World Order

by Henry Kissinger

The second cause of an international order’s crisis is when it proves unable to accommodate a major change in power relations. In some cases, the order collapses because one of its major components ceases to play its role or ceases to exist—as happened to the Communist international order near the end of the twentieth century when the Soviet Union dissolved. Or else a rising power may reject the role allotted to it by a system it did not design, and the established powers may prove unable to adapt the system’s equilibrium to incorporate its rise. Germany’s emergence posed such a challenge to the system in the twentieth century in Europe, triggering two catastrophic wars from which Europe has never fully recovered. The emergence of China poses a comparable structural challenge in the twenty-first century. The presidents of the major twenty-first-century competitors—the United States and China—have vowed to avoid repeating Europe’s tragedy through a “new type of great power relations.” The concept awaits joint elaboration. It might have been put forward by either or both of these powers as a tactical maneuver. Nevertheless, it remains the only road to avoid a repetition of previous tragedies.