Madam,
Listening to years of your coverage on world politics, I have the feeling it’s getting more complicated by the week to read through the noise created by US politics on the one hand, and to stay upbeat on the other. US “noise” is overshadowing each of your episodes, with one outrageous announcement followed by the next in short intervals. The reckoning that our old world order is dead and there’s no clear alternative in sight, makes me wonder what a way out could look like for those of us that haven’t abandoned the concept of a rules-based world order and that still believe that freedom and democracy are preferable to any alternative.
Annika Brockschmidt’s “The Arsonists” confirms what emerges from your weekly coverage: the United States of America are evolving in a direction, politically as well as socially, that is no longer part of what used to be “the western world”. This development has been in progress for decades, the current administration has simply stopped pretending otherwise. The rest of this club is frantically trying to keep the US in, and preserve the old order. But that is a lost cause. You shouldn’t force somebody to stay in a club they don’t want to be in, and actively try to blow up.
Sticking to a liberal, democratic, and rules-based order is an aspiration I can subscribe to. It is in line with centuries of enlightenment, secularization, freedom struggles and efforts to avoid wars that kept getting more disastrous, peaking in two world wars of unimaginable brutality. But “If we want everything to stay the same, everything has to change”, as Tomasi di Lampedusa wrote in times of political upheaval. I therefore think it might be time to let America go its own way, to figure out what it wants and what its place in the world can be.
In the meantime, countries and societies that keep subscribing to that liberal, democratic, and rules-based order should get together and organize. First and foremost, there needs to be a confirmation to what is being committed to. The concepts of liberalism or defense of freedoms for citizens might need re-definition in the context of today’s world. If a liberal society cannot defend itself against its adversaries, it is doomed. But it cannot compromise on core liberal values without losing its north. What are the rules we want to base our way of life on? How to guarantee freedom, prosperity, openness, tolerance, but at the same time be able to defend it against the many adversaries that wish for this way of life to fail?
Agreeing on how to defend these concepts is key. Having grand ideals when your adversaries can constantly sabotage them and undermine your society is pointless. The free world needs to accept that in times of aggression by opponents, a certain degree of our freedoms might have to be temporarily suspended to defend our system. In today’s world, where might is right, countries that are not part of the “free world” are fighting an active war of disinformation, divide-and-conquer and in some cases a plain old conventional war against it. This assessment includes the US as one of these adversaries of the free world. Nixon, Bush Jr, two-times Trump – the trajectory doesn’t bode well for the future.
Who is in the “free world club” though? I see Europe beyond just the EU in it. Assuming that after Poland and Hungary we can also get rid of the “foreign agents” in governments like Slovakia, Serbia, Georgia or Turkey, Europe is right now the single biggest area in the world where a liberal, democratic and rules-based order is a reality, as imperfect as each of its parts might be. But Europe is not alone. Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan should all be part of this club, as might be countries like Chile, Uruguay or Costa Rica. It is key to its concept that such an alliance must be global, diverse, and bound by the fundamental commitment to the values described above. Together this alliance of free countries not only spans the globe, but can also easily rival other powers like the US and China, and keep nuisances like Russia, Iran or North Korea at bay.
This bloc represents just 13% of the world’s population, but 29% of its GDP, 22% of global military spending, 44% of global trade. It holds chokepoint positions in global industries like semiconductors and chipmaking equipment, advanced industrial machinery, capital goods, mobility, pharma, finance, energy, minerals, agriculture, aerospace and defence. If this group were to form a single common market combined with a NATO-like defence alliance, its power and global presence would keep adversaries at bay. It could make sure that its core values, liberalism, democracy and a rules based order are not only the norm, but will also be enforced with geopolitical power behind it – within the club as well as outside of it. Its sheer scale would project an aspirational way of life for the rest of the world, the US included.
This club of countries needs to assert its own strength, become self aware of its might, and play a proactive role on the world stage. It should rid itself of occupying forces, like US military bases, and redefine the world order in its own sense. Its way of life, prosperity and liberty are the envy of millions in the rest of the world. Organizing this group, formulating its ambitions and asserting its strength would give its cause a big boost, instead of hiding behind a “fading star” attitude. In today’s world, freedom and liberty are as modern ideals as ever before.
I’m pretty sure that listening to your weekly coverage of world news would sound a lot more cheerful under such circumstances.
