Challenging the Inevitability of the Liberal World Order
Rodger Baker
Director, Stratfor Center for Applied Geopolitics at RANE, Stratfor
MIN READJul 26, 2018 | 08:00 GMT
This picture shows a session of the U.N. General Assembly from June 13. Institutions like the United Nations, the World Trade Organization and others represent the liberal world order -- a global system that is not as inevitable as first believed.
(DON EMMERT/AFP/Getty Images)
The liberal world order is neither inherently universal, nor is it the inevitable path of societies across the globe. Democracy itself evolved out of a particular strand of Western philosophy, and its application has been far from equal across place and time. But just because a Western-oriented liberal model has driven the trends of globalization, political development and economic growth for nearly the past century – and particularly since the end of the Cold War – that doesn't mean it will continue in perpetuity. Instead, there is little to indicate that the liberal world order will be the destiny of everyone....
