Carlos Aldea de Vicente
International Analyst
The invasion of Ukraine has not put an end to the international liberal order. It has simply accelerated its long degradation. We no longer live in an order; we are in a transitory scenario that brings with it tensions and disorder, the result of competition between powers to improve, in the case of some, and preserve, in the case of others, their positions of power in the coming order. The Potsdam, Yalta and Bretton Woods conferences gave birth to a robust liberal system whose increasingly decaying rafters are collapsing. Its essences, the prohibition of the use of force, multilateralism and free trade, have been weakened one by one: illegal wars have been waged, eroding the UN system and the most basic principles of international law, such as sovereign equality and territorial integrity; confidence in common forums has been lost as we have seen with the withdrawal of countries from the WHO or the blockade of the WTO; and, furthermore, the world is in a process of adjustments in its trade and energy relations in which the choice of suppliers is not governed by price, but by political risks. Without substance, things cease to be, even if the accidental lives on.
We live, then, in a disorder in which vestiges of the old remain and new ingredients are introduced. The powers that be try to shape the future according to their different interests. In the midst of this disorder and the war in Ukraine, there are calls for bloc politics reminiscent of the Cold War: “The West against the rest”. However, neither alignments define today’s reality nor is there a confrontation between the West and the rest of the globe. The world ceased to be bipolar in 1991 with the collapse of the USSR and since then there has been a brief glimmer of unipolarity and, subsequently, the emergence of new powers, giving a multipolar scenario far removed from that of the two-bloc Cold War. Moreover, the West is not alone vis-à-vis the “rest” of the world; UNGA resolution A/ES-11/L.1, condemning the invasion of Ukraine, is evidence to the contrary. On the other hand, the West is not a monolithic bloc per se: due to a shared cultural and historical substratum, it tends to unite on essentials, such as the invasion of Ukraine, without imposing perfect symmetry.
In the current transitional scenario, the EU wants to occupy a position of power in the future order and is therefore increasingly convinced that it is taking decisions to shape it. The adoption of the Strategic Compass is proof of this. The Union is aware of its dependence on the US defence umbrella, articulated through NATO. Moreover, the fragility of Europe’s ‘hard power’ has been seen in the Balkans and Libya, two territories on its near periphery where it could not have acted without American help. Aware of its weaknesses, the EU is working to become more autonomous and able to confront purely European risks without turning to the United States now focused on the Indo-Pacific. The NATO summit in Madrid did not lead to progress on the creation of a European pillar within the organisation. The alliance concentrated on more immediate security issues in Europe, which has not seen such a war since the mid-20th century. However, the European pillar has not been discarded, merely postponed. This implies that, in the medium term, the EU’s strategic defensive autonomy will come into being through a deployable force of approximately 5,000 troops, as announced by High Representative Josep Borrell in 2021. The transatlantic link, articulated through its three axes: NATO, US-EU relations and bilateral relations, has been strengthened by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but this rapprochement is circumstantial: since the Obama administration, the US has focused its energies on China, its great strategic rival.
NATO held a historic summit hosted by Spain in Madrid. There, the American delegation succeeded in having the Madrid Concept reflect its main interests by mentioning China for the first time in NATO’s history. However, President Biden has not succeeded in creating a Western bloc against China. An intermediate vision has been adopted, close to Mogherini’s 2019 Strategic Outlook, which does not lump all illiberal regimes together. Predictably, in the Madrid Concept, Russia has moved from being considered a strategic partner to being the Alliance’s most significant and direct threat. In addition, other security concerns are included, such as those emanating from the southern flank, which are of great importance to the Mediterranean Allies. All this without losing the Alliance’s long-standing 360-degree approach. The Madrid Summit also launched the accession process for two new NATO members: Sweden and Finland. This was unthinkable a year ago and breaks with decades of neutrality in the case of Finland and centuries of neutrality in the case of Sweden. The Madrid summit has therefore been a success for NATO, but also for Spain, which, in addition to reflecting its interests in the Madrid Concept, has strongly projected an image of commitment, capacity and moral stature that it is not used to showing. This contrasts sharply with the diplomatic isolation it experienced for much of the 20th century.
The future world order is being built in the present. International liberalism has lost its relevance and bloc politics does not correspond to reality. The coming order is multipolar and far from alignments that exclude intermediate positions, it will require negotiations of variable geometry on a case-by-case basis. In the transition scenario, the powers must act to shape the emerging order. The European Union must move fast, within its means, so as not to lose the opportunity to be a major power in the future.
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