Multilateralism and Nationalism in an Era of Disruption: the Great Pandemic and International Politics

Abstract

The Great Pandemic of 2020 has caused a shock to international politics. But has it forced a radical restructuring of the international system and a change in the way international actors behave? a survey of the effects of the pandemic demonstrates that it has sped up existing trends, but has not brought about any transformation. The three-tier international system established after 1945 survives, but the struggle between two contesting models of global order (the Atlantic power system and the associated liberal international order and the alignment of sovereign internationalist powers) has intensified to consolidate a nascent new bipolarity in international affairs. Multilateralism has long been under threat, but its degradation has accelerated as bodies such as the World Health Organization have been challenged over their handling of the coronavirus pandemic, and the dangers of distant supply chains and the recrudescence of nationalism have accelerated deglobalisation. The legitimacy of state action has been revalidated as the only effective actor in handling the crisis. But this has been accompanied by the intensification of national populist challenges not only to liberal universalism, but also to sovereign internationalism. The return of great power politics entails the accelerated erosion of the dense structures of the international community developed in the post-war years, and signals a return to the period when a previous international system (the Vienna order established in 1815) came to an end in the early years of the 20t h century. Attacks on the UN and other multilateral institutions of the Yalta era means that the struggle between the rival models of world order will be less constrained by the guardrails of the international system, and thus the Second Cold War may well be more dangerous than the first.