A rules-based world order. Where?

Uncle Sam's claims of supporting a rules-based world are suspect, and its days as rule-maker are numbered

After Russia invaded Ukraine, America and its global allies have worked themselves into a frenzy over protecting a “rules-based global order” and “saving democracy”. Bollocks. The question to ask is: Whose rules? When Russia and China, among others, think they ought to be part of the new rule-making club, but continue to make them anyway in the areas they dominate, which rules-based order are we talking about? Rules are subservient to power.

The rules for China’s entry into the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and the UN Security Council were bent by the US and its allies in the 1970s and 1980s when they wanted the Dragon as a counter-weight to the Soviet Union, but the same rules won’t be bent for India. The rules-based order that Uncle Sam frets about is really about the end of Pax Americana. It has been shot to pieces by China and Russia. Not that the US ever played by the rules set by itself. When it came to protecting its own interests, the US did not wait for UN sanction or a global consensus to invade whichever country it saw as a threat (Vietnam, Korea, Iraq, Afghanistan, et al). Rules are not meant for Great Powers to follow.

In the West there is excessive belief in “rules” and “laws”, when the primary point is that rules have to be enforced, and the only rules that can, or will be enforced, are those that are directly or indirectly beneficial to the powerful people or forces which make those rules in the first place. The US wanted free trade after the Second World War as it needed to dominate Europe and Asia. Since the dollar was acceptable as payment for anything exported to the US, it allowed the US to give imports a larger play in its economy. But once China entered the picture, this rules-based order could no longer sustain. The US found that while its consumers benefited from cheap Chinese products, its producers benefited from cheap Chinese labour, and moved jobs offshore. Its companies managed to stay competitive only by using capital and technology to displace labour to deliver products and services. This ensured that even higher-quality jobs went offshore to India and other emerging knowledge-based economies. If America elected Donald Trump and came close to electing more Left-leaning politicians as president or governors, it’s because its own rules no longer work for it. The rules-based order is falling apart inside America itself, and this is why we are seeing such sharp polarisations inside the country. When rules don’t work for the vast majority, either the rules have to be changed or dumped altogether till a new synthesis or consensus emerges.

Illustration: Binay Sinha

Even outside the area of politics, consider how old man-made rules are crumbling as women challenge those rules. It is not a coincidence that all major religions are patriarchal. Their founders were all male — from Moses down to Jesus to Muhammed to the Buddha and Mahavira. So, the case for any rules-based order can only be justified over the long-term, once we know the outcomes resulting from those original sets of rules. Just as patriarchy no longer seems justifiable, rules created by the US-led Western alliance, informed by Christian experience and values, or, equally, one made by a China-led node, informed by Confucian values, will clearly not be viable over the long term.

We can reach three conclusions from the above short detour into the theory behind any rules-based order. First, rules work as long as there is a hegemon who is invested heavily in them, and is additionally willing to be responsible for ensuring some benefits for those who don’t make the rules. America’s version of free trade was hugely supported by exporting countries in Europe and Asia for this reason. It was not just love for Uncle Sam and his version of democracy. Most of those who benefited initially were, in fact, autocracies (the Asian tigers, for example).

Second, a state, or a society, must have the capacity to enforce whatever rules it prescribes. The vast majority of states in India have cow protection laws, but have no ability to enforce them fairly. Net result: Vigilante enforcers get into the picture and collect speed money for allowing illegalities to continue. Thus, rules and laws can exist on paper, but they don’t work in the real world if the power to enforce does not exist.

Third, when power is bipolar or increasingly multi-polar, the rules have to be regularly tweaked to accommodate all interests, or we will end up with two or more parallel systems, each with its own set of rules. This is what we saw during the Cold War, where one set of countries played to America’s rules and another to the Soviet Union’s. The only kind of law that can survive a bipolar or multipolar world is one that has weaker enforceability even while each bloc has stronger laws that apply to its core group. This poses a problem for countries like India, which is in Asia, and needs to trade with the China-led bloc, but is also threatened by a China-Pakistan military and political axis. It needs the Western bloc on its side. Weaker global rules give us elbow room for protecting our interests without formal alignment with any one side. On the other hand, rogue states like Pakistan and North Korea, and many in Africa, survive because broadly and universally acceptable rules cannot be imposed on them either.

The point is this: Power is the key element that allows for a rules-based order, and right now power is not only diffused, but also under challenge by emerging powers. China has already emerged, but Russia is trying to re-emerge, and both Japan and Germany will seek to re-emerge by side-stepping the restraints the victorious Allied powers imposed on them after 1945. Once Japan and Germany re-militarise, Uncle Sam will no longer be able to set the rules even for his own allies. Uncle Sam’s days as rule-maker even in the Western alliance are numbered.

For India, the challenges are two-fold. One, to aspire to be a part of the rule-making club, it must build a stronger economy and internal defence capabilities. Two, in the short-term, ie, before we become a $10-billion economy sometime in the early 2030s, we must tactically align on issues with some major powers, including the US, China, Russia, Japan and the European Union. But we cannot be fully aligned with any of them on all issues. Some strategic short-term ambiguity is inevitable, provided the long-term goal is clear, India can be a superpower in the 2030s if we manage both challenges successfully. This is the idea of India that should endure.

The writer is editorial director, Swarajya magazine