Short-Handed West

The meeting between Xi Jinping and Biden came as good news in the midst of global military chaos. Signs of detente, greater awareness of the chasm that would open in the event of conflict, the resumption of healthy economic competition, Chinese wisdom (there is enough room in this world for both), and American prudence (there is no point in going simultaneously against two nuclear powers, China after Russia), finally recognizing that Taiwan is important to the values of democracy and freedom that it represents, but not so important as to risk enormous costs in economic and human terms. Detente with China is an opportunity that cannot be missed before the fragile global balance tilts further against the West. A fatal mistake would be not to understand this or not to take advantage of the lessons of the past.

European colonial empires and the USA dominated the world from late 15th century to early 21st century. The rising American power reinforced its dominance over the past two centuries, defeating Nazism and fascism and exporting the values of democracy and freedom until it achieved superiority over Soviet and Chinese communist models. Economic power and patterns of living and consumption triumphed everywhere. China and Russia developed authoritarian institutional systems but transitioned to market economies.

However, disorderly economic globalization, the absence of strong global economic and political governance, and repeated wars and crises have distorted the meaning and direction of Western supremacy.

The rise of the Global South has significantly reduced the G7’s weight in global GDP. Asia produces more than the United States and the European Union. American defeats in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, the loss of French influence in the Sahel and of the West as a whole in Africa and Asia have threatened strategic and diplomatic opportunities, called into question base currencies, and intensified competition among high-tech industries. The war in Ukraine and the Middle East has highlighted the West’s difficulties in building a united front against Russia and solidarity with Israel. Western democracies found themselves short-handed at the UN and should recognize the ineffectiveness of sanctions against Moscow and now contain the social trauma of the moderate Arab world as a result of Israel’s disproportionate retaliation in Gaza. A retaliatory strike, which in the medium-term risks turning into a boomerang for Israel and its main ally, the USA. Globalization is fragmented into ideological, financial, commercial, and military blocs.

In the West, the current narrative tends to blame the impoverished middle class, which turns to populist or nationalist movements and parties, and also blames the student and university milieu for the wave of solidarity with the Palestinian people and for confused anti-capitalist or eco-revolutionary reflexes. Even the circulating seeds of anti-Semitism are blamed on the Western masses, who are supposedly uncritically seduced by Islamism, the Third World, and one-sided pacifism. But what is needed is a deep and less ideological reflection on the social phenomena and catastrophic mistakes that led to this sensitivity, rather than the singers’ self-referential extolling of the superiority of Western values.

The diverse alliance of authoritarian regimes is expanding, and the threat of Islamism is also growing due to the presumption of capitalizing on the profits of the termination of the Cold War, regardless of how many countries and peoples would like to share the pie of globalization and contribute equally to the new world order. World conditions in 1989 and after the collapse of the USSR were ideal to begin to build this order, but it was preferable to start a policy of trade conquest and military expansion, which ultimately led to the opposite results: the strengthening of Russia before the invasion of Ukraine and Chinese commercial and military aggressiveness.

After 9/11, the opportunity to build a global alliance against Islamic terrorism with Russia and China was lost. The 2008 crisis exposed the vicious mechanisms of the growth of financial capitalism. In the military sphere, NATO is being senselessly expanded in the Balkans and Eastern Europe up to the Caucasus. The 2020 pandemic has destabilized and impoverished the middle class and the Global South. The conflicts of the last two years have added to this picture. The West’s enemies and adversaries took advantage of the vacuum created by weak leadership, uninformed and disillusioned public opinion, and internal disputes over Western values.

Many in the Global South, from Asia to South America and Africa, see double standards in the West, which condemns Russia for violating international law with its invasion of Ukraine but is unwilling to condemn Israel for the deaths of thousands of civilians in the attack on Gaza. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen condemned “attacks on civilian infrastructure, especially electricity, as war crimes,” but referred to Russia.

This inconsistency makes the prospect of a rules-based order impossible today. But at this rate, it’s not hard to imagine who will pay the highest price.