Why the World Needs Multilateralism and Middle Powers

As world leaders gather this week in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, they face a central problem: the world has become more interconnected than at any other point in the history of international relations since the fifteenth century. Yet, at the same time, it has become more fragmented and polarized, with power increasingly dispersed. National economies are deeply intertwined, technology connects billions of people across borders, while capital, goods, data and ideas move at speeds unimaginable when the United Nations was founded in 1945. Global trade reached a record $35 trillion last year, while six billion people, nearly three-quarters of humanity, are now connected to the Internet.

Geopolitics, however, is moving in the opposite direction. In 2025, 35 countries experienced armed conflicts that were not entirely unrelated to the actions of the great powers, the highest number recorded since 1946, while global military spending rose to a record $3 trillion. International law is under growing pressure, as the language of spheres of influence and power politics resurfaces. The international system is attempting to preserve its cohesion amid a possible shift in the hierarchy of global powers, with China seeking to secure a place at the top of that system, while the United States seeks to consolidate the foundations of its global dominance and remain the superpower that controls the vital levers of the world economy, while continuing to build its military, political and technological power. Economic ties and oil and gas corridors are also increasingly being used as instruments of pressure and coercion, while inequality continues to grow, both within countries and between them.

What the world is experiencing today, therefore, is not yet a new international order, but a transitional phase toward the world yet to come. Questions can thus be raised about the nature of that system: has the multilateral order failed? Will the international system remain unipolar? And are the wars currently unfolding merely temporary accidents of history?

This criticism is partly understandable from the perspective of those whose views diverge from those of the United States. A multilateral system that fails to reflect today’s realities will not withstand the tests that have intensified in recent years, amid pressure on the international order from some major and middle powers that believe they can weaken existing norms and reshape them to their advantage. Forms of international contestation have therefore emerged that challenge the foundations on which the international system rests, alongside efforts to operate outside the framework of legal governance in regulating trade, technology and even migration flows, which are increasingly being used as weapons in the service of particular populist and geopolitical interests. Meanwhile, many world leaders choose silence rather than defending international law.

The international system is under severe strain at the level of norms. Yet the need for multilateral cooperation remains very much alive, in order to bring spheres of influence back within a framework of common rules and restore balances conducive to international harmony, stability and peace.

The fundamental logic that justifies multilateral cooperation has become clearer than ever. Such cooperation requires instruments of global coordination that strengthen the central state, uphold basic parameters of sovereignty and reactivate the multilateral architecture. Multilateralism, however, is not an abstract ideal. It is a daily reality affecting citizens around the world as a new balance emerges between order, chaos and coercive power.

The climate emergency is exceeding even the most alarming forecasts. Artificial intelligence, or what the American president has called “superintelligence,” is advancing faster than our ability to control it. Epidemics can spread across continents within weeks, while financial shocks can disrupt entire markets within hours. Armed conflicts can destabilize entire regions, force millions of people from their homes and expose them to hunger in the Middle East and the Horn of Africa. Global maritime chokepoints, such as the Strait of Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb, can also be disrupted by conflicts involving Iran, potentially paralyzing supply chains around the world.

Yet no country, regardless of its power, can manage these challenges alone. Cooperation is therefore not an act of idealism, but a practical necessity.

The question is not whether multilateralism can survive, but how it must evolve to meet present realities. It needs partners from different regions and political traditions, as well as coalitions for reform. This means strengthening cooperation among regional organizations and upholding the fundamental principles enshrined in the United Nations Charter. These principles are non-negotiable: sovereign equality, territorial integrity, the peaceful settlement of disputes, the prohibition of the threat or use of force, respect for international humanitarian law, sustainable development, human rights and fundamental freedoms.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres recently said that “the great powers are discovering their limits.” The international community must rediscover the extraordinary potential of collective action. This was also reflected in a joint statement by the president of Brazil, the president of the European Council, the president of Kenya and the prime minister of Canada. These leaders have also expressed disappointment with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, who failed to exert the necessary pressure on his American counterpart in pursuit of peace, despite China’s unique economic leverage.

There is also a cynical explanation for China’s reluctance to pursue peace. According to this pessimistic view, Communist Party leaders take satisfaction in watching America and its military forces become bogged down in the Middle Eastern quagmire. Given the extent of Chinese leaders’ aversion to both sanctions and regime change, they are also comfortable seeing Iran continue to hold out. By reducing its imports, China can maintain its policy of avoiding excessive dependence on any single supplier, including close geopolitical partners such as Russia.

Yet a new factor has entered the equation, whether as an element of confrontation or mediation, or even as a new fault line: growing concern over the risks posed by artificial intelligence. Talks among the great powers in Washington and at the G20 face serious challenges. If the American and Chinese leaders manage to reach an agreement on artificial intelligence as part of negotiations over trade and other issues, this could provide an opening for a broader breakthrough, reinforced by parallel statements reaffirming their nuclear understandings and expressing shared concerns about artificial intelligence escaping human control, or being used for bioterrorism and electronic fraud.

By contrast, middle powers must work together if they are not to find themselves on the menu of powers that act solely according to their own will. They must pursue foreign policies based on values, as is the case with European Union countries and Canada, and advocate open maritime routes, a stable financial system, collective security and support for mechanisms of conflict resolution.

But this arrangement no longer works. The multilateral institutions on which middle powers have relied, including the World Trade Organization, the United Nations, the Conferences of the Parties and the International Criminal Court, and which form the architecture of collective solutions to common challenges, have been significantly weakened.

States are therefore increasingly concluding that they must strengthen their strategic autonomy in energy, food, critical minerals, finance and supply chains. This classic form of risk management comes at a cost. Yet investments can be shared through the adoption of common standards that reduce fragmentation.

For middle powers, therefore, the question is not whether they should adapt to this new reality, but how that adaptation should take place: should it come through building ever higher walls against those who are rediscovering Machiavelli, Hobbes, Hume and Clausewitz and turning international society into a race for power, with little regard for ethical or idealistic principles?

In an echo of Nicholas Spykman, the idea of a natural drive to control the Middle East, transport and communication routes, and strategic points is once again emerging, while every state, in one way or another, seeks to expand its regional reach and returns to the struggle for power.

Middle powers must therefore give priority to broad-based dialogue within an increasingly plural international order, in order to help reshape the broader conditions governing international relations.