still must compete with each other for power and inºuence. But if bipolarity or multipolarity gives way to unipolarity, the new order will be either agnostic or ideological, depending on whether or not the sole pole is committed to a universalistic ideology. Realist orders tend to have signiªcant staying power, because major shifts in the balance of power are usually the result of differential economic growth among the great powers over a long period of time. Great power wars, however, can sometimes lead to a swift change in the global distribution of power, although such events are rare.15 After World War II, for example, the system shifted from multipolar to bipolar, largely because of the total defeat of Germany and Japan and the terrible price the war exacted on Britain and France.
The Soviet Union and the United States emerged as the two poles. Moreover, when realist orders change, they usually give way to newly conªgured realist orders—as happened after World War II—simply because unipolarity is rare. Agnostic orders also tend to have substantial staying power, because the unipole accepts the heterogeneity that is inherent in political and social life and does not try to micromanage the politics of nearly every country on the planet. That kind of pragmatic behavior helps preserve, if not augment, the hegemon’s power. An agnostic order is likely to meet its end when unipolarity gives way to either bipolarity or multipolarity, making the order realist; or if the sole pole experiences a revolution at home and adopts a universalistic ideology, which would surely lead it to forge an ideological order.
By contrast, any ideological international order based on a universalistic ideology, such as liberalism or communism, is destined to have a short life span, mainly because of the domestic and global difªculties that arise when the unipole seeks to remake the world in its own image. Nationalism and balance of power politics work to undermine the requisite social engineering in countries targeted for regime change, while nationalism also creates signiªcant problems on the home front for the sole pole and its ideological allies. When such problems emerge, the unipole is likely to give up trying to remake the world in its own image, in effect abandoning its efforts to export its ideology abroad. It might even forsake that ideology altogether. When that happens, the order stops being ideological and becomes agnostic.
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