Partnership for Resilience: A UAE-Europe Relationship Committed to Stability
Announcing tectonic shifts in the geopolitical order has become a reflex, as though the observation itself were a novel conclusion. The international system has never been static; change is inevitable, it is shaped by context, and by the choices states make under conditions of uncertainty. In our current moment of polarisation, weakened institutions, and fraying […]
The Retreat From Global Leadership: America’s National Security Revolution
There is a ritual in Washington, performed by every administration, that usually amounts to little more than bureaucratic theater. The release of a National Security Strategy that tends to be an exercise in checking boxes, a collection of platitudes destined to be quickly forgotten by allies and adversaries alike. However, the document released by the […]
The Architecture of Rivalry: Power Politics in the Post-Western Age
While the discourse regarding a “new world order” has yielded certain insights, it remains largely premature. To be sure, the post-Cold War unipolar moment has passed, as has the global hegemony of U.S. liberal democracy. A polycentric reality—often erroneously labeled “multipolarity”—is already upon us. Yet, it lacks a foundational order to underpin it; instead, the […]
Beyond Polarity: Power, Agency, and Order in the Contemporary Global System
Events in the global environment are largely concrete, yet their interpretation depends on analytical frameworks that subsequently shape action and, in turn, future realities. Theoretical perspectives—whether realist, liberal, constructivist, or otherwise—do not merely describe the world; they function as interpretive lenses through which external realities are classified, understood, and acted upon. Understanding global phenomena emerges […]
Mortal Nations, Immortal Individuals: The Crisis of the Intergenerational Contract
In 1643, the preacher Jeremy Whitaker warned his parishoners that “these days are days of shaking, and this shaking is universal.” That same year, a Spanish contemporary wrote, “This seems to be one of those epochs in which every nation is turned upside down, leading some great minds to suspect that we are approaching the […]
Multipolarity and a New Humanism
The 2025 Munich Security Conference became notorious for a speech by the Vice-President of the United States, J. D. Vance, in which he contended that threats from within Europe worried him more than threats posed by any external actor to the region. That statement was received with discomfort by most of the Munich audience, who […]
European Russophobia and Europe’s Rejection of Peace: A Two-Century Failure
Europe has repeatedly rejected peace with Russia at moments when a negotiated settlement was available, and those rejections have proven profoundly self-defeating. From the nineteenth century to the present, Russia’s security concerns have been treated not as legitimate interests to be negotiated within a broader European order, but as moral transgressions to be resisted, contained, […]
How China Is Quietly Outpacing the West
While the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump doubles down on “America First” and U.S. think tanks propagate the narrative of “Peak China,” Beijing is quietly, yet methodically, eclipsing the United States in what Chinese policymakers describe as “comprehensive national strength.” This concept—though admittedly somewhat nebulous—encompasses five decisive dimensions: economic development, infrastructure, technological innovation, new […]
The Re-Anchoring: Beyond the World of 1945
To forecast the future—or even to comprehend the present—one must first grasp the past. The geopolitical architecture established at the end of World War II has become obsolete. Today, the global system is undergoing a transformation as radical as the one witnessed in 1945. Prior to 1945, the global order rested on two pillars. The […]
Preparing for the Asian Twenty-First Century
In 1925, the world’s geopolitical center of gravity was indisputably Europe—the epicenter of culture, power, and colonial authority. The United States, surging with industrial might and youthful optimism, clearly represented the future. Asia, large swathes of which had been ransacked and impoverished by colonial powers and rendered technologically stagnant, was viewed by the West as […]