The world order has collapsed. Now comes the dangerous part

“A new world order must be built to ensure economic justice and equal political security for all nations. An end to the arms race is an essential prerequisite for the establishment of such an order.”

This year marks the 40th anniversary of those words from the Soviet-Indian Delhi Declaration, signed in 1986 during Mikhail Gorbachev’s visit to India and his talks with Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. It was one of the first major documents of the late Cold War era to openly speak of the need for a ‘new world order’.

At the time, the Soviet leadership believed this order would emerge through what it called ‘new political thinking’. The idea was that former adversaries would abandon confrontation and combine the best elements of their respective systems to create a more stable and equitable international framework. It was an ambitious vision: A joint effort to rebuild global politics from the ruins of ideological rivalry. But history, however, had other plans.

The Soviet Union soon disappeared into a vortex of internal crises before vanishing altogether from the world stage. The phrase ‘new world order’ survived, but it was quickly repurposed by the administration of President George H.W. Bush. In Washington’s interpretation, the concept no longer meant a shared international architecture. It came to mean a liberal order dominated politically and militarily by the US and its allies.

In reality, this wasn’t an entirely new order at all. It was an extension of the post-1945 system, only now without the counterweight of the Soviet Union.

For a time, many believed this arrangement represented the natural endpoint of history. Yet contrary to those expectations, once the Cold War confrontation disappeared, global stability didn’t deepen. Instead, tensions gradually intensified and by the beginning of the 2010s, the foundations of the system were already beginning to crack.

Since then, the pace of disintegration has accelerated dramatically.

As humanity moves deeper into the second quarter of the 21st century, it is becoming increasingly difficult to deny that the previous world order has effectively ceased to exist. Whatever doubts may have lingered vanished during the opening months of 2026.

What matters isn’t simply that the strongest states increasingly ignore laws and conventions that once appeared firmly established, more significant is the style in which politics is now conducted. Decisions are impulsive and often openly contradictory as governments act first and improvise later. Statements made today may directly contradict those made yesterday, yet this no longer seems to matter.

This atmosphere shouldn’t necessarily be mistaken for collective irrationality. Rather, many political actors appear convinced that the old restraints have collapsed and that the current moment represents a historic opportunity. The instinct is simple: Seize as much advantage as possible before the landscape hardens again.

The redistribution of the world has already begun. Political influence, transport corridors, resources, financial flows, technological ecosystems, and even cultural and religious spheres are all being contested simultaneously. Every major power is now defining its ambitions and testing the methods by which those ambitions might be achieved.

Of course, mistakes will be expensive, but that, at least, is nothing new in international politics.

The real uncertainty lies elsewhere because the previous era left behind an assumption that periods of chaos are eventually followed by the emergence of a new equilibrium. After disorder comes structure and after confrontation comes a new framework. But there’s no guarantee this time.

The international system today isn’t an empty construction site waiting for a new design. After major world wars, old structures are often swept away on a vast scale, creating space for something new to emerge, and that’s not the case now.

Instead, the world remains cluttered with institutions and habits inherited from previous eras. Many are discredited or dysfunctional, but they still exist. And even those states that attack these institutions most aggressively continue to use them whenever convenient.

The United Nations system remains an example. Its authority has diminished, yet governments still appeal to it selectively when doing so serves their interests. Likewise, the structures created during the period of liberal globalization have proven more resilient than many expected.

Despite trade wars, sanctions, geopolitical fragmentation, and increasingly open rivalry among major powers, the global economic network continues to resist complete disintegration. Supply chains bend but do not fully break. Markets remain interconnected. Even countries engaged in fierce political confrontation continue trading with one another indirectly.

This resilience appears to frustrate some of the very powers trying to reshape the system.

The creation of a genuinely new international framework will therefore be an exceptionally painful process. The available raw material consists of fragments from different historical periods, ideological systems, and institutional models. Somehow these incompatible components must be assembled into something functional.

Some states are attempting this carefully, selecting elements that might fit together into a relatively coherent structure. Others are behaving more crudely, trying to hammer incompatible pieces into place through pressure or intimidation. The danger is obvious: Excessive force may not produce stability at all, but only further fragmentation.

Yet perhaps the defining feature of the present moment is that nobody possesses a real blueprint for what comes next. During earlier periods of transition, however flawed the visions may have been, leaders at least believed they understood the destination.

However, today there is no such clarity and the latest struggle to construct a new world order comes without universal principles or even a broadly accepted idea of what success would look like. The old rules are fading, but no agreed replacements have emerged.

For now, the message confronting every major power is brutally simple: Do it yourself, and then try to live with the consequences.