July 19, 2020
A new world order for the post Covid-19 era is emerging
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali
Henry A. Kissinger wrote in the Wall Street Journal on April 3, 2020: When the Covid-19 pandemic is over, many countries’ institutions will be perceived as having failed. Whether this judgment is objectively fair is irrelevant. The reality is the world will never be the same after the coronavirus.
Rory Medcalf, head of the National Security College at the Australian National University agrees by saying a lot of structural problems in the international order are becoming much more glaringly apparent. With a convergence of multiple pressure points, from failures of leadership to a lack of trust in the veracity of information, “it does add up to a kind of perfect storm,” Medcalf said.
Alan Crawford, Senior Editor of Bloomberg, quoted Constanze Stelzenmueller, senior fellow at the Center on the United States and Europe at the Brookings Institution in Washington as saying that the pandemic hasn’t so much changed the world as “thrown a brutal spotlight on the flaws, deficiencies and the disrepair both for the international order and national order.”
“And where there have been flaws and weaknesses, the pandemic has ripped through with particular brutality.” That applies to the U.S. and the U.K., both of which have suffered a disproportionately high number of deaths to Covid-19.
Stelzenmueller also sees China and Russia as having had bad crises: Beijing’s aggressive virus diplomacy contributed to the backlash it’s witnessing, while Vladimir Putin’s move to consolidate his grip on power underlines his domestic weakness rather than strength.
Populism and its scorn for experts has been exposed. By contrast, Europe’s efforts to present a viable third way have been given a spur, and appear be on the verge of becoming credible. Stelzenmueller sees hope in the performance of her native Germany, which has proved that “one sane government” can get a grip on even incredibly complex problems.
Le Monde Editorial
Meanwhile, the French newspaper, Le Monde writes: Are we witnessing, under the effect of the global health crisis, a radical transformation of our geopolitical environment? Does the dynamic at work stem from the acceleration of pre-existing trends or from a change of paradigm? Will the world after be worse or better than the world before?
In an editorial in April, Le Monde said: These questions are as legitimate as those we have been asking ourselves for the past two months about the future of our societies and our economies. And trying to answer it is just as risky as long as we do not know the duration of the crisis, its extent, or how it will be overcome.
But it is already possible, at this stage, to draw some lessons from the shock inflicted by the Covid-19 pandemic on global scheduling. The first is that the international order built under the aegis of the United States in the aftermath of the Second World War is no longer adapted to the reality of the balance of power of the 21st century. It was already fragile before the coronavirus crisis: some even trace the beginning of its dislocation to the collapse of the communist bloc in 1989. The end of the cold war, the disappearance of the USSR and the rise of China little by little unbalanced a world that was based on the American-Soviet duality. The bipolar order has been succeeded by a multi-polar disorder, which somehow cope with - less and less well, in reality - a mode of multilateral world governance.
The unity of Europe did not resist the onslaught of the coronavirus. Disarmed in the face of a pandemic that it was unable to see coming, it was unable to organize solidarity for the member states most affected. The egoism of states and the return of borders have endangered two pillars of the European Union, the Schengen area and the single market. Abandoned by the United States, coveted by China, at odds with Russia, it still believes in multilateralism. But if it wants to influence the development of a more just and more secure post-crisis world order, rather than endure it, it must begin by organizing its own economic reconstruction, jointly and resolutely.
Hessie Jones wrote in Forbes, Are we ready to embrace a new world order?
The Coronavirus has forced all of us, in the few short months, into a massive reflection of our way of life and what we’ve taken for granted. It’s nudged us into territory we were bound to go eventually, and it's compelling all industries to finally embrace transformation. If the crash of 2008 sought to redefine the financial industry, this pandemic will be the catalyst to define how we live, Jones concluded.
Abdus Sattar Ghazali is the Chief Editor of the Journal of America (www.journalofamerica.net) Email asghazali2011 (@) gmail.com
The Journal of America Team:
Editor in chief:
Abdus Sattar Ghazali
Senior Editor:
Prof. Arthur Scott
Special Correspondent
Maryam Turab
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