Edited by W. Joseph Stroupe with the mission of explaining world events correctly via strategic analysis & forecasting
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The term "multipolarity" has increasingly been trumpeted by Russia, China, India and many others since the mid-1990’s as the most desirable and equitable configuration for the world order. Multipolarity is seen across much of the globe as the most attractive replacement for US-dominated unipolarity. Does it really matter? Are unipolarity and the US-centric world order really at risk? Indeed, yes.
The fundamental configuration of the world order is rapidly undergoing transformation as US power and influence continue their progressive dilution in all spheres and those of rival centers or poles such as Russia and China are becoming ever more concentrated, thanks in no small measure to their advancing control over global strategic energy resources.
Control over strategic resources has become the primary lever to increased global influence for those powers either rich in such resources or closely allied with those who are.
Hence, in the insidious and perceptible rebalancing of global power, moving from inordinate concentration in one pole (the US) to distribution among rival poles (Russia, China and others) we are witnessing the progressive arising of a new world order. However, what will its true configuration turn out to be?
Fundamentally, multipolarity simply means multiple poles, or centers of power, distributed widely and more equitably across the globe, with no single pole inordinately dominating the others. However, does the term “multipolarity” accurately describe the configuration of the new world order that is now arising? Or is its real configuration developing into something quite different than mere generic “multipolarity”?
The concept of multipolarity does not properly take into consideration a recent and ongoing development of fundamentally enormous significance – the re-division of most of the world order into two camps, "East" and West, with control over strategic energy resources as the primary dividing line between the two camps.
Even the so-called Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) consisting of 116 developing nations, encompassing most of the world’s authoritarian governments and two-thirds of UN membership, generally takes stances independent of, or even against, the US pole, thus most often in de facto alliance with the rising "East" rather than West. Notably, NAM has come down on Iran’s side in the ongoing nuclear dispute, reaffirming Iran’s right to domestic enrichment activities, to the pointed chagrin of the US. Significantly, a large portion of the member nations of NAM possess great deposits of strategic energy and mineral resources of very high value.
Thus, simple "multipolarity" allows for the fundamentally erroneous assumption that all the poles or centers of power are genuinely discrete, that each pole is virtually insulated from the gravitational effects of other poles. In the real world such is certainly not the case.
Any pole or center of power that achieves a noteworthy degree of power and influence tends to pull or attract other centers of power toward itself – especially those in proximity to it, whether geographically, economically or geopolitically speaking. Furthermore, that rising pole tends to draw additional power from the poles that begin to lean inward, as it were, toward it, thus fueling an accelerated rise of the more prominent pole. The result is a new center of power that is complex in nature, with many lesser poles in array around one or two greater poles in the nucleus of the newly arising center of power.
A prime example of the phenomenon noted above is the Russia-China axis that is rapidly attracting into array around itself many lesser but significant poles. As noted above, the two poles (Russia-China and America-Britain) each possess a gravitational pull of a force and stature that no others on the globe can lay claim to, and the main dividing line between the two poles has become control over strategic energy resources.
Consequently, the new configuration of the arising world order is fundamentally reverting to a bipolar nature. Just two primary rival poles increasingly dictate, by their gravitational influence, developments across the globe.
Generic multipolarity ultimately fails to describe properly these real-world phenomena, those of a global reversion to bipolarity along with the inherent complexity (multifarious makeup) found especially within the new pole arising in the "East".
Along the path toward this eventuality there will undoubtedly be more oil wars such as the one waged in Iraq in 2003, and ideological “wars” such as the Orange Revolution of 2004, but the West cannot prevent the eventuality described here being realized very soon judging by the rapidity with which global events are moving in that very direction.
Hence, the bipolar world order that is even now arising will not, in fact, be balanced or symmetrical, with both poles roughly canceling each other out in a zero-sum game. Instead, it will be asymmetrical, with the "East" in ascendancy over the West.
In view of the foregoing, the term "multipolar" may adequately describe the complex, multifarious composition of the rising pole of the East itself, but that term is entirely inappropriate to describe the essentially (uneven) bipolar global configuration that is impending for the world order.
From the preceding fundamental analysis of the geopolitical system we could now attempt to construct a new and more accurate term to describe where the world order is actually heading:
Asymmetrical Bipolar Complexity refers to the uneven bipolar world order that is impending, one in which especially the East pole is complex (multifarious) in nature, consisting of many lesser poles in array around the nucleus that consists of the Russia-China axis.
To coin a new term, the phrase could be shortened to Asymm∙Plexity by dropping the “bipolar” portion for the reason that in its most fundamental sense the word “asymmetrical” already strongly insinuates just two main parts (bipolar), but of unequal size or power. "Multipolarity" is a misnomer because it fails to meet the requirement of accurately describing where the world order is actually heading.
Asymm∙Plexity (asymmetrical bipolar complexity) more accurately describes the uneven bipolarity that is impending.
| Note: This Gold version of the analysis is significantly condensed as compared to the full text Platinum version available only to subscribers. The Platinum version addresses head-on the issues of India's increasingly important role as the third pillar of the developing Russia-China-India Triad and the central role played by global energy in the reversion to a bipolar world order. |
© Copyright 2004-2008 This article may not be reproduced, reprinted or otherwise disseminated, nor may its inherent distinctive and original ideas be used elsewhere without the prior written permission of W. Joseph Stroupe. No journalistic, analytical, editorial or forecasting substance from GeoStrategyMap.com may be republished or employed in any form without prior written permission. Send all requests for permission by email to: editor_in_chief@geostrategymap.com. |
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