Rules Based International Order

This article is going to be a background on what the Rules Based International Order (RBIO) is and what sorts of arguments people are having about it.

In addition to RBIO, sometimes this is also referred to as LIO (Liberal International Order). For the purposes of this article, the distinction between them is irrelevant and they can be used interchangeably.

The arguments made about the RBIO are central to multiple contentious and polarized topics in the current political climate. These topics include, but are not limited to: Israel versus Palestine, Iran, Russia versus Ukraine, Colonialism, and a multitude of pro-western versus anti-western topics.

After 1945, when WWII ended, this framework was created in response. The scale, cost, and risk to humanity of the World Wars were so great that multiple global organizations were created. 

Four of these included:

UN (United Nations), 

WTO (World Trade Organization), 

IMF (International Monetary Fund), and 

NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization).

The idea was to create global entities that could replace the need for large-scale conventional warfare. The western allied countries won WWII, obtained dominant military force, and created a structure for international laws.

Prior to this, universal human rights did not practically exist. The same is mostly true for war crimes. Some acts like perfidy were previously codified throughout history in codes of chivalry and the 1907 Hague convention.

With the RBIO, the idea of rules of war and disallowing certain actions was rapidly expanded. This includes things like:

• Banning the use of certain types of weapons, generally WMDs (weapons of mass destruction).

• Disallowing the explicit targeting of civilians.

• The separation of civilian and military targets (human shielding).

• Defining genocide (genocide didn’t exist as a term before Raphael Lemkin coined the phrase in 1944).

The implicit idea was: The countries that won WWII rule the world now. They are going to dictate what is okay and not okay to do. Join the club or be left behind by the new global collaborative group.

NATO’s military strength in particular was dominant. Over time, this primarily became the military strength of one founding NATO member: The United States of America.

This resulted in a significant global cultural shift towards liberal democracy. Countries with incompatible government systems, dictatorships in particular, viewed this as a fundamental threat to their survival and opposed the RBIO.

Critics of the RBIO may argue the entire RBIO is effectively a sham and that all of its changes do not exist in practice. Their most common evidence will be hypocritical actions taken by the United States that violate the rules it imposes via the RBIO.

Supporters of the RBIO generally defend it in the following sort of way:

‘People have two choices: 1. Accept the international rules-based order or 2. Return to the law of the jungle’

Often this will be phrased in using lengthy political tact, but this is effectively the message. The ‘law of the jungle’ is fairly frequently referenced.

This phrasing is intended to suggest that the RBIO is morally superior to the alternative and that the ‘old’ way of doing things is something relegated to savages. Some individuals find superiority versus inferiority and calling certain ideological positions ‘savage’ as derogatory, highly offensive, racist, or any number of other labels that signal the end to a good-faith conversation.

Now we can apply this to current events.

Proponents of RBIO will say that the history of terrorism by Iran is fundamentally wrong. They may find the current military actions of Israel and the USA against Iran to be a difficult debate. On one hand, the effects of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz are causing massive economic hardship globally. On the other, the current Iranian government cannot be allowed to exist as it fundamentally threatens the RBIO.

Critics of the RBIO will argue that Iran can fight any way it wishes to. In essence, terrorism is permitted because international law doesn’t exist in practice. The rules are written by the victors and those rules are a sham.

This has created three predominant opinion themes which keep appearing regardless of the conflict:

Western Ideolog (Pro-RBIO): 

They effectively have to acknowledge NATO (primarily the USA) as the de-facto world-police and need to hope they behave. When hope is insufficient, some try to enforce the RIBO within the existing systems established by the RBIO.

The Hawk (Anti-RBIO): 

Might makes right, the winner dictates the rules. They are okay with the USA using weapons of mass destruction and obliterating its enemies. “Superpowers historically don’t follow the rules anyways, who cares?” Often, they will encourage massive loss of human life using phases like “just glass them all”, “turn it into a parking lot” etc. Whatever they think wins the war as fast as possible.

The monkey’s paw curls (Anti-RBIO): 

These individuals think that different rules of war apply depending on the relative military strength. Terrorism is allowed by the underdog and is disallowed by the state that is militarily dominant. They want wars to be a ‘fair fight’. In reality, this individual justifies the Hawk.

The West thinks it is morally superior. In its pursuit of its self-declared moral superiority, the West has significantly limited its military flexibility. If the RBIO fails and the western ideologs are laughed out of the room being called naïve, then we risk being left with the Hawk.

Vezina is the CEO of Prepared Canada Corp. and is the author of Continuity 101. He can be reached at info@prepared.ca.