Revisionist power

Finally, even in part of the so-called West, there is recognition that the world has changed in its interstate balances. This recognition, this newfound awareness, is particularly significant as it emerges from the new US presidency — namely, the government of the most important nation-pole of the West, which has been its undisputed leader for the past 80 years.

We say "finally "because many observers and scholars (as prophetic as they were ignored) had already suggested the need to adapt to these changes, calling for greater cooperation with state-civilization poles such as China, Russia, India and Iran, and more engagement with new non-Western international institutional platforms such as "BRICS Plus "cooperation model, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, Eurasian Economic Union and the Belt and Road Initiative. At the same time, they suggested rejecting the logic of opposing blocs.

The United States, like its traditional allies, is being forced to adapt to a new world simply because it is no longer able to manipulate it at will. Therefore, Donald Trump's second term as US president will help shed even more light on the consolidation of a multipolar world. He will do so with all the contradictions and unpredictability we have come to expect from him.

In my view, many of the "Make America Great Again" ambitions of the latest occupant of the White House are unfeasible. The administration's policies are interesting insofar as they stem from the recognition of US decline — a decline highlighted by the emergence of a new international order and, more specifically, by the strategic mistakes that resulted from previous resistance to adaptation in an attempt to restore a lost hegemony.

The Ukraine crisis, for instance, has demonstrated how the West has failed to isolate Russia and instead found itself more isolated from the rest of the world. This is because a new international order had already emerged, yet they pretended not to see it.

These profound changes, which have been called the "tectonics of geopolitics", should have long ago led the West to abandon its hegemonic, imperialist and supremacist logic — first rooted in Euro-centric universalism and later in Anglo-Saxon messianism — that inspired the West's global domination projects. That era is over.

China and the US are becoming comparable in terms of global economic weight. As of 2023, China accounted for 18.75 percent of global GDP in terms of purchasing power parity, compared to the US' 15 percent share. It is worth noting that GDP calculated using PPP and production-based methods rather than expenditure-based methods strongly favors China. In fact, China has, for many years, surpassed the US in industrial production, international trade and technological development, as reflected in international statistics. Not to mention the green technology sector, where China is the undisputed global leader.

It is precisely within these dynamics that Trump's remarks about the labor market, trade and war — spoken on the day of his inauguration — take on significance.

Not only will it be difficult to recover lost ground, but it will be almost impossible unless a more "Keynesian" vision of the relationship between states and markets is restored — one that prioritizes social cohesion and justice at the center of Western political action. Otherwise, fragmentation, socioeconomic inequality and the private-interest conflicts embedded in its parliaments leave little hope for anything significant or desirable.

The radical transformation of the world system was foreseen by some at least 20 years ago. This system has shifted from a more or less liberal, unipolar order (or a restricted multipolarity limited to a small portion of the world) to a new, expanded multipolar order structured around multiple state-poles across different continents.

With the US' open support for and complicity in Israel's ethnic cleansing against the Palestinian people, the already faltering international legitimacy of the West is now definitively disappearing.

But arrogance, presumption and a sense of superiority continue to encrust the corridors of power in the West. And while recognizing that the world is changing is necessary, it will not be sufficient, because such recognition alone is unlikely to generate the new cultural and political paradigms necessary for intelligent adaptation.

The only way to serve the interests of an entire nation and ensure lasting forms of peaceful coexistence is through dialogue, cooperation and mutual respect. This will be the real challenge for those in the new Trump administration, who may believe they can resolve deep-rooted historical problems quickly — relying solely on business strategies and an approach that, in part, remains outdated, as it still requires finding enemies among competitors rather than fostering greater cooperation among equals.

We shall see, but I deeply doubt, that the imperialist "DNA" of the US-led West, along with its messianic vision, can be "revised" in the short term. Consequently, the transformation of the world system will continue to unfold through extremely contradictory processes.

The first month of Trump's second term is already revealing — unsurprisingly, except for the so-called European leaders — the growing fracture between the US and the European Union. This divide will play out both in security and defense matters and in economic and trade policies. We had already discussed this during Trump's first term, but this time, the neo-mercantilist and isolationist approach of the new administration is even more pronounced.

Trump's initial foreign policy actions appear swift and impactful. They seem genuinely aimed at reindustrializing the country and expanding domestic job opportunities, although his political agenda primarily serves the country's elites. The idea, whose effectiveness remains to be seen, of imposing tariffs on all fronts while simultaneously cutting taxes for businesses and workers and reducing energy costs is conceived within this framework.

In this light, the pursuit of military disengagement in Europe makes sense not only to save resources and benefit from Ukrainian raw material deposits, but also to concentrate efforts in the "Indo-Pacific" region and foster a closer relationship with Russia in a vain attempt to destabilize the Sino-Russian partnership. Meanwhile, the EU appears divided, diplomatically weak and incapable of constructing real strategic autonomy, making its political nonexistence evident to all.

The EU has almost always followed the US geopolitical agenda, even sacrificing its own interests to support the proxy war between the US and Russia in Ukraine. Over the past 30 years, it has gradually abandoned its political and strategic autonomy in favor of unwavering support for the US. However, interests are now diverging more sharply. As the contemporary periphery of the US empire, Europe will be forced to bear the costs of the West's decline.

The West used to label external regional powers as "revisionist powers" of the existing world order — the so-called rules-based order. Today, however, it is the US itself that is the true "revisionist power", as it seeks to reassert the US' centrality in the new post-Western multipolar order.

The author is a member of Earth Charter International China. The author contributed this article to China Watch, a think tank powered by China Daily. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

Contact the editor at editor@chinawatch.cn.