As Trump abandons the old world order, NZ must find its place in a new ‘Pax Autocratica’

Donald Trump is moving rapidly to change the contours of contemporary international affairs, with the old US-dominated world order breaking down into a multipolar one with many centres of power.

The shift already includes the US leaving the World Health Organization and the Paris Climate Accords, questioning the value of the United Nations, and radical cuts to the US Agency for International Development (USAID).

Such a new geopolitical age also involves an assertion of raw power, with Trump using the threat of tariffs to assert global authority and negotiating positions.

While the US is not significantly less powerful, this new era may see it wield that power in more openly self-interested and isolationist ways. As new US Secretary of State Marco Rubio put it in January, “the post-war global order is not just obsolete – it is now a weapon being used against us”.

With global democracy in retreat, the emerging international order looks to be moving in an authoritarian direction. As it does, the position of New Zealand’s vibrant democracy will come under mounting pressure.

But world orders have come and gone for millennia, reflecting the ebb and flow of global economic, political and military power. Looking back to previous eras, and how countries and cultures responded to shifting geopolitical realities, can help us understand what is happening more clearly.

An evolving world order

Previous orders have often focused on specific centres – or “poles” – of power. These include the Concert of Europe from 1814 to 1914, the bipolar world of the Cold War between the US and the Soviet Union, and the unipolar world of American dominance after the end of the Cold War and since the September 11 attacks in 2001.

Periods of single-power dominance (or hegemony) are referred to as a “pax”, from the Latin for “peace”. We have seen the Pax Romana of the Roman Empire (27 BCE to 180 AD), multiple Pax Sinicas around China (most recently the Qing Dynasty 1644 to 1912), Pax Mongolica (the Mongol Empire from 1271 to 1368) and Pax Britannica (the British Empire from 1815 to 1924).

It is the Pax Americana of the US, from 1945 to the present, that Trump seems bent on dismantling. We now live in an international order that is visibly in flux. With autocracy on the rise and the US at its vanguard, a “Pax Autocratica” is emerging.

This is accentuated by the rapid rise of Asia as the main sphere of economic and military growth, particularly China and India. The world’s two most populous countries had the world’s largest and third largest economies respectively in 2023, and the second and fourth highest levels of military spending.

The simultaneous rise of multiple power centres was already challenging the Pax Americana. Now, a new international order appears to be a certainty, with Trump openly adapting to multipolarity. Several major powers now compete for global influence, rather than any one country dominating.

China’s preference for a multipolar international order is shared by India and Russia. Without one dominant entity, it will be the political and social basis of this order, as determined by its major actors, that matters most – not who leads it.

Pax Democratica

The current (now waning) international order has been underpinned by specific social, political and economic values stemming from the national identity and historical experience of the US.

According to US political expert G. John Ikenberry, former president Woodrow Wilson’s agenda for peace after the first world war sought to “reflect distinctive American ideas and ideals”.

Woodrow imagined an order based on collective security and shared sovereignty, liberal principles of democracy and universal human rights, free trade and international law.

As its dominance and military strength increased in the 20th century, the US also provided security to other countries. Such power enabled Washington to create open global trade markets, as well as build core global institutions like the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, World Trade Organization, United Nations and NATO.

For Ikenberry, this Pax Americana (we might call it a Pax Democratica) rested on consent to the US’s “provision of security, wealth creation, and social advancement”. This was aided by the its more than 800 military bases in over 80 countries.

The democratic deficit

Trump undercuts the central tenets of this liberal world order and accelerates a slide towards authoritarianism. Like Russia, India and China, the US is also actively constraining human rights, attacking minorities and weakening its electoral system.

This democratic retreat leaves a country such as New Zealand in a global minority. If Trump targets the region or country with economic tariffs, that precariousness might increase.

On the other hand, previous world orders have not been truly hegemonic. Pax Britannica did not encompass the entire world. Nor did Pax Americana, which didn’t include China, India, the former Soviet bloc, much of the Islamic world and many developing countries.

This suggests pockets of democracy can survive within a Pax Autocratica, especially in a multipolar world which is more tolerant of political independence.

The Economist Intelligence Unit’s 2023 Democracy Index ranked New Zealand, the Nordic countries, Switzerland, Iceland and Ireland highest because their citizens

choose their political leaders in free and fair elections, enjoy civil liberties, prefer democracy over other political systems, can and do participate in politics, and have a functioning government that acts on their behalf.

It is these countries that can be at the vanguard of democratic resilience.

Chris Ogden is a Senior Research Fellow with The Foreign Policy Centre, London.