Ronald Flores, in his analysis for Free pressaddresses its perspective on multilateralism:
I consider that we can affirm that the current world system is not perfect. More than a global government, with robust executive and judicial organizations, The current system resembles a permanent assembly in which all countries seem to have more voice than vote, where they share almost as the same, although they do not necessarily have the same level of population and territorial representation, economic development, military capacity, similar forms of government or a shared culture.
Although they cannot compare equitably, India and China, with their billions of inhabitants, share the same representation in the United Nations as small countries such as Surinam, with just a little more than half a million inhabitants.
However, the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (United States, China, France, Great Britain and Russia) They are considered primus inter pairs, that is, the first among equals.
If you have ever been involved in an association like the one between the members of a community, a colony, a building, and has realized the variety of problems that may exist between neighbors, magnify that experience to understand what it would be like to try to make the most powerful countries in the world get along with each other, with their allies and adversaries, which reigns harmony and not discord, and well -being and prosperity.
It is a humanly impossible task, especially when political, military, economic, cultural and technological differences are considered.
The current world system does not even have a century and is the result of multiple clashes and some wars that had a serious impact on several regions, such as the calls first and second world wars. To a large extent, the system as we know today begins with the establishment of the United Nations Organization (UN) in 1945.
Since then, a series of international institutions have been established to address different themes, whose operation has not been ideal not even successful, such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and until the poorly remembered International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (Cicig). Despite the proliferation of these international organizations and its complex acronyms and its high operating costs, social and economic problems From the majority of the population they continue to grow before everyone’s sight.
The complex system of binding institutions and treaties between governments has not always worked well. Like every human system, it has serious failures and cannot and should not guarantee the well -being of each of the countries that represents or agglutina.
To function properly, the system precise of the goodwill and economic contribution of all its members. Some have good will and others do not want to pay costs. While everyone wants to receive funds but not everyone wants to contribute, none wants to stop showing good will or their appearance.
Neither countries with serious systematic violations of fundamental individual rights – as Cuba, Nicaragua or Venezuela – want to be left out and even insist on the part of the UN Human Rights Council, a contradiction that would be scandalous in itself, but that has already become customary.
In 1795, the German thinker Immanuel Kant tried an approach to a world government system in the essay on perpetual peace: A philosophical outline, knowing that it was just an idealistic aspiration because no nation would be willing to give its sovereignty to subordinate a world government that legally limited its actions under the usual order of things. Many theories seem great until they are tried to put into practice.
Pragmatically, it cannot be lost sight of the fact that there is a healthy discussion and different political visions about what the scope and limits of this global system should be. This discussion resulted in Brexit of 2016, in robust political movements in Belgium, Italy and France, for example.
Currently several politicians and thinkers consider that the global system has been used mainly by progressive and socialist groups to finance their programs, To spread your ideology, To impose its agenda, even in countries whose cultural roots is completely adverse.
Frequently, the global system seems monopolized by a leftist clique that tries to force the countries of the world to adopt a uniform culture, to fulfill a socializing drive.
Beyond this vision discussed in global intellectual circles, surveys constantly identify that the citizen Common feels little represented by local governments.
If the identification between the citizen and his government is little, less is identified with this complex international bureaucracy that seems to exist above the law, since it often enjoys diplomatic immunity, and is not perceived subject to the need to articulate the needs of the voter.
As if that were not enough, the digital citizen, who shares his opinions on social networks, suspects that local governments They are organized with the exclusive purpose of extracting taxes and benefiting from state corruption. In this narrative, these international entities are even more expensive, more opaque and more corrupt than local governments.
It is also common for bureaucrats from these international entities to be completely disconnected in the way the majority of the world’s population lives. Somehow they are the jet set of government bureaucracy. Their salaries are high, the costs of their homes and transport are on account of the international organism for which they work and are only authorized to reside in the so -called safe areas, isolated in an institutional way of the population they claim to serve.
“The complex system of binding institutions and treaties between governments has not always worked well.”
Most of the positions are not granted by merits, but by kinship. At some point, they lost sight of the fact that the solution for the problems of the majority of the population is not to raise taxes to create more state bureaucracy, but to create more business opportunities, promote people’s entrepreneurship and self -management capabilities, to achieve prosperity in an environment of freedom.
It is currently discussed about the way in which the president of the United States, Donald Trump, is acting unilaterally on the global stage, considering leaving some international treaties, without consulting other countries if their decisions affect them or not. In his campaign itself, Trump was very clear in saying that he would place the interests of the United States first, which was one of the factors that gave him visibility, votes and followers.
These actions seem explained in the first paragraph of the book La Diplomacia, by Henry Kissinger, published in 1994: “Almost as by the effect of a natural law, in each century a country seems to emerge with the power, will and the intellectual and moral impetus necessary to modify the entire international system, according to its own values.”
Historically, the United States has had an attitude that has been theoretically called “American exceptionalism”, based on the belief of its unique and exemplary purpose, as John Winthrop’s sermon articulated in a poetic way in 1630. Thus, Trump’s attitude has a deep roots in the history of that country and should not be considered as a break, but as the continuity of an American tradition.
President Trump has also been an unconventional character, so it was not expected to act as if everything was normal. Their international actions serve to emphasize that we are living an unusual moment.
Everything is changing and I think it is convenient that we realize that. Beyond the political, we can refer at least to the advent of artificial intelligence and the impact it is having in economic, technological and cultural terms.
Therefore, many things are also changing in the superficial level of politics. President Trump is not the reason why we are living this time of changesbut it is only part of a deep change of time.
I consider appropriate to discuss the way we fit in this world system. Like everything human, this system is subject to reforms and improvements. Or If so many are the failures of the current world system, we can address its solution from a topic that is very fashionable in Guatemala: maybe we will have to recycle it.
I have no doubt that the fundamental characteristic of the human being is evolution. We must evolve towards a better system, both local and global, preferably a system that privileges the welfare, prosperity and freedom of people.