Multilateralism Still Matters |
As the calendar edges toward 2026, gloom has become the default mood of international affairs. Wars burn across dozens of countries. Trade, once the lingua franca of cooperation, has turned into a blunt weapon of tariffs and counter-tariffs. Economic growth limps along at rates that would have shocked policymakers a generation ago. Climate disasters feel less like rare calamities and more like seasonal rituals. Pandemics, supply-chain breakdowns, and financial tremors have blended into a kind of permanent global background noise.
From this vantage point, it is tempting to declare multilateralism dead—another noble postwar idea crushed under the weight of nationalism, geopolitics, and distrust. That conclusion is understandable. It is also wrong.
UAE Vice President arrives in RY Khan for wildlife expedition
The truth is more uncomfortable and more interesting: multilateralism is not finished, but it is no longer automatic. Cooperation still matters, but it must now justify itself in a harsher, more skeptical age. The real crisis is not global interdependence—people experience that daily—but confidence that cooperation can still work.
To understand why the world feels so unstable, one must look beyond headlines to the deeper shifts reshaping the global order. The first is the end of unipolarity. The brief post–Cold War moment, when American power seemed unrivaled and liberal norms appeared destined for universal adoption, has faded. Power today is dispersed among major states, rising regional players, and non-aligned actors who resist choosing sides. Multipolarity does not automatically mean chaos, but it does mean that coordination is harder and consensus rarer.
DC inspects Land Record Centre, Maryam Nawaz Health Clinic
The second shift is the erosion of the rules-based order. International law, arms-control regimes, and multilateral agreements increasingly yield to raw power and transactional diplomacy. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was not just a regional war; it was a declaration that force........