This book evaluates the current state of world (dis)order at a time of growing populism, nationalism and pandemic panic. It distils the implications of the ‘civilisational state’ for world order.
The retreat of US leadership is mirrored by the decline of both the material and normative liberal multilateral infrastructure it supported. Meanwhile, the rise of China as a challenger is accompanied in political, economic and cultural terms by other emerging powers no longer bound to the norms of 20th century world affairs, notably Turkey, India, China and Russia. By emphasising a cultural lens of analysis alongside robust political and economic analysis, the author offers a prescriptive agenda for the coming post-pandemic age that recognises the changing powers of civilisational, state and hybrid non-state actors. Without overestimating their probabilities, he outlines prospects and preconditions for effective inter-civilisational dialogue and proposes a series of minimal conditions for a multilateral ‘reset’.
This book will appeal to public and private decision-makers, the media, the educated lay public and civil society actors interested in the rise of civilisational politics and its possible consequences for world affairs. It will be of particular interest to students and researchers in the fields of politics, international relations, international political economy, geopolitics, strategic studies, foreign policy and social psychology.
Author(s): Richard Higgott
Series: Innovations in International Affairs
Publisher: Routledge
Year: 2021
Language: English
Pages: 188
City: London
Cover
Endorsement
Half Title
Series Information
Title Page
Copyright Page
Table of Contents
Figures
Preface
Acknowledgements
Introduction: States, Civilisations, Pandemics and Order
The Structure of the Book
Notes
Part I States, Civilisations and World Order
1 Making Sense of Liberal International Order: Concepts and Context
Conceptual Deck-Clearing: Order, Culture and Values
Liberal Order and Beyond: the Argument in Brief
A Little Bit of Economic Theory: Towards a New Mercantilism
Notes
2 International Order, the US–China Relationship and Europe
The Big Picture: Ideology Or Interest in the New Geopolitics?
The US, China and the New Economic Warfare
Coping With the Binary Divide: the EU and Its ‘Existential’ Crisis
Conclusion: From Rules-Based Order to ‘Fight Club’?
Notes
3 Civilisational States and Regions: Actors Beyond a Western Liberal Order
Impressions of Civilisational States
The Philosophical Roots of Chinese Thinking On International Order
China, Cultural Values and a Multilateral World
Putting Cultural Ideals Into Practice
Civilisational Discourse in Russian Geopolitical Thinking
Ideological Transformation in the 20th Century and Its Influence On Russian Foreign Policy
Russia in the 21st Century: Once Again Between West and East
Turkey: a Europe–Asia Pivot?
India: an Emerging Great Power?
Hierarchical Relations in Southeast Asia
Towards Eurasia?
Notes
4 Challenges for World Order: Development, Ecology and Pandemics
Development, Ecology and the Environment
COVID-19 and Beyond: Pandemics and Global Order
A Further Look at the US–China Relationship: the COVID-19 Factor
Notes
Part II A Post Pandemic World Order: Towards a Reset?
5 Civilisational Dialogue as a Vehicle for Reforming World Order: Can the Liberalism–nationalism Standoff Be Negotiated?
Core Questions for Our Age
Towards Ambiguous Tolerance in the US–China Relationship
Can We Create a Global Dialogue?
Civilisational Dialogue: Some Questions of Method
Time for a Rethink of Human Nature? The World According to Rutger Bregman
Notes
6 Relearning Multilateralism: The Principled Case for a Global Reset
Community and Moral Solidarity Matter
Shocks On Cooperation: Brake Or Accelerator?
Multilateral Institutions (Still) Matter
Networks and Hybridity Matter
Notes
7 From Principle to Practice in a Multilateral Reset
Towards Hard-Headed Internationalism
Multilateralism and the Search for Leadership
Multilateralism and the Search for Collective Institutional Governance
Notes
8 Ten Propositions and a Provocation On World Order
Proposition One: Liberalism Is in Crisis
Proposition Two: Sovereignty as an Organising Principle Is Under Challenge But Will Not Go Away
Proposition Three: US Leadership Is in Decline, in Both Hard Power and Soft Diplomatic Terms
Proposition Four: Managing Cultural Difference in an Era of Digitalisation Is Now as Important as Managing Economics and Security in International Relations
Proposition Five: Restraining Self-Interest Is Key to Taming and Reforming Globalisation
Proposition Six: New Approaches to International Governance Offer Some Cause for Hope
Proposition Seven: the US and China Are the Main Powers, But It Is Too Early to Write Off Europe
Proposition Eight: Chinese ‘Revisionism’ Needs to Be Engaged
Proposition Nine: Cooperative Dialogue Is Vital to Combatting Revived Zero-Sum Narratives
Proposition Ten: the Prospect of a New Cold War and the Limits to Dialogue Are Real
A Provocation: Can/will Asia Overtake the West?
Notes
Conclusion
Note
Bibliography
INDEX
