Make the World Order Great Again” – The Fight over the Liberal Order as an Instance of the Transatlantic Divide

Abstract

The purposes of this article are a) to offer some highlights on the various concepts conflated under the term “world order” (post WWII world order, liberal order, global order), thus underlining its context-specific character; b) to place the discussion in the current context of the Transatlantic Divide and c) to examine EU’s embrace of the current narrative of a universalistic, unhistorical liberal order and the consequences of such embrace for the amplification of the Transatlantic Divide and of the internal East-West one. The choice to focus on the challenges to the world order from within the Transatlantic world and from its most prominent members is motivated by the fact that, to our understanding, this development is age-defining. The fact that China would challenge the world order that was established by its main competitor – US – in order to serve its own interests is less spectacular than the fact that the dismantling of the US-led world order appears to be led by US itself or the fact the biggest fights over the current order and its aftermath take place within the Transatlantic world itself.