The rules-based global order, its institutions and value system face a crisis of legitimacy and credibility as the US turns away

The rules-based global order, its institutions and value system face a crisis of legitimacy and credibility as the US turns away

‘The old world is dying,” Antonio Gramsci once wrote. “And the new world struggles to be born.” In such interregnums, the Italian Marxist philosopher suggested, “every act, even the smallest, may acquire decisive weight”.

In 2025, western leaders appeared convinced they – and we – were living through one such transitional period, as the world of international relations established after the second world war crashed to a halt.

During such eras, Gramsci more famously wrote, “morbid phenomena of the most varied kind come to pass”. And at present there is no more morbid phenomenon than the crisis of legitimacy for the networks of rules and laws on which the international order was based – the world that the US was central in creating in 1945.

No one can say they were not warned about the wrecking ball that was about to be inflicted on the global order by Donald Trump.

  • badgermurphy@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3·
    16 hours ago

    While that’s true, world leaders and those backing them have learned well the known weaknesses in human psychology. They’ve figured out how to use this knowledge to make large groups of individuals believe falsehoods, and even convinced them that those stating the truth are the liars, despite what all evidence shows.

    I think that to return the world to a state of stability, one of the first steps must include criminalizing and enforcement of public figures knowingly making false statements and those with no evidentiary backing.

    I think that any victories for the common man gained before that can and will be temporary. The problem is that these ideologues have is much power as we want to allow them to have, but we as a group have been convinced/fooled/hacked into thinking that we want them to have as much power as they say they need, which is clearly to much to allow for a stable global society.

    If we concentrate power so much that one person is all it takes to, say, tear up a treaty or trade agreement, we’re always one temper tantrum away from global unrest.