This is an essay that I've written and submitted for the course "Core Debates in Political Science" as part of my Master's. I've received an 8/10 for this course.
Introduction
Fukuyama (1992) argued in his book The End of History and The Last Man that liberal
democracy would triumph above all other forms of governance. With the collapse of the
Soviet Union, the world no longer had any obstacle to becoming a unipolarity with liberal
democracy as its leading political ideology, thus marking liberal democracy as the end of
history. Nevertheless, twenty-eight years later, it is still not the end. On the contrary, the
world has seen a rise of illiberal democracies, the emergence of significant powers such as
China, and currently suffers from the disastrous socio-economic effects of globalism caused
by the pandemic COVID-19. The current global affairs elude the impression that future
historians may mark the year 2020 as the end of the liberal world order (Ikenberry, 2020).
This essay discusses the existence of the liberal world and thereby explains why it has a
future. The first section will discuss the concept of the liberal world with its characteristics.
The second section will identify a typology of orders, followed by the third section providing
a critical perspective on the contemporary world order. Finally, a brief conclusion will draw
all ends together.
A Typology of Orders
Orders are not a new concept. On the contrary, their existence is traceable back to the Peace
of Westphalia in 1648 (Nye and Welch, 2016, p. 4). Mearsheimer (2019, p. 16) offers one
definition of world order within the context of contemporary global politics by establishing a
typology of orders, which is characterized by the scope of membership, breadth, and depth of
coverage, and kinds of international orders. Orders are international when they constitute all
the major global powers. International orders take on the role of a facilitator in the sense that
they serve or facilitate cooperation between states. Depending on the distribution of power
(bipolar, multipolar, or unipolar), international orders can be realist, agnostic, or ideologic by
nature (Mearsheimer, 2019, p.12). From a realist perspective, if the power distribution system
is bipolar or multipolar, the great powers involved must behave according to realist rules and
employ in the stringent security competition process. In the case of unipolarity, there is a
complete absence of security competition, and there is a strong desire to spread the political
ideology around the globe (Mearsheimer, 2019, pp. 16-17)
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, From a liberal perspective, the international order is not a system based on mere state power.
In contrast, it is a multifaceted, multilayered, and above all, complex. Ikenberry (2020, p. 20)
provides an “evolutionary perspective” on the international order. He presents it as a global
governance network, linking state actors with institutions and vice versa, whereby
agreements, treaties, political relations, protocols, and other types of ruling serve as
connectors that make up the international order.
Defining the Liberal World
Fukuyama (2006) predicted that liberalism is a universal truth that all communities will
welcome with open arms, yet the world seems to move further away from this envisioned
reality. However, does this liberal world even exist? To answer the initial question, an
understanding of the required characteristics of a liberal world is necessary.
According to the description of Mearsheimer (2019, p. 22), what constitutes a liberal world is
the existence of multilateral institutions with universal membership that can wield enormous
influence over its member states; an open and inclusive international economy that supports
free trade and capital markets, and the leading political ideology is a democracy. From this
liberalist perspective, only the United States and Europe fit within Mearsheimer’s view
(Mearsheimer, 2019; De Graaff & Van Apeldoorn, 2018; Lissner & Rass-Hooper, 2018). On
the other hand, some argue that it is the leading and corporate elite networks with their liberal
internationalist view that dictate the type of world we live in, or as Ikenberry (2020) phrases
it: “liberal internationalism and its elite networks are the foundation of the US-centred world
order, and has been for 75 years now” (Ikenberry, 2020; De Graaff & Van Apeldoorn, 2018).
Realists would argue that the liberal world came to be due to the collapse of the Soviet Union
in 1991, making it possible for the United States to step forward and move the rest of the
world towards a unitary liberal order, albeit not at once (Mearsheimer, 2019; Lissner &
Rass-Hooper, 2018).
A Critical Perspective on the Contemporary World Order
As echoed multiple times in the existing literature, the United States has led the current
liberal world for decades. Given recent developments, it is not entirely surprising that a
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