From confrontation to cooperation

The crisis of multilateralism has become a dangerous signal that the world order based on shared principles enshrined in the UN Charter and other key international instruments and Treaties is crumbling under the weight of a series of global challenges. These challenges are increasingly met with power politics and confrontation, not only in the military sphere but also in the political, economic, trade and financial domains.

The current international environment is marred by increasing geopolitical and geoeconomic competition, which is not only the result of the unfinished business after the end of the Cold War but also, more importantly, provoked by policies aimed at ensuring the control of key mineral resources and sources of energy in an environment where the lack of these resources would threaten the path towards further development and growth, especially for the greater world powers.

The long road from cooperation to confrontation in Europe

The conclusion of the Cold War brought with it expectations of an era of peace, stability and prosperity for all. In Europe, in the early years after the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia had floated the idea that NATO itself might be reformed into a cooperative defence organization, one that would contribute to UN peacekeeping, of which Russia itself might over time have become a member. After all, Russia was arguing at the time, since NATO had been created as a defensive alliance, who were its enemies after the end of the Cold War?

In fact, a North Atlantic Cooperation Council was soon established, followed by a Partnership for Peace programme encompassing both NATO members and their former adversaries. Discussions on the new principles for modern peace operations were held in an extended forum, which included Russia, Eastern European countries and other European nations particularly active and experienced in peacekeeping under a UN flag. The group produced important agreed reports, which highlighted the key role of the UN and other inclusive regional organizations such as the OSCE to issue mandates which would ensure full legitimacy of future operations. It looked like a new era of cooperation had in fact emerged, as had been announced in the 1999 CSCE Charter of Paris.

Yet that path was not sustained. A deep inset diffidence between the US and the Russian political and military establishments had in fact not been fully overcome. True, during the 1990s important steps were made, especially in the CSCE/OSCE framework, in the area of disarmament and confidence-building. Regular reciprocal inspections, visits to military establishments, observations of military activities took place in those years, resulting in intensive and stable military relationships. However, the USA, as the only remaining superpower at the time, felt that it had special responsibilities to ensure peace and stability through promotion of democratic institutions. NATO could be a useful tool to support this policy and therefore it started expanding to include former Eastern European members of the former Warsaw Pact which had vowed to embrace a democratic path.

In spite of the reassurances that were provided to Russia, the latter began to perceive NATO's enlargement as unfriendly and potentially threatening, and this helped fuel the rise of more nationalist political leadership inside Russia, which engaged more actively in rebuilding its own sphere of influence in the former Soviet space. Western support for reforms and leadership changes in countries like Ukraine, Georgia and Kyrgyzstan, among others, was seen in Moscow as open interference in this space and contributed to increasing tensions in Europe and to the introduction of illiberal reforms in Russia.

Deterioration of relations between the West and Russia had an immediate impact on the process of dialogue and cooperation within the OSCE. Throughout the 90s, this organization had regularly issued political statements at the ministerial level, showing an unprecedented degree of convergence among European nations. As disagreements started to emerge towards the end of the decade, especially following NATO's aerial campaign in Kosovo and against Serbia, achieving consensus on these political statements became increasingly difficult. The last agreed statement was in fact adopted in 2002, after which no OSCE Chairmanship managed to issue an agreed statement: this marked just how wide the underlying divide had become.

From that point onwards, the trajectory was consistently negative. Arms control agreements collapsed one after another at a time when these mechanisms would have been most useful and needed. Russia came to view Western support for democratic movements in countries like Ukraine, Georgia and Kyrgyzstan as open interference in its neighbourhood. It reacted by tightening its grip over the former Soviet space through new economic and security mechanisms of its own. Ukraine became "the most visible example" of this collision, and the current conflict ultimately was one of its consequences.

As the OSCE was founded on a shared set of governing principles, their violation in the name of national security imperatives produced their progressive erosion and weakening, as European relations were witnessing the progressive emergence of raw power politics.

The speed of change

As one looks at the consequences of the growing geopolitical confrontation, it is important not to dismiss the importance of the overall environment within which they are taking place, an environment which is profoundly affecting our societies.

The last half century has undoubtedly witnessed the most profound and unprecedented changes in human history. If we step back and take a broader look at these developments in terms of history of life on our planet, these changes are even more striking. If we look at the decades that immediately follow the end of the Second World War, the world population level was in the order of a couple of billion, with a very different distribution compared to what we see today; the lack of internet and social media prevented global flows of communication; development and growth were the key goal for all economies, without particular concern for the availability of resources. Today, just half a century later, population levels have skyrocketed past 8 billion; we are all connected, via internet and social media, and artificial intelligence is opening up new frontiers; new competition and conflict is surfacing over the control of resources increasingly less available for all; the environment is deeply affected by these rapid changes, with a clear trend towards a drastic reduction of biodiversity, increase of pollution levels, and changes in the climatic patterns with an overall tendency towards global warming.

The Earth has seen profound changes before, but never at this speed: in the past, this speed of change had only been witnessed in conjunction with extinction-level events. Plotted on a chart, this trajectory does not curve gently upward; it rises as a near-vertical line. The implication is not a matter for debate about whether such acceleration is occurring, but a matter that should concern policy makers enough to act.