The Crisis of Multilateralism. DOI: http://dx.doi.org.10.18847/1.22.1

Abstract

One of the defining characteristics of the liberal world order that emerged after the end of the Second World War was multilateralism as a means of ensuring international cooperation and guaranteeing peace. The institutional framework embodied by the United Nations and its extensive network of specialized agencies thus came to constitute not only a coercive authority that legitimized the use of force to impose peace, but also a mechanism for addressing a wide range of assistance needs and for coordinating global public policies. Beneath this complex United Nations structure, numerous regional cooperation organizations also emerged, among which the European Union stands out as an attempt at supranational organization aimed at achieving economic—and later political—integration among European states. In most other regional cases, these arrangements took the form primarily of intergovernmental organizations focused on political dialogue and the promotion of economic cooperation. The erosion of a rules-based international order has carried with it a significant portion of this institutional scaffolding constructed and sustained by Western countries over recent decades. Although often of limited effectiveness, this framework nonetheless fulfilled an important role in providing assistance to less developed countries and to the most vulnerable groups. In this issue of the Journal of International Security Studies, we examine several of these international organizations, both long-established and newly created.