Global Order, Great Powers, and Globalization Over a Century

The contemporary global order which arose between 1945 and 1950 saw war among states drastically decline from the level of previous centuries. Following the end of the Cold War, the “One World” championed by U.S. leaders in the 1940s re-emerged. Economic growth vastly expanded and, worldwide, poverty greatly declined. Globalization still carries the dangers that it did in the late nineteenth century: inequality and the encouragement of a populist backlash. The free market fundamentalism that inspired the gold standard has been reborn since the 1990s in attempts to lower trade barriers too quickly or allow hot money to flow. The tension between an open world and the self-interestedness of anarchic states has also remained. The United States can undercut the very rule-based global order it claims to uphold. Chinese economic success has depended on embracing globalization according to the model of the pre-1914 world. China has also become a restless great power, reminiscent of the troubled world of the 1930s. Opposition to the global order makes it all the more imperative for democratic nations to demonstrate that globalization can be tamed without undermining the entire global order. The current century can learn from history or repeat it in a different key.