Why the West should stop talking about the “rules-based order”
https://www.newstatesman.com/international-politics/geopolitics/2024/06/why-the-west-should-stop-talking-about-the-rules-based-order
For far too long, the West has pretended that it gets to pick and choose from its own rulebook on statecraft. One senior leader reportedly told Khan that “this court is built for Africa and thugs like Putin”. The message was clear: the rules are there for the others; they do not apply to us. …
Yet behind this emphasis on rules-based trade lurked a larger agenda. In their more candid moments, senior US officials recognised that the RBIO was never about the rules themselves. It was about preserving the capacity of the US to shape the rules on its own terms. As Obama stated in 2016, “America should write the rules. America should call the shots. Other countries should play by the rules that America and our partners set, and not the other way around.”
https://www.newstatesman.com/international-politics/geopolitics/2024/06/why-the-west-should-stop-talking-about-the-rules-based-order
For far too long, the West has pretended that it gets to pick and choose from its own rulebook on statecraft. One senior leader reportedly told Khan that “this court is built for Africa and thugs like Putin”. The message was clear: the rules are there for the others; they do not apply to us. …
Yet behind this emphasis on rules-based trade lurked a larger agenda. In their more candid moments, senior US officials recognised that the RBIO was never about the rules themselves. It was about preserving the capacity of the US to shape the rules on its own terms. As Obama stated in 2016, “America should write the rules. America should call the shots. Other countries should play by the rules that America and our partners set, and not the other way around.”