The post-Cold War order, long assumed to be stable, is coming undone. The relative optimism that once sustained belief in the “liberal international order” has dimmed, along with its promise of equitable peace and prosperity. Selective application of international and humanitarian law has corroded confidence in global institutions, and across much of the world, poverty, alienation, and violence endure. Meanwhile, the UN Security Council remains outdated and constrained, a system built not for justice but for great-power privilege. These developments invite renewed reflection within International Relations theory on how power, legitimacy, and order interact in a rapidly transforming world. Have we crossed a threshold where Hobbesian anarchy once again defines international life, where zero-sum rivalry displaces shared commitments to peace, dignity, and human rights? Or is this simply an echo of Thucydides’ warning that “the strong do what they have to do, and the weak accept what they have to accept”? Such questions lie at the heart of International Relations debates about whether global politics can ever transcend power’s logic. Some attribute this shift to external shocks: the rise of China, Russia’s renewed assertiveness, or disruptive technology. Others locate the problem within the Western-led order itself, whose claims to universality were always shadowed by selectivity and hegemony. Perhaps what is changing is not the nature of power, but our ability to disguise it: the emergence of new actors and technologies has stripped away the pretence, exposing what was always there.
*Originally published in 2025. E-International Relations is free to read. We rely on reader support to make this possible.
One thing is clear: the new global order will not be confined to Earth. The politics of outer space are fast becoming central to questions of power, security, and cooperation. The erosion of the liberal international order is giving rise to a more fluid, plural, and contested architecture of power, extending beyond terrestrial politics into disruptive technologies and outer space. Understanding this evolution requires rethinking how global order itself is structured and sustained. For International Relations scholars and practitioners alike, this means expanding the scope of inquiry beyond traditional state-centric paradigms to include new transdisciplinary domains, technologies, and non-terrestrial arenas.
The Changing Architecture of International Relations and Global Order
Global order refers to the web of rules, institutions, and norms that structure relations among states and other actors. The liberal order built after 1945 rested on two premises: the stabilising role of American leadership and the universal appeal of liberal democracy and free markets. Both assumptions are now under stress. The shift in material power is unmistakable. China, India, and other emerging economies are reshaping trade, technology, and regional security. Some foresee a managed bipolarity centred on Washington and Beijing; others predict a more complex multipolarity in which middle powers wield greater agency. Either way, the post-hegemonic world may not enjoy the predictability once linked to American primacy. This shift has profound implications for International Relations theory, challenging assumptions about polarity, stability, and strategic balance that have long defined the discipline.
Beyond power redistribution, the normative foundations of the Western-led order are eroding. Perceived double standards in intervention and conflict responses have weakened liberalism’s moral authority. Many non-Western powers, especially in the Global South, seek a redefinition of norms informed by distinct civilisational experiences rather than passive inclusion within existing structures. This has given rise to what some describe as civilisational politics: Russia, China, and others present themselves as custodians of unique cultural heritages rather than converts to Western universalism. Institutions such as BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation reflect this pluralisation of legitimacy. Whether these movements crystallise into enduring post-Western arrangements or remain instruments of strategic positioning is uncertain, but they signal a move toward a more plural normative landscape.
The Geopolitics of Outer Space: The New Frontier of Power
The emerging order will not be confined to Earth. Rapid advances in rocket technology, robotics, and satellite systems are transforming outer space from a scientific frontier into a central arena of geopolitical competition. Once an abstract stage for Cold War rivalry, space now hosts a crowded field of state and private actors seeking strategic advantage, commercial profit, lunar and asteroid resources and technological prestige and dominance. In the 1960s, space exploration symbolised human progress. Today it mirrors the world’s fractures. States are racing to establish lunar stations, asteroid-mining projects, and cislunar monitoring systems. Private companies such as SpaceX, Blue Origin, Rocket Lab and many others in Europe, Japan, China and elsewhere may become global actors shaping the contours of governance. The number of active satellites has quadrupled in the last decade, underpinning everything from navigation and climate monitoring to financial transactions and military operations. This new space age is not only about exploration but control: of orbits, data flows, and resources. Dominating space infrastructure grants leverage over communications, surveillance, and global logistics in terrestrial peace and war. Space power now encompasses technology, economics, information, and multi-layered defence resilience.
The lack of shared norms is evident in competing governance initiatives. The US-led Artemis Accords, signed by over fifty states, call for transparency, peaceful cooperation, and the right to utilise lunar resources. Critics argue they effectively normalise appropriation and marginalise outsiders. In response, China and Russia plan a joint International Lunar Research Station and promote alternative interpretations of “common benefit". These parallel developments highlight the growing fragmentation of the legal order governing outer space. The 1967 Outer Space Treaty in theory prohibits national appropriation and restricts militarisation, yet it remains silent on commercial exploitation and private ownership. As more actors enter orbit, its ambiguities are being stretched to breaking point. From an International Relations perspective, this represents the extension of global anarchy and hierarchy into a new domain, one that tests the adaptability of existing theories of governance, sovereignty, and cooperation.
Space militarisation adds further risk. Anti-satellite (ASAT) tests by major powers have created debris clouds that threaten civilian assets. A major orbital conflict would cripple global infrastructure and could trigger the “Kessler syndrome” (a chain reaction of orbital collisions), rendering parts of multiple orbits unusable for centuries. Yet space also offers an opportunity to transcend terrestrial rivalries. Joint missions such as the International Space Station show that mutual dependence and transparency can sustain cooperation, even though it excluded China. A future framework for dignity-based space governance would embed accountability, equitable access, and environmental stewardship as guiding principles. This ensures that exploration benefits all humanity rather than a privileged few. The politics of outer space thus reflect a broader truth: in an era of deep interdependence, security and prosperity can no longer be achieved in isolation or through absolute dominance and zero-sum games.
Symbiotic Realism: Understanding the Forces Shaping International Relations and Global Order
To shape outcomes rather than endure them, humanity must begin with a realistic grasp of what drives behaviour, both human and institutional. Symbiotic Realism offers such a lens. As a contribution to International Relations theory, it integrates transdisciplinary insights from neuroscience, disruptive technologies, neuropsychology, history, strategic culture, and biology, explaining how human nature and material forces interact to generate both order and disorder. Symbiotic Realism identifies seven interdependent forces reshaping the global system.
First, technological innovation is redrawing geopolitics and security. These advances shift power balances and create ethical and strategic dilemmas that strain existing norms. Some scholars foresee autonomous or even sentient AI emerging as actors in world affairs, compelling a rethink of sovereignty, law, and diplomacy. Second, new strategic domains (especially cyberspace and outer space) are redefining competition. Cyberspace has become a battlefield for espionage and disinformation, while outer space is fast becoming central to security and resource rivalries. Third, non-state actors now wield power once reserved for states. Corporations, transnational networks, criminal syndicates, and terrorist groups exploit cyber, bio, and space technologies to project influence globally. Fourth, civilisational frontier risks such as climate change demand unprecedented coordination and adaptive governance. Fifth, the weaponisation of interdependence (through supply chains, markets, and finance) shows how connectivity can become coercive when pursued through zero-sum logic. Sixth, growing supranational and transcultural schisms are generating new identities and divisions, heightening systemic complexity.
Finally, neuroscientific predispositions of human nature determine how actors respond to these forces. These forces not only shape contemporary world politics but also redefine what International Relations must seek to explain in the 21st-century global order. Symbiotic Realism recognises that while competition is inevitable, its expression is not. As I have argued through Emotional Amoral Egoism, states (like individuals) are driven by emotion, rational self-interest, and context rather than inherent morality. These impulses can generate conflict but, under the right institutional and ethical conditions, also healthy, non-conflictual competition with win-win and absolute-gain scenarios. Outer space illustrates this duality vividly. The Neuro-P5 motivations (power, profit, pleasure, pride, and permanency) encapsulate the drives shaping state behaviour. Left unchecked, they may fuel a scramble for resources and dominance and lead to conflict; yet if institutionally channelled, these drives could foster governance systems that reward transparency, accountability, and shared achievement.
Sustainable History and Dignity-Based Governance in International Relations
To counter humanity’s emotional amoral egoism and redefine the ethical and sustainable foundations of International Relations, Symbiotic Realism (building on my Sustainable History Theory) advances the principle of Dignity-Based Governance. This framework recognises that lasting peace on Earth and in space depends on managing the enduring tension – or “tug of war” – between the three attributes of human nature (emotionality, amorality, and egoism) and the nine fundamental dignity needs (reason, security, human rights, accountability, transparency, justice, opportunity, innovation and inclusiveness). I refer to this dynamic equilibrium as “the ever-present tension principle”. Only when dignity needs are met can stability endure. The same logic that sustains societies on Earth must also govern humanity’s expansion into space, for this is the only way of ensuring continuity between terrestrial and extraterrestrial governance.
My Sustainable Global Security framework builds on this foundation by linking human dignity to strategic stability across five interdependent security dimensions (human, environmental, national, transnational, and transcultural security). It recognises that peace cannot be sustained through deterrence alone but through systems that meet the dignity, cultural and material needs of individuals and societies. Rooted in transdisciplinary insights, it reframes security as a multi-sum enterprise where fairness and empathy become instruments of sustainable power and collective peace. Dignity is not sentimental, nor is it just about the absence of humiliation. Instead, dignity is rooted in the presence of recognition and a deep neuropsychological substrate of stability. When individuals or nations feel respected and secure, they are inclined toward cooperative modalities in the form of non-conflictual competition; but when dignity is denied, resentment corrodes order. Across societies, dignity deficits – from loss of status and inequality to digital exclusion – undermine trust and legitimacy. Restoring dignity is therefore not simply moral but pragmatic: no system that denies it can remain stable for long.
Dignity-Based Governance re-aligns political, economic, and technological systems around nine principles sustaining legitimacy and stability. Technological ethics, too, must reflect these principles. Artificial intelligence, neuro-enhancement, and bioengineering are redefining what it means to be human. Without ethics, such technologies risk entrenching inequality or commodifying thought. Dignity demands algorithmic transparency, equitable access to innovation, and safeguards against manipulation of thought and emotion – making dignity the moral compass of technological civilisation. The same logic extends to outer space, where exploration will soon confront ethics. The cosmos is not yet burdened by Earth’s borders and hierarchies, but those patterns are already being projected upward. If emerging space governance replicates terrestrial inequalities, it will become another theatre of domination rather than discovery. To prevent this, a Dignity Charter for Space should be adopted: an ethical and legal framework that embeds dignity, accountability, and inclusiveness at the heart of extraterrestrial governance. It would build upon the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, updating its principles for a multipolar era. Such a charter would rest on shared stewardship, equitable participation, transparency, peaceful use, and benefit-sharing for future generations. A Dignity Charter would not only reduce the risk of conflict in space but also model the kind of governance urgently needed on Earth: transparent, inclusive, and oriented toward shared survival. It would create continuity between terrestrial and cosmic ethics, recognising that our conduct beyond Earth reflects our moral choices upon it.
My Ocean Model of Human Civilisation complements this vision by showing how individual cultures (geo-cultural domains) flow like rivers into humanity’s collective ocean. These domains continually interact and reshape one another. The model rejects static hierarchies and any civilisational pecking order. Instead, it recognises our shared interdependence, our long history of mutual borrowing and influence, and the dynamic exchanges that sustain collective human progress. Knowledge, both theoretical and practical, is passed on to the next emerging geo-cultural domain once the golden age of the preceding culture has waned. A clear example of this is the transfer of geo-cultural prominence from the Arab-Islamic world to Europe during the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. Lasting stability in International Relations depends on embracing cultural pluralism and acknowledging the debt all cultures owe to one another, while upholding the universal dignity that unites all peoples and civilisations.
These ideas show that ethics, culture, and strategy are inseparable, and that stability depends on recognising shared history and interdependence. This vision of dignity redefines self-interest in multi-sum terms: states gain legitimacy and influence not by coercion but by being fair, responsible, and creative contributors to common goals. Power becomes performative, the capacity to enable rather than dominate. Even competition can serve cooperation when bounded by respect and accountability. Dignity-Based Governance, grounded in Sustainable History Theory, thus forms the ethical infrastructure of Symbiotic Realism. It transforms what traditional realism interprets as inevitable conflict into a framework for dignified coexistence, one that links security and ambition to the recognition of others’ worth, on Earth and in the cosmos alike.
Toward a Symbiotic Realist Order
The future of global order stands at a crossroads. The animus dominandi ('lust for power') continues to drive states to pursue narrow self-interest, often trapped in zero-sum logic. Within the broader dynamics of the Neuro-P5, power operates alongside other psychological, philosophical, and socio-political impulses that shape state behaviour, amplifying both insecurity and ambition. Yet such approaches are self-defeating in an interconnected world. The same satellite constellations that secure one nation’s communications sustain global trade and science; their destruction could cripple every state. The “Kessler syndrome” embodies the folly of zero-sum competition and reminds us that humanity’s fates are intertwined on this planet and in the skies. For International Relations as both a discipline and a policy practice, this moment demands theoretical innovation and moral clarity.
Climate change, pandemics, artificial intelligence, and resource depletion reveal a simple truth: security can no longer be built on the insecurity of others. The defining challenge of our era is to turn interdependence into non-conflictual competition and shared, absolute gains (as Symbiotic Realism advocates) rather than vulnerability and conflict. Cooperation will always remain transient and need-based so long as national interests continue to compete; what matters is channeling that competition toward mutual sustainability. Meeting that challenge requires the Transdisciplinary Philosophy Imperative: integrating insights from science, ethics, and policy to craft systems that reflect the full complexity of human motivation. Only by bridging these domains can we design institutions resilient enough to navigate the convergence of technological and human evolution. Symbiotic Realism thus redefines International Relations as a truly transdisciplinary field ultimately invites us to rethink the meaning of power in an age of profound interconnection. Sustainable national, transnational, and even transplanetary interests require reconciling security, justice, accountable corporate profitability, environmental integrity, and human dignity. The greatest threats we face today transcend borders and disciplines, demanding an integrated approach to global survival. That survival depends on our capacity to transform emotional and egoistic drives into forces of creativity rather than destruction. This is not a utopian aspiration, but a logical adaptation to an era in which vulnerability is mutual and destiny shared.
The future global order will depend on our ability to transform zero-sum ambitions into a multi-sum coexistence, defined by non-conflictual competition and shared gains. It will also depend on our willingness to pursue excellence in the service of collective progress rather than domination. Symbiotic Realism reframes International Relations for an era of national, transnational, and transplanetary interdependence. In this context, the pursuit of collective dignity becomes the ultimate measure of non-conflictual competition. Absolute gains are expressed through sustainable national interests and through peace and prosperity for all, even amid differing national capacities.
Professor Nayef Al-Rodhan is a philosopher, neuroscientist, geostrategist and futurologist. He is the Head of the Geopolitics and Global Futures Department, and head of the Outer Space Security Cluster, at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy in Switzerland, and a Member of the Global Future Council on Complex Risks at the World Economic Forum. He is also an Honorary Fellow at Oxford University’s St. Antony’s College and a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Philosophy at the University of London.
This is a valuable, insightful essay. As an anthropologist specializing in the subject of governance, I am studying how societies project guilt, disorder, and failure onto nature, and how that history evolved into modern governance and a new concept of the Anthropocene. Explore this with me! See my articles at: substack/@bertrandlaurent