For nearly 70 years, the world has benefited from a rules-based international order that brought an end to a millennia of large-scale war. This system expanded its scope beyond preserving peace to promoting economic prosperity, human rights, public health, scientific exploration, and environmental protection.
Today, however, that system seems more fragile than at any time since the Cold War. Trust in institutions is at an all-time low. Western liberal values are being challenged by China and Russia. Emerging nations don't want to be subject to rules they didn't get a chance to write. And the global response to the pandemic exposed rifts at the local, national, and international level that cost over 6 million lives.
Is this the end of an era or just an inflection point?
