Universalism

It is now commonplace to depict the global scene as ‘multipolar’. This blog looks at the prospects for a more universalist world where common values can be supported and enforced at the global level

Introduction
 
In the immediate post second world war era there was hope for a universalist approach to international relations based on common values, supported and enforced by global institutions. The hope was symbolised by the UN’s Declaration of Universal Human Rights and by the creation of the UN and its specialised agencies. The hope was immediately dashed by the descent of the ‘Iron curtain’ and peace only prevailed though the threat of mutually assured destruction. 
 
Hopes revived again at the beginning of the 1990s when Soviet communism collapsed. There seemed reasonable prospects for growing international integration through trade, a global acceptance of market principles for economic organisation and the hope that democratic principles for political organisation would also gradually be accepted world-wide.
 
In recent years these hopes have also been dashed. Major powers remain fundamentally divided by political values; international trade is being ‘decoupled’ and has become a leading source of tension; market principles themselves are challenged by the transition from the world of scarcity depicted by conventional economic models to a world characterised by a superabundance of information and platform delivery. 
 
The question therefore is about the dynamics that might encourage a return to some form of universalism.
 
Common values
 
The root of universalism is that there are some values that are common to everyone in the world and should be recognised and respected by all. This is the motivation underlying the UN’s 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
 
The difficulty with this foundation is that there may not be agreement on these values. Even if there is agreement at some basic level there may be many different interpretations given to them. It is difficult to imagine a world order that does not allow both for different values and different expressions of values.
 
Global superstructure and enforcement
 
A second basis for universalism lies in the idea that in the same way that a political and economic order can be constructed for nation states so too can it be constructed at a global level standing above nations or federal states. In their internal construction, nations have to allow space for differences through, for example, federal or consociational structures including minority vetoes. A global order could be constructed in the same way. 
 
The difficulty with this basis is that there is no agreement on what the supranational framework would look like. It is not sufficient to offer international platforms for political grandstanding. Giving equal weight to each state in the world is hardly realistic. At the same time, the institutions should be capable of implementation and enforcement. At the moment the impetus behind supranational rule making has all but collapsed. Implementation and enforcement are virtually nowhere to be seen from peacekeeping to the environment and to trade.
 
Peaceful association between states
 
In the absence of a global superstructure for universal government the alternative is to look to a form of association between the different states and federations in the world that would aim to keep the peace and focus on problem solving as the need arises. It is picture animated by national interest to avoid conflict rather than shared values.
 
The difficulty with this approach is that the world is composed of many small or medium sized states. leaving the power blocs of the major states to assert themselves and to compete with their own agendas and national priorities. It is an unstable world prone to miscalculation of where lines are drawn. Even in the eras of the so-called ‘pax Brittanica’ (1815-1914) and the ‘pax Americana’ (1946-2011) significant conflicts and bloodshed continued in most parts of the world conducted in large part by those responsible for the ‘pax’.
 
The indirect: trade: AI
 
A further platform for universalism that aims to get around national conflicts is to point to indirect routes to universal peace, co-existence and cooperation. 
 
The time-honoured avenue since the eighteenth century has been to point to international trade as allowing all countries to participate to their mutual advantage. Since all participants benefit from exchange the edge is taken off national rivalries. Trust and confidence can be built that can be applied to other areas beyond trade as well. After the Second World War there was a widespread assumption that free trade would provide the means to avoid the protectionism and rivalries of the inter-war years. Free trade was seen in particular as a way to lock a pacified Germany into a peaceful Europe.
 
The difficulty with this route is that the benefits of trade are distributed unevenly and some countries and constituencies within countries may see themselves as losers. Trade is now used for strategic purposes and political leverage by the major trading powers including the EU.
 
In recent times a different indirect avenue has potentially opened up with the rapid advance of AI. AI is seen to pose possible existential threats to society as we know it. In theory all countries have a self-interest in cooperating in the management of AI in order to avert such existential threats.
 
The difficulty with this route is that advance in AI is also seen as a matter of national technological advantage and key to national security. Both limit the motivation to cooperate even in the face of existential threats.
 
Accommodation
 
A final avenue to a more universalist world is to return to shared values. These are not the values expressed in comprehensive declarations of rights but the values that enable countries to live side-by-side. Coexistence is the aim. The key values involve the toleration of difference, moderation in pursuing goals and a willingness to look to accommodate the desires and objectives of others. 
 
Even this avenue has its limits. Toleration is said to have its limits in relation to what the American political theorist John Rawls referred to as ‘outlaw states’ and by other authors in relation to ‘crimes against humanity’ such as genocide. There is often seen to exist a duty to protect, even if overlooked in places such as Gaza and Darfur.
 
Integrity
 
A completely different way of looking at universalism is to set aside the framework of states and their relationships and to revert back to Kant and his notion of individual moral integrity. According to Kant we can test our moral propositions against the benchmark as to whether they are universalizable or not. 
 
Even this approach to universalism needs to be treated with caution. Religious beliefs and patriarchal views project irreconcilably different views of what is universalizable in terms of individual moral integrity.
 
Nevertheless, notions of individual moral integrity remain of fundamental importance as a way of thinking about universalizable values. They are important not least for the limits they may set on accommodation and tolerance for what governments do. At the moment moral integrity is singularly lacking in Washington DC as lawyers and others fail to stand up to the authoritarianism and unilateralism of President Trump.