Demise of the Rules-Based Order

The rules-based international order is no longer merely weakening; it has effectively collapsed. In its place, a power-based system has already emerged. At the recent World Economic Forum (WEF) summit in Davos, much discussion revolved around the apparent death of this order, an arrangement that many now concede had been on life support for years. While several leaders expressed nostalgia for the old system, few were willing to acknowledge openly what has replaced it.

One of the most candid interventions came from Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, a figure long associated with liberal globalization. In a striking departure from conventional diplomatic language, Carney acknowledged that the rules-based order had always been selectively applied. Powerful states, he admitted, exempted themselves when convenient; trade rules were enforced asymmetrically; and international law was applied with varying rigor depending on who stood accused and who stood victim. Rather than continuing the fiction, Carney urged policymakers to name reality as it is: an era of intensifying great-power rivalry where economic integration itself is increasingly used as a coercive tool.

This admission crystallized a long-suspected truth. The rules-based order was never as neutral, universal or binding as it was claimed to be. What has changed is not its moral character, but the inability of its custodians to maintain the façade.