Kevin Sullivan

Nonpolarity

Posted by Kevin Sullivan under Uncategorized

Richard Haass has an interesting essay in the upcoming issue of Foreign Affairs, wherein he addresses the issue of nonpolarity.  In short, Haass argues that unlike the pre-WW I era, the global system is now embarking on a quasi-anarchic journey that involves more than state-oriented actors; instead branching out to players such as NGO’s, large corporations, terrorists and energy providers.  It’s well worth the read, and Haass proposes a litany of ameliorating measures to help manage this new world order (such as a “World Investment Organization,” more trade, etc.).  All of his points aside, the thing that grabbed me was the question of multilateralism, and the makeup of global deliberation:

Multilateralism will be essential in dealing with a nonpolar world. To succeed, though, it must be recast to include actors other than the great powers. The UN Security Council and the G-8 (the group of highly industrialized states) need to be reconstituted to reflect the world of today and not the post-World War II era. A recent meeting at the United Nations on how best to coordinate global responses to public health challenges provided a model. Representatives of governments, UN agencies, NGOs, pharmaceutical companies, foundations, think tanks, and universities were all in attendance. A similar range of participants attended the December 2007 Bali meeting on climate change. Multilateralism may have to be less formal and less comprehensive, at least in its initial phases. Networks will be needed alongside organizations. Getting everyone to agree on everything will be increasingly difficult; instead, the United States should consider signing accords with fewer parties and narrower goals. Trade is something of a model here, in that bilateral and regional accords are filling the vacuum created by a failure to conclude a global trade round. The same approach could work for climate change, where agreement on aspects of the problem (say, deforestation) or arrangements involving only some countries (the major carbon emitters, for example) may prove feasible, whereas an accord that involves every country and tries to resolve every issue may not. Multilateralism à la carte is likely to be the order of the day.

Nonpolarity complicates diplomacy. A nonpolar world not only involves more actors but also lacks the more predictable fixed structures and relationships that tend to define worlds of unipolarity, bipolarity, or multipolarity. Alliances, in particular, will lose much of their importance, if only because alliances require predictable threats, outlooks, and obligations, all of which are likely to be in short supply in a nonpolar world. Relationships will instead become more selective and situational. It will become harder to classify other countries as either allies or adversaries; they will cooperate on some issues and resist on others. There will be a premium on consultation and coalition building and on a diplomacy that encourages cooperation when possible and shields such cooperation from the fallout of inevitable disagreements. The United States will no longer have the luxury of a “You’re either with us or against us” foreign policy.

A lot of ideas get floated here, but I think Haass is essentially right.  We’ve seen how the UN has encountered problems in dealing with world affairs; mostly due to an antiquated framework that elevates some not-so-relevant actors, while belittling the emergent ones.  This not only affects commerce and trade, as Haass notes, but it has direct bearing on the way in which wars are waged, and what conflict will look like in the new century. 

The emergence of so-called failed states and non-state actors has handcuffed the United Nations, which approaches many of the world’s dilemmas with a “grand strategy” sort of approach, when a more focused, regional and short-term solution would often make more sense.  Because of the control over resources and energy, alliances and interests will constantly shift at the behest of external actors lacking a state-oriented mindset.  In other words, asking the “whole wide world” to make slow, deliberative and overly bureaucratized decisions on every pressing matter makes little sense, and it only serves to make states less relevant when corporations and terrorist cells can operate with a freedom that nations united cannot. 

Haass’ diagnosis is pretty sound, but in the case of global terrorism, I would also add a stronger emphasis on the true Bush Doctrine.  The enabling of violent extremism is one result of an increasingly nonpolar world, and it’s essentially a redefinition of warfare (proxy wars via various money channels, financing of militias and separatists, etc.).  We’ve seen how this has made progress difficult in the Middle East.  During the Nixon years, the U.S. relied on a “twin pillars” policy that asked Saudi Arabia and Iran to essentially police the region on our behalf.  With the states receiving internal competition for influence in the region, this kind of arrangement is no longer possible (if it ever truly was).  This may be unavoidable, which makes isolating the regimes that perpetuate this anarchism all the more important.  We should thus continue to freeze assets going towards terror, sanction regimes that knowingly attack the state system and fight these terrorists when and where it’s possible.