Few people express satisfaction with the state of world affairs. Everyone has their own reasons for frustration. Europe is groaning under migration pressure and the lack of a solution for the integration of societies, the United States is tired of carrying on its shoulders the burden (financial and military) of extinguishing crisis outbreaks in the world. Russia cannot come to terms with its shrunken power. China is not satisfied that its great economic potential does not translate into the ability to pursue political interests (especially the annexation of Taiwan). India would like permanent membership in the Security Council. The Global South does not like the dictate of the North and the slow pace of closing the prosperity gap. Not to forget about the spectre of a new world war. Too long to mention.
We have entered an era of widespread complaints.
However, frustration, washing out the remnants of credibility from the existing system of world governance, i.e. the network of international organizations, agreements and treaties that constitute it, has not led to a systemic reflection on the future of international relations. Everyone has been saying for three decades that this is a transitional period, that the international order is in a state of transformation. But there is no common vision of where the world should go. We tackle the symptoms.
We have entered an era of global drift.
And in a fatalistic daze we admit that this drift may throw the world onto the rocks, giving us a catastrophe, and what a beautiful one at that. Future forecasters compete with each other in writing dystopian scenarios. Even writers. Even Twardoch (“Let’s say: Piontek”). The world has not seen such pessimism for decades. It is already starting to take on the characteristics of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Mass consensus is built around the slogan: this must break, this must fall apart. And we naively believe that a new, better world can only be built on the ruins of the old one.
We have entered an era of waiting for catharsis.
Catharsis in the dictionary definition is cleansing, purification, whitening. In the social dimension, it concerns the sphere of emotions, both individual and collective. From the ancient Greeks we learned the art of overcoming emotions, confronting our fear with self-pity, in order to emerge from the tragic turn of events mentally strengthened and determined to act.
Usually, catharsis, also in politics, comes after defeat, fall, humiliation. It involves internal shock.
It involves realizing the significance of the events that led to failure. And in the perfect, complete version it should lead to awareness of the universal laws governing destiny. Building a new vision of the order of your own existence.
We usually experience catharsis in politics after wars, especially lost ones. In Poland, only the partitions of the XVIII century liberated the society from national numbness and brought freedom from the belief in the perfection of our own system of governance. The lost September campaign of 1939 profoundly ploughed through the consciousness of the elite of the Second Polish Republic, but also gave moral wind to the communists, who were landed from a foreign ship to the top of power. Many countries awoke to development only after suffering defeat.
But wars also made the victors realize the need for radical changes. In the Thirty Years’ War, the devastation was so great that no one could claim victory. And this war was a great catharsis that brought an end to religious wars and created new rules for international relations. Likewise the Napoleonic Wars. And both world wars in the 20th century even more.
There was no global catharsis after the end of the Cold War. In most of the former Soviet bloc, there was a new beginning, but in Russia and many post-Soviet countries, the old elites followed the path of adaptation in order to maintain power in the new political realities, and the Soviet past became a point of reference in retropian visions of rebuilding the empire. In China, not to mention North Korea or Cuba, communism did not even formally fall. The collapse of the communist bloc did not cause a global shock. The departure of the bipolar world triggered conflicts. Often previously only frozen and obscured.
And so it came to the point that everyone began to say that the existing international order was defective and dysfunctional. That it is transforming, that we are in a transition period. But the inter-epoch has become an era itself.
We have waited for crises and shocks to serve as a catalyst for change. The great shock after the attack of September 11, 2001 was supposed to mobilize the international community to build a new order for the sake of the universal fight against terrorism. It didn’t happen. The 2008 financial crisis was believed to serve as a catharsis for reforming international economic relations. It didn’t happen. COVID-19 was thought to serve as a catharsis in the management of global pandemics. And it didn’t happen again.
There was nothing left to do but accept the thesis that only a great war could awaken the world to reforms. Because in the past, it was primarily wars that destroyed the old order and opened the way to building a new one.
The Russian-Ukrainian war was supposed to shock the world, because it made us aware of the deep division of the world against the background of basic values. But it didn’t shake it. Especially in the perception of the Global South.
Should we wait for a new world war, which has already apparently begun, but is still in its creeping phase? A new great nuclear world war as the only way to build a new international order?
For years we have been reassured that nuclear weapons make world war unlikely. But nuclear weapons in the hands of superpowers and reactionary states such as Russia or North Korea make the stakes of attempts to change the order unimaginable.
So the current order would stay with us forever? At least in the sphere of ornamentation, in particular institutions, that is, in relation to the composition and prerogatives of the UN Security Council, universal membership in the UN legitimizing dictatorships and oppressive regimes, fully voluntary membership in treaty regimes and other elements of the order. But everyone will agree that the current order is not the end of history. So how to induce catharsis? Is it possible to fundamentally change the world without purification? Can any mechanism for peaceful transformation be created?
It is hard to believe in such a peaceful transformation. Will North Korea give up its nuclear weapons on its own? Not to mention whether Russia itself would be ready to give up its veto right at the UNSC, because it is only the size of its nuclear arsenal that predisposes it to this right? Would France give up its permanent seat in the Security Council to be replaced by the European Union? Would the US agree to establish a global human rights court? The list of rhetorical questions is long, very long.
There are no radical reforms in sight. The leaders hide themselves behind the argument that the masses of voters in their countries are not yet ready for the reforms, especially when it comes to ceding sovereign rights to international institutions. The organizations’ functionaries blame member states for the weakness of the institutions. State leaders have a convenient excuse for the weakness of international organizations. In addition, there is a lack of self-criticism typical of politicians and international officials. The assessment of the institution’s work is dominated by the so-called self-congratulatory mode. Nobody wants to admit that they are doing something wrong.
In the past, great and disastrous wars sparked intellectual searches for a better formula for the world. The Thirty Years’ War and the War of the Spanish Succession must have mobilized Kant somewhere in the back of his mind to produce his vision of a peaceful order. Often, the devastation of wars opened the way for the spread of criminal ideologies, as in the cases of Leninism or fascism. But also noble visions, as in the case of Wilson or Schumann. Today, the only utopia remains the vision of a world government, but no one wants to follow it.
It would be best to start with what is unsustainable in the current order. Not in the political sense, as we mentioned at the beginning, but in the so-called systemic sense. So what? Imperial behaviour of superpowers? Dominant position of big powers? Privileges of nuclear states? Inviolability of nuclear states? The mere existence of nuclear weapons? State monopoly on the representation of human beings and citizens? State monopoly on the use of military force? The principle of sovereignty as a cover for the way we treat our own citizens? Lack of responsibility of leaders for actions towards other countries? Lack of effective means of international coercion and enforcement of standards of conduct? Lack of effective global solidarity mechanisms?
Let’s start with such a list. Only then should we look for the best solutions.
And finally, the most practical of practical questions: who can become an agent, a transformation leader? USA? European Union? China or India as emerging powers? Global South as a bloc? However, many of the Southern countries do not want to change anything systematically, they do not want to overturn the table, they only want to exchange places at the top with the Western countries.
Malicious people remind us that this is an old reflex in the behaviour of peoples who have been humiliated for many years. They recall the slave uprisings in Roman times, Eunus and Salvius. They proclaimed themselves kings by divine appointment, but they did not want to change the system. Even Spartacus was only fighting for his own freedom, maybe for his own kingdom in Sicily, but not for changing the system. Most peasant revolts looked similar. But these types of comparisons don’t seem apt.
So maybe some politician, a distinctive personality, a global celebrity who could inspire the world? There are politicians with greater recognition, yes. There are those who definitely exceed the political potential of their own country. But they don’t have enough pulling power.
Because as a class, politicians seem too grounded in political thinking by the tyranny of the present. What about social groups? There was a time when we believed in the transformative zeal of the global middle class. Nobody talks about it today. The only hope lies in the youth? Yes, they are the spearhead of the ecological and climate movements. But these are the activist elite. Because millions of young people do not think about the future. They don’t save, they don’t have children. Women?
All we have to do is look out for “black swans”? Some say that one just landed in November. Others maintain that it’s not a swan, but a giant peacock, although with an eagle’s beak and strong talons. It circled above us for a long time. And it came not the first time. It has already disturbed our peace of mind once with its unpredictability. There was time to prepare for its coming. But, it seems, few people prepared themselves for it.
Unpredictability as the trademark of politics well reflects the atmosphere of the era, the era of frustration, drift, temporariness, great waiting.
But I view these unpredictability with hope. Even if in the short term it means decisions that will have a negative impact on us in Europe.
I believe in the effect of a lucky accident, serendipity, a favourable turn of events that originally seem to be bad. I believe in the Gorbachev effect, when a modest attempt to change the order spills out into an avalanche sweeping away all the deposits and remnants of the old world. I do believe.
And on that optimistic note…
And on this optimistic note, I close the account of my past public speeches, lectures and presentations written down over the recent years. Let me remind you that I took on these challenges then, sometimes so far removed from my then current activities, so as not to get stuck in the trivia of diplomatic affairs that I experienced, to look for a deeper meaning and a broader context for everyday activity at that time. Not for pedagogical pleasure at all. Nor from a sense of preaching mission.
And I wanted to take then the opportunity, and I won’t hide it, to engage in an intellectual wrestling match with the boring stuff that was dominating academic discourse at that time. I do not deny that I wanted to shake the minds of my young, educated listeners and disturb their mental order formed in the classrooms of higher education, especially at those universities where a highly scholastic model of study is still in force.
For the opportunity to give these lectures, I would like to thank in particular Lena Nemirovskaya, Yuri Senokosov, Inna Berezkina and all friends from the School of Citizenship Education and other similar schools who invited me.
I don’t plan to make more speeches of this sort. Even if there were invitations and opportunities. Although life, especially professional experiences, taught me never to say never.
However, I want to look for new challenges.
I invite you to the new, completely different page of the blog in January 2025.
