Interpreting a Changing World Order

Abstract

Contemporary international politics is marked by a paradox: at atime when geopolitical transformations appear increasingly visible,the conceptual frameworks through which those transformationsare interpreted seem increasingly uncertain. The return of war toEurope, the re-emergence of great-power competition, the fragmen-tation of global governance, the acceleration of technological andenergy transitions, and the growing centrality of information in in-ternational affairs all point towards a rapidly evolving internationalenvironment. Yet while change itself has become impossible to ig-nore, there is far less agreement on how it should be understood.This raises a broader question: do the conceptual frameworks thatshaped our understanding of world politics over the last decades re-main adequate for interpreting the emerging international order?