Council on Foreign Relations Report Analyzes the Changing World Order

Views of emerging relations from China, the European Union, India, and Russia

By Carnegie Corporation of New York June 5, 2020

Perspectives on a Changing World Order

A new report, Perspectives on a Changing World Order, published by the Council on Foreign Relations and funded by Carnegie Corporation of New York, offers perspectives on China, the European Union, India, and Russia by leading scholars in foreign policy. The report is an outcome of the Managing Global Disorder project, launched by the Council on Foreign Relations’ Center for Preventive Action with funding from the Corporation.

In the report’s introduction, Paul B. Stares, General John W. Vessey senior fellow for conflict prevention and director of the Center for Preventive Action at the Council on Foreign Relations, writes:

“Observers of world affairs like to point to a defining moment or pivotal event to proclaim the end of one era and the beginning of another. Not surprisingly, the novel coronavirus pandemic has already spawned much speculation that the world will undergo profound change as a consequence, even that contemporary history will forever be divided between what happened BC (before coronavirus) and AC (after coronavirus). Historical eras, however, and certainly international orders — the complex amalgam of rules, norms, and institutions that govern relations among states at any given time — rarely, if ever, hinge on singular events. They, and the power relationships that undergird them, are simply too entrenched to change rapidly. For this reason, it is more accurate to identify transitional periods that span the rise and fall of specific international orders. In these periods, elements of the old order are still discernible, albeit functioning below their peak, while features of the new order are clearly emerging and playing a more influential role.”

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