In a recent interview with The Economist, U.S. journalist and podcaster Tucker Carlson remarked: “If Europe is not an ally of the United States, then China rules the world.” Whether or not this claim proves accurate, its significance lies in what it reflects: a renewed tendency to interpret global politics through a narrowly geopolitical lens—one that reduces international complexity to rival power blocs and shifting balances of influence.
In this context, it is often argued that the so-called “rules-based international order” is in terminal decline. This view, however, is overstated. While confidence in the norms and principles underpinning this order has clearly weakened, the system itself has not disappeared. Key components – such as trade regimes, security arrangements, and international legal frameworks – remain in place, even if they operate less consistently and face growing contestation. Rather than a clear transition from order to chaos, what we are witnessing is a gradual process of fragmentation, marked by selective compliance and increasing political friction.
Carlson’s statement is therefore less a prediction than a simplified argument about how global power operates. It highlights a core insight in international relations: power is rarely exercised in isolation but is shaped and constrained by alliances, institutions, and patterns of cooperation. Seen in this light, such claims raise central analytical questions: How is global order formed and maintained? What factors make it stable or unstable? And how do material capabilities, institutional structures, and ideological change interact to shape outcomes in world politics?
Rather than signaling the decline of international relations as a field of study, the current shift from a relatively coherent rules-based order to a more fragmented system of competing power centers underscores its continued relevance. It reinforces the need for careful analysis of how order is built, maintained, and sometimes lost under conditions of deep uncertainty. At the same time, it calls for moving beyond broad universal assumptions and examining more closely how material capabilities, strategic alliances, and contested norms interact to shape global politics.
For students of international relations, this moment is not one of decline but of opportunity: a chance to engage critically with a changing world and to develop the analytical tools needed to understand—and perhaps shape—the future of global order.