The liberal international order is dead. Long live the liberal international order.
Can a new international order can be built on classical liberal foundations?
By Edwin van de Haar, author of Human Nature and World Affairs: An Introduction to Classical Liberalism and International Relations Theory
Even before President Trump took office, the global balance of power and the international political order were shifting, resulting in greater instability, uncertainty, and insecurity. But Trump’s recent actions—such as launching a global trade tariff war, siding with Russia in an attempt to end the war in Ukraine, desiring to annex Canada and “buy” Greenland—have accelerated the decline of the so-called "liberal international order". Contrary to what many commentators believe, this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, because the concept of the “liberal international order” is largely rooted in social liberalism, as are most liberal theories in the field of international relations.
The best-known thinker on the liberal international order is Professor G. John Ikenberry (Princeton), who outlines that its development began after World War I, influenced by US President Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points for world order. These included proposals to establish the League of Nations (which the US ultimately did not join), calls for transparency in treaty-making, free trade, and decolonisation. This approach failed dismally, but was nevertheless revived in the “free and democratic West” after World War II—again under American leadership. The United Nations was meant to be the central international organisation, which expanded with a host of specialised agencies like UNRWA and UNICEF. More international organisations were established as well, the most prominent being the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the GATT (later Word Trade Organisation). International law exploded. After the Cold War, this system was extended to include former communist countries and various previously non-aligned nations such as India and Indonesia, making it a full global order, although many countries and leaders only paid lip service to its ideals and foundations.
According to Ikenberry, the key feature of the liberal international order is a system of sovereign states (preferably but not limited to liberal democracies) with open, mutual relations, governed by international law, international organisations and other agreements. Although defence cooperation (such as NATO) is an inseparable part of the liberal international order, the larger idea is to constrain power politics through international organisation, not least through the development of mutual interdependence between states. The belief is that global trade, international negotiations, and legal obligations help maintain peace. While there is little convincing evidence for this, as the many wars of recent decades demonstrate, Ikenberry and his supporters still claim that countries in the liberal international order are united by shared values and a common goal of continuous improvement—both materially and in pursuit of a “socially just world”.
Ikenberry’s view is open to criticism, as it’s debatable whether this is an accurate portrayal of international politics over the past decades, where power politics has remained a central tenet. The idea that we are moving towards a socially just world has always been utopian, but is solidly attached to liberalism in world politics, often based on erroneous interpretations of Kant’s Perpetual Peace or the writings of John Rawls. The same applies to the overly simplistic idea (also held by some classical liberals) that trade fosters peace, with Adam Smith as the main victim of misinterpretation.
Recently, Trump’s and Putin’s actions have pushed idealistic notions of international solidarity and progress to the sidelines. Interstate war is back on European soil, between countries previously tightly bound by mutual trade. International organisations like the WTO have been dysfunctional for some time, and many UN agencies are ineffective. The number of democracies worldwide is also shrinking—The Economist counted only 34 last year. In short: if the liberal international order ever really existed, it’s now largely a thing of the past.
But that does not need to be a tragedy from a classical liberal perspective. The social-liberal international order was steeped in the illusion of manageability—particularly due to the explosion of international law, which supersedes national law, and the proliferation of international organisations. In recent decades, we also saw the rise of “humanitarian interventions”, often in the name of establishing democracy. These interventions rarely succeeded and came at enormous costs in lives and taxpayer money. The liberal international order thus simply posed a threat to individual freedom.
Classical liberal ideas about international relations are a better fit with modern times. The foundations are shared with Ikenberry, such as the state-based international order, and the importance of defence cooperation. Yet classical liberals place more value in the balance of power between states or alliances as a legitimate ordering mechanism—even though war is always a possibility. The principles of national sovereignty and non-intervention are good guides in international politics, as is a foreign policy of restraint. Classical liberals believe that states should be cautious about establishing new rules of international law or creating new international organisations. If these are formed at all, they should be limited to functional, cross-border issues. Development aid rarely works and should be largely abolished—except for temporary emergency relief. Here, Trump has set a laudable example by dismantling USAID. However, his tariff war is misguided: classical liberals, from David Hume to Adam Smith, have long argued that free trade and globalisation offer benefits for all. Higher tariffs obstruct that, as nearly all economists agree. Still, classical liberals have no illusions: this won’t necessarily lead to a more peaceful world.
There is no need to cry over the demise of the current liberal international order, as long as the new order can be built on classical liberal foundations. The chances for this are considerable, because they make a better fit with the world as it is and always has been, rather than the starry-eyed social liberal fantasies that have stained liberalism in international politics for so long.