Where does Britain stand in the New World Order?
A new world order has been declared and described by Canada’s Mark Carney. Is he right, and if so, is there room in it for Britain?
Davos, that alpine gathering of the great and the good, is normally a predictably dull affair. To give you a flavour of its worthiness, consider the formal title for the 2020 summit: Stakeholders for a Cohesive and Sustainable World. Inspiring stuff.
In recent years this jamboree has concerned itself with all the acceptable tropes of contemporary business and diplomatic niceties; net zero, sustainability, diversity, inclusive growth, you get the picture.
This year, those comfortable topics have been shunted down the running order – as they have been in many boardrooms of late – not least because the conference kicked off under the cloud of Donald Trump’s threats to annex Greenland and blackmail European countries that stood in his way.
In that context, the President’s speech at Davos yesterday was eagerly anticipated. But it was a speech given the day before, by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, that really got people talking.
If you want an original, intellectual response to the power dynamics that will define the years ahead, I urge you to find it and read it. I’ll give you a flavour of it now.
Rules-based system ‘a fiction’
Carney, a former governor of the Bank of England, said that what we called the rules based international order is over – but more than that, he said it never really existed; we just pretended that it did. He said:
“For decades, countries like Canada prospered under what we called the rules-based international order. We joined its institutions, we praised its principles, we benefited from its predictability. And because of that, we could pursue values-based foreign policies under its protection.
“We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false, that the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, that trade rules were enforced asymmetrically, and we knew that international law applied with varied rigor, depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.
“This fiction was useful, and American hegemony in particular helped provide public goods, open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security, and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.”
It was a fiction, he said, and the bargain we made with ourselves to go along with it no longer works. This strikingly candid observation followed Carney’s appearance in Beijing where he signed various deals with the Chinese and raised eyebrows by saying that such arrangements were necessary given what he called “the new world order.”
In his speech at Davos, Carney said that there are two paths open to countries who recognise this new reality; build a fortress at home and peer nervously out through the gates or, his preferred option, focus on strength and security at home while forging new alliances that are both pragmatic – like with China – and values driven, such as Canada’s commitment to Nato and global trade agreements.
He said: “This is not naïve multilateralism, nor is it relying on their institutions. It’s building coalitions that work issue by issue with partners who share enough common ground to act together.”
He was also particularly tough in talking up Canada’s domestic strengths; domestic energy supplies, critical minerals, sophisticated investors, capital, talent and now – most importantly – honesty about the world around them.
What does Keir Starmer make of all this?
To be sure, there was something for everyone in Carney’s speech; progressives admired the way he stood up to Trump and championed new global alliances; more hardened realists liked his talk about energy independence and clear-headed self-interest.
But where is Keir Starmer in all this? Where is Britain? Could Starmer have given that speech? Would anyone have listened if he did?
He wasn’t even at Davos, which is just as well or he’d have to listen to Donald Trump’s furious broadside against the UK’s insane energy policy. Starmer is most comfortable when he’s taking part in a multilateral summit, signing memoranda of understanding, developing co-operation agreements and joining coalitions. He is the embodiment of the rules based international order – our Lawyer in Chief – clinging on to a system that Carney says is over.
Where is Britain’s ruthless self-interest? It’s not in our energy policy, that’s for sure. It’s not in our decision to surrender sovereignty of the Chagos islands – a mission crafted entirely by lawyers – and it’s not in our decision to grant China the world’s most prestigious diplomatic presence in the heart of our capital.
Starmer has handled Trump well, and he was right, as I said at the start of this week, to keep a cool head while the tariff threat blew itself out – but now is surely the time for him – and indeed all our aspiring leaders – to present a coherent and robust and urgent case for the UK’s future; its economic growth, its security, its borders, its energy policy and its alliances.
Otherwise we risk looking like we haven’t noticed quite how much the world is changing around us.