Is Trump the end of the international rules-based order?

The world largely agreed that “enough is enough” after more than a year of Israeli bombing, tens of thousands of Palestinian deaths, and a humanitarian disaster in Gaza.

United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolution 12667 in December was clear in its demand: An immediate ceasefire in Gaza. Vietnam, Zimbabwe, and Colombia are all examples of nations that appeal.

And yet, bucking that consensus were nine “no” votes – chief among them, as is typical when it comes to resolutions calling for Israel to adhere to international law or human rights, was the United States.

Israel is alleged to have committed genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), and its prime minister has an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court (ICC) in his name. Throughout this conflict, the US has continued to support Israel.

Gaza had made the US choose openly between adhering to the international “rules-based order” – the system of laws and norms established in the wake of World War II to avoid wars and foster democracy – it claims to uphold, or support Israel. The latter was chosen.

The Democratic administration of former US President Joe Biden, which was in the last days of its tenure when it voted “no” on the UNGA resolution, repeatedly claimed to be acting in defence of the rules-based order – not least in its condemnation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – in all matters other than those related to Israel and Palestine.

The Democratic Administration of former US President Joe Biden claimed to support the rules-based order in matters unrelated to Israel or Palestine, particularly in its repeated condemnations of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The US supported Ukraine as a country defending itself from an unjust invasion by a neighbour. It strengthened cooperation with allies in the Asia-Pacific, particularly Taiwan, who are in danger of potential Chinese expansionism.

But the first few weeks of US President Donald Trump’s second term upended all expectations. Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, is now being berated by Trump and his vice president, JD Vance, who have sent out warm-hearted greetings to Russia.

Trump’s imperialist rhetoric includes remarks made by Greenland, Panama, and one of the country’s closest allies, Canada.

Trump has made clear that the old rules are out of the window. His attitude toward Ukraine and his calls for tariffs on allies are a result of an isolationist, “America First” mindset that treats international cooperation as weak and US business as not.

Vance’s words at the Munich Security Conference in February – insinuating that European governments are authoritarian for not working with far-right parties – highlighted that Trump’s Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement doesn’t see Europeans as allies, at least not if European leadership remains liberal and internationalist in nature.

Is this a sign of the future? Is the US moving away from its allies and abandoning the rules-based order? And was the rules-based system ever actually international, or was it merely aimed at advancing the West’s interests?

The short answer: Trump’s current trajectory could mark the final end to a world order that has long faced accusations of double standards and selective application of international law. Leaders in Europe are already saying that the US cannot be trusted because they need to defend themselves. Analysts who spoke to Al Jazeera believe that the rules-based order cannot survive this onslaught in its current form – it would have to adapt and change.

The rules-based order

At its heart, what we call the rules-based order is the bedrock of much of modern international relations. Intentionally, the state’s relationship with one another is supposed to remain stable, coexist, and predictably.

Emerging from World War II and the Holocaust, the rules-based order, underpinned by international law and multinational organisations like the UN, was intended to embody shared principles of sovereignty, self-determination, territorial integrity and dispute resolution through diplomacy rather than force.

The system promotes peace, democracy, human rights, and economic stability, according to its supporters, including US and European countries.

But it has its critics: Global South countries say its institutions are biased in favour of the West. The system may have developed at a time when the US was able to establish itself as the dominant force on the planet.

Throughout its history, the rules-based order has been supported by the US’s economic, diplomatic and military heft. The Soviet Union’s collapse and the end of the Cold War in 1991, when the only real rival for international dominance, the US, only increased.

Imperial thinking

The second Trump presidency’s first few weeks seem far removed from the post-Cold War high, where Francis Fukuyama asserted in The End of History and the Last Man that liberal democracy had triumphed over global ideologies.

Trump now tells Zelenskyy that in order to fight the Russian invasion, there is a deal to be made for Ukraine’s natural resources.

For Europe, and the US under Biden, Ukraine’s battle was about sovereignty and defending democracy against autocracy. Trump, who portrays himself as a “peacemaker,” is not interested in those arguments because he realizes that might is appropriate.

An indifference to the principle of sovereignty can also be seen in Trump’s Gaza “plan”, which would involve the US takeover of the territory – and ethnically cleansing the Palestinians who live there.

There is little evidence that he is completely off the table, despite the fact that he recently made an apparent walkback to his claim to expelling Palestinians.

“Donald Trump’s willingness to betray Ukraine and his rejection of the basic principle of territorial sovereignty is consistent with simultaneously giving Israel a green light to proceed in ways that break the law and seem likely only to fuel an endless cycle of violence”, Michael Becker, a professor of international human rights law at Trinity College in Dublin, who previously worked at the ICJ, told Al Jazeera.

Trump views global free trade as a fool’s game, where the US has been “ripped off by almost every country on Earth” for decades, one of the objectives of the rules-based order.

Instead of a global spirit of cooperation underpinned by US leadership – however flawed that was in reality – Trump appears to see the reality of a multipolar world with spheres of influence, and little place for liberal ideals.

That aligns him with actors like Russia, which may explain why Trump occasionally appears more amiable when addressing European Union leaders than Vladimir Putin.

The Trump administration’s barely disguised contempt for traditional systems of global governance has prompted observers to suggest that the lip service paid to a rules-based order may be over and the world instead faces a return to “machtpolitik”: The pure, naked power that dominated international relations in the 19th century.

According to Professor Michael Doyle of Columbia University, the motivations for aggressive unilateral actions by powerful states are increasingly both self-serving and brazen.

“What is new is the articulations of overwhelmingly imperial ambitions and purely acquisitive aims: Ukraine to restore the Russian empire, Greenland for minerals and sea lanes, Panama for naval control of sea lanes and to exclude China from the region”, Doyle told Al Jazeera.

“There is no credible claim to self-defence or multilateral norms”, he continued, explaining that the world is experiencing a “return to the rules of 19th-century imperialism and the foreign policy norms of Mussolini and the other 1920s and 1930s fascists”.

The Royal United Services Institute (RUSI)’s HA Hellyer agrees, but he added that while “it’s not inevitable, we could still redirect, it’s still the way to travel and has been for at least the last ten years.”

Can the damage to the rules-based order be reversed?

What steps, if any, can the international community take to curb its ambitions when faced with a US that is untethered from international norms?

Few mechanisms exist whereby states can directly influence the actions of others, and most still rely on economic dominance.

Countries typically invoke sanctions, tariffs, trade embargoes, UN condemnation, or a criminal trial against a person in the ICC.

Since the end of World War II, the US dollar has been the preferred reserve currency for many of the world’s central banks, meaning that any economic sanction that damages the dollar carries the risk of repercussions elsewhere.

The US economy’s size should also be taken into account. As of 2023, the US generated about one-seventh of global gross domestic product (GDP), with much of the world dependent on it for trade and defence – dramatically reducing the likelihood of a state bringing a case against it.

The Palestinian territory’s actions, which the ICC claims are crimes against humanity or crimes against humanity, are also not very likely to be brought up against the US president.

“Any attempt to prosecute Trump at the ICC is a legal and political minefield that has virtually no prospect of success”, said Becker, who previously worked at the ICJ.

According to him, “it could also lead to the entire unraveling of the Rome Statute system under US pressure,” he continued, referring to the 1998 ICC statute, which the US signed but never ratified because it worried the court would hold its citizens or members accountable.

Becker remarked that “international law is fragile and not perfect.”

“But defending some type of world public order not dictated by the whims of the most … powerful states requires other states to stand up and loudly and persistently protest the Trump administration’s actions”, he added.

A system that is contradictory?

Whether the rules-based order is saved depends on what states are interested in pushing back against Trump. A system they frequently perceived as focusing solely in a non-Western direction may be beneficial for Russia, China, and others.

In its own actions, the US has repeatedly acted as if it is beyond the law – for instance, through its invasion of Iraq in 2003, as well as targeted assassinations without trial.

Despite rulings from the European Court of Human Rights that claimed countries like Romania, Lithuania, Poland, and North Macedonia tortured prisoners for US purposes during its extraordinary rendition program, which saw civilians abducted and forcibly interrogated, in 2012, 2014, and 2018, Washington has always been too strong to face international punishment.

The US, which is not a party to the ICC, has protested the Court trying people from non-signatory states, like Israel, and has sanctioned members of the ICC after warrants were issued for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes committed in Gaza.

Trump claimed that the ICC “engaged in illegitimate and baseless actions against America and our close ally Israel.”

There is also little doubt that Israel’s war on Gaza in full view of the world has undermined the regard given to a rules-based order.

Not just the US ignores the laws when it comes to Israel. So far, France, Hungary and Italy have said they will not enforce the ICC arrest warrants. Friedrich Merz, Germany’s anticipated next chancellor, has declared he will follow suit.

“Israel has waged a war on Gaza for 16 months in complete defiance of international law”, RUSI’s Hellyer said.

The ICJ is hearing a case involving genocide, and the ICC has indicted Israel’s prime minister, and far too many people in the West have used all kinds of justifications to justify their detention, unlike they never would with Putin, who was also detained.

We can’t beg for America’s failure to stand by a rules-based order when it comes to Ukraine, for instance, but we can’t allow for a complete abrogation of that order when it comes to Gaza, he continued.

” To quote]Jordanian Foreign Minister] Ayman Safadi: ‘ Gaza has not only become a graveyard for children. It has become a graveyard for international law, leaving a bad taste in the world’s entire system. “

The collapse or fundamental weakening of the “so-called liberal-based order” would at least put an end to the hypocrisy that has plagued its rule for many, according to Karim Emile Bitar, a professor of international relations at the Saint Joseph University of Beirut.

” It has always been perceived in the Global South as highly hypocritical because allies of the United States were always shielded from attacks, “he told Al Jazeera.

Even when they violated international law, human rights, and other UN resolutions, they continued to violate them. They got a free pass, whereas countries that were opposing the superpowers were often targeted. “

Change risk

For it to carry weight”, international law has to apply to everybody”, said Hellyer”. When it isn’t, it sends a clear message to everyone else, including Israel, Gaza, and Ukraine. This is very dangerous.

“An end to multilateralism means we’re less equipped to face the next crisis, whether that’s a health crisis, or the next war”, he added.

It’s still unclear where the Global South and small states will go next.

In the short term, at least, those who would first pay the price of the collapse in the rules-based order would be “the Palestinian people and many other small states who were the victims of proxy wars and those exposed to aggressive neighbours”, Bitar said.

Without a rules-based system in place, Taiwan is much more vulnerable from China, and the 1990s’ imperfect solutions, like the Dayton Agreement that brought an end to the Bosnian War, could collapse, and minorities like the Uyghurs in China have even less chance of justice.

Bitar believes any hope of a resurgence of any kind of a rules-based order after the war on Gaza is, at best, unlikely.

He claimed that it took World War II for international organizations to emerge and for a world with a rule of law. “Once this has been dismantled … it will be extremely difficult to rebuild it from scratch”.

Instead, the world’s political system might be reduced to a competing sphere of influence, with US, Russia, China, and an unmoored Europe occupying the majority of the world’s politics.

What is more concerning, Bitar pointed out, is that the collapse of a global governance system is concomitant with what he sees as the collapse of democracy in its most vocal upholders in the West.

According to Bitar, “We are witnessing the rise of what some might call illiberal democracies.”

“And, simultaneously, the emergence of some sort of oligarchy or plutocracy, where the strongest and the richest rule without any checks and balances”.

Source: Aljazeera