Liberalism is facing its greatest crisis in decades, in part because western governments have failed to uphold their values and Donald Trump has damaged the wests moral authority, according to a new Lowy Institute paper.

The scathing assessment, published on Wednesday, is accompanied by a call for countries including Australia to work towards a more inclusive order driven by a common imperative in meeting 21st-century challenges such as climate change, pandemic disease and global poverty.

Dr Bobo Lo, a non-resident fellow at the Lowy Institute in Sydney and a former deputy head of mission at the Australian embassy in Moscow, writes that the coronavirus pandemic has thrown a harsh spotlight on the state of global governance.

Faced with the greatest emergency since the second world war, nations have regressed into narrow self-interest, Lo writes in the paper titled Global Order in the Shadow of the Coronavirus: China, Russia, and the West.

The concept of a rules-based international order has been stripped of meaning, while liberalism faces its greatest crisis in decades.

The actions of Donald Trump, in particular, have undermined transatlantic unity, damaged the moral authority of the west and weakened global governance

Lo argues that even though western leaders blame global disorder on an increasingly assertive China and disruptive Russia, the principal threat lies closer to home because governments have failed to live up to the values underpinning a liberal international order.

This failure, he says, has been compounded by inept policymaking and internal divisions.

The actions of Donald Trump, in particular, have undermined transatlantic unity, damaged the moral authority of the west and weakened global governance.

The paper portrays Trump as openly contemptuous of norms under the rules-based order but it also cites the 2003 invasion of Iraq under George W Bush as the most notorious instance of Washington deciding it would not be bound by supranational rules.

In recent years, it says, the US has moved to withdraw from major accords such as the Paris climate agreement and trashed deals the US initiated such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Iran nuclear agreement giving Beijing and Moscow all the justification they need to indulge in their own considerable sense of self-entitlement.

In setting out the case that liberalism is retreating around the world, the paper cites the rise of illiberal democracy in European Union member states Hungary and Poland and the increasing strain on international agreements as some countries abuse or withdraw from them.

Lo, a former head of the Russia and Eurasia program at Chatham House in London, says authoritarian regimes have become more numerous and repressive, with Xi Jinpings China and Vladimir Putins Russia just the most conspicuous examples of a larger trend.

His paper emphasises that with the world in the midst of the worst crisis of international leadership since the 1930s, the issue is not simply Trump but a collective failure that cuts across continents and systems of governance.

The very notion of moral authority is imperilled. Truth has become almost entirely subjective, giving way to narratives. The old cold war confrontation between capitalism and communism may have gone, but in its place are new ideological conflicts, both internationally and within nations.

Lo accuses western policymakers and thinkers of being in denial about the values, norms and institutions of liberalism being in crisis wrongly believing that normal service can be restored with adjustments, such as a change of US president, more transatlantic unity, getting tough on China, and accommodation with Russia.

Lo instead calls for a fundamental rethinking of global governance, with the future being a more inclusive and flexible order. America will remain the leading power in the world for at least the next decade, he says, but US global leadership in its post-cold war form is over.

The paper suggests multilateral organisations will become more important and governments should build their capacity, starting with the chronically under-resourced World Health Organization.

It argues the evolution of global governance will bring greater input from middle-level powers, such as Australia, and smaller states, while also featuring greater involvement of business, civil society organisations and private individuals.

Governments should also be receptive to new regional and global mechanisms, leading eventually to a network of interlocking structures that helps us tackle key priorities, be it climate change, security in the AsiaPacific and Europe, or addressing the infrastructure deficit in Eurasia and Africa.

Sounding the alarm over stalled action to deal with the climate crisis, the paper says the economic downturn prompted by the pandemic had led to misguided moves to drop or weaken carbon emission and other environmental standards when nothing could be more short-sighted.

Lo argues while coronavirus is seen as the most immediate peril facing humanity, the threat of climate change is even larger and more devastating in its consequences both now and in the longer term.

Yet most governments (not least Australia) have ignored, denied, or minimised its importance; made half-hearted and wholly inadequate commitments to cut carbon emissions; played for time they do not have; and shifted responsibility onto others.

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Liberalism is facing a crisis and it's a cop-out to blame China and Russia, analyst claims - The Guardian