Do you remember when Vladimir Putin invited many world leaders to Russia`s annual Victory Day parade in Red Square on May 9, 2015? Do you remember that all the western leaders were boycotting that event because of the crisis in Ukraine?
Vladimir Putin said at that time that the U.S is trying to create a «unipolar world». Putin and Russia have used an address commemorating the 70th anniversary of victory over Nazi Germany to accuse the U.S of attempting to dominate the world.
I wrote an article about it on June 3, 2015, and you can read that article here. Cuba`s Fidel Castro shares Putin`s worldview. He released a new book called «Cold War – A warning for a unipolar world» on September 1, 2003. Castro said; «To endure the global struggle between the superpowers is bad. To live under the total hegemony of one of them is worse».
That`s exactly what the war in Ukraine is about. A world order. World dominance. But Putin stopped this big dream, which means we will go from a Unipolar world to a Multipolar world.
The U.S President, Barack Obama, and Germany`s Angela Merkel didn`t come. Neither did other Western leaders like UK`s Prime Minister David Cameron and French President Francois Hollande. Moscow has increasingly appeared to pivot away from Europe and focus more on developing relations with China, I wrote in the article at that time in 2015.
The Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, was the most high-profile guest on the podium next to Putin. Other presidents in attendance included India`s Pranab Mukherjee, Presiden Abdel Fatah al-Sisi of Egypt, Raul Castro of Cuba, Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, and Jacob Zuma of South Africa.
«The boycott illustrates the depth and breadth of the chasm now separating Russia and the West,» said Dmitri Trenin, head of the Carnegie Moscow Center.
But what is Putin trying to say when he claims that the U.S is trying to create a «Unipolar World?»
Unipolarity in international politics is a distribution of power in which one state exercises most of the cultural, economic, and military influence. Unipolarity is an interstate system and not an Empire. Unipolarity implies the existence of many juridically equal non-states, something that an empire denies.
Unipolarity is anarchical. Anarchy results from the incomplete power preponderance of the Unipole. Kenneth Waltz, argues that great power cannot «exert a positive control everywhere in the world.» Therefore, relatively weaker countries have the freedom to pursue policy preferences independent of the Unipol.
Unipolar systems possess only one great power and face no competition. If a competitor emerges, the international system is no longer unipolar. Kenneth Waltz maintains that the United States is the only «pole» to possess global interests.
So, here we are. We knew at that time that Russia appeared to pivot away from Europe and focus more on developing relations with China.
Russia in bed with China, India, and Africa means a new world order, and that coalition is powerful. Keep in mind that 50% of the world population lives in China and India alone. In terms of business; that is a huge market.
The unipolar world has come to an end.
The modern international order, system, and relations developed after the end of the Thirty Years’ War in 1618 – 1648, and the conclusion of the Westphalia Treaty in 1648. Raymond Aaron studied international relations and he said: «I call the international system a set of political entities that maintain constant relations and can be involved in a large-scale war».
It`s all a part of an evolution, and there are four types of structural organization of the international system: the Westphalian system (1648-1789) as a system of classical European balance, the Vienna system (1814-1914) the system of European concert, the Versailles-Washington system (1919-1939) with the main conquest, the League of Nations and the Yalta-Potsdam system (1945-1991), the crown of which is the creation of the United Nations.
There are three types of world order: unipolar, bipolar, and multipolar. The unipolar world order presupposes the domination of a single super-power that is ahead of all other states by its combined power.
The bipolar world order is transformed into a multipolar one when economic and military power comparable to the power of the two states is reached by other powers. In an equilibrium system, several large states maintain roughly the same influence on the course of the events, restricting each other`s excessive claims.
At the beginning of the twentieth century, the world was multipolar, but by the middle of the century, two World Wars and many smaller conflicts had created a bipolar model.
With the end of the cold war and the collapse of the Soviet Union, bipolarity was replaced by unipolarity. The United States began to play a major role. But that has come to an end.
Recent facts and events show that the United States cannot cope with the role of being the only pole in the current world order. They were unable to balance forces in the Middle East. Neither with their troops nor with the support of groups that tried to seize power. Therefore; the troops withdraw from the war in Afghanistan.
The old world order is gone forever. Now, the world has entered a period of uncertainty and increased risks, exacerbated by the inability of the United States and its allies to solve the global problems of our time.
Former Barack Obama adviser, President of the Council on Foreign Relations Richard Haas introduced the concept of a world without states or a multipolar world in his book «A World in Disarray: America Foreign Policy and the Crisis of the Old Order.»
Nations must be prepared to surrender independence to world structures. The unipolar system has ended, and International relations in the 21st century will determine the situation of polarity. The power would be blurred rather than concentrated, and the importance of nation-States would diminish as non-state actors strengthened.
A multipolar system complicates diplomatic activity. it`s not just that they’re more actors in the polar world. It lacks the predictable fixed structures and systems of relations that characterize unipolar, bipolar, and multipolar structures.
The multipolar system will be difficult and dangerous, and international relations are undergoing a powerful transformation in the 21st century that changes the nature, structure, and essence of the international order.
A formation of a new model of international relations will be very painful and costly, and the entire world order will have to go through an era of turbulence. We had the pandemic. Now, we have a war, but there is more pain to come. There will be more economic and social hardships and it`s time for more world chaos.
The British philosopher and sociologist Sigmund Bauman said: «No one can consider themselves truly indispensable. Even the most privileged status can be temporary and suddenly change».
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