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Comment by exceptione | Hacker News Reader

> 'US-led rules-based interntional order

You have to look deeper into what kind of government has a problem with an international rule-based order. It is not the democratic countries with trias politica that have a problem with that, but autocratic regimes.

How are you going to ethnically cleanse Uyghurs in a rule based order, or run international crime networks at the level of statehood?

The question is: how are you going to integrate criminal and very powerful clangs in a world that is past the French Revolution? We tried, we failed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partnership_for_Peace

Answer is: you can't, unless the common people take ownership over their own countries. Very difficult.

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Just a reality check: the United States is currently funding and providing military equipment to Israel, who is carrying out an ethnic cleansing in the Gaza strip. Apparently, democratic governments also have a problem following the rules.

I am the OP and say: spot on. Also problematic that the Dems do not have the information space to follow their own agenda. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42068340

I went into more detail here about hypocrisy: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42203997

With the far right on the rise, the rules will disappear, because their ideology is "might makes right". That is the mindset of a maffia boss. War and conflict will follow, those who are not powerful enough get trampled.

You seem to be under the assumptions that the rules based international order is a real thing that is being thwarted by Mafia regimes and right wing ideology. First, America is a Mafia regime, under Democrats or Republicans. Many of the biggest Biden donors in 2020 have switched to donating to Trump, not because of ideology, but because they think Trump will be better vessel for their interests. And second, the rules based international order never existed in reality and never will exist because large force welding states will always have disagreements that will sometimes result in violent conflict.

The USA is indeed sliding backwards. State and business interests are getting even more intertwined. There is blindness about that, sure. That might make you feel depressed. Don't turn into a nihilist, as that is nothing more than giving your neck to the butcher.

I also assume you don´t want to know what a non rule based international order will look like. Things are depressing, but can get worse than where we are now.

Society needs to get their act together, but also desperately needs a healthy debate. Corporate media effectively block that, they rather sell the Politeia as entertainment. Still, the onus is on the people.

> You have to look deeper into what kind of government has a problem with an international rule-based order. It is not the democratic countries with trias politica that have a problem with that, but autocratic regimes.

The democratic countries follow the pattern of status quo powers. Is that because they are democratic or because they are status quo, or some of both?

The rules are of the status quo powers (matching their political cultures), by the status quo powers, for the status quo powers. Of course they follow those rules and support them. The rules seem to require a country to be a democracy to be legitimate - I agree with that as necessary to legitimacy (not sufficient), but obviously that doesn't suit non-democratic countries.

And like status quo powers, when they break the rules - most prominently the US many times, such as the Iraq war; the EU treatment of refugees and undocumented immigrants; and currently by Israel with US sponsorship - then they let themselves off the hook. They engineer technicalities, such as the weak UN resolution arguably authorizing the Iraq invasion; or just look the other way. They say they can't be handcuffed etc. (And some of those actions may be the right choice - I'm not judging - but they certainly violate the rules.)

> The rules are of the status quo powers (matching their political cultures), by the status quo powers, for the status quo powers

That might seem so, and all individuals have some degree of hypocrisy at times, the more a body of multiple countries. Without rules this devolves into warring tribes and fiefdoms, a lesson the societies in the west had learned themselves.

Everyone is invited to be critical and keep your representatives in check. When the people speak loud and clear about what they accept and what not, representatives will have to listen.

  If you have rights, use it or lose it.

I will add that Western elites were handcuffed by those international rules, it went against their interests. So no, it is also a self-restriction. The west certainly did have the power to exploit other countries, but instead self-restricted by abolishing colonies. There are certainly cases of ifs and buts, but the whole idea is that you stand by your values.

You mentioned the US making transgressions. That they get this room internally is certainly a problem of society and the state of ethics. Let´s not devolve in relativism, it will make things worse!

I generally agree; I'm not saying the status quo power - the US-led rules-based international order - is completely corrupt. They do follow the rules sufficientlty to have legitimacy, and there are many good things in those rules, such as univeral human rights, which have accomplished good outcomes. Overall, the world from WWII to about 2015 was the 'best' it's ever been - an explosion of freedom, security, and prosperity.

At the same time, there is some of the same status-quo-power corruption going on.

> Overall, the world from WWII to about 2015 was the 'best' it's ever been - an explosion of freedom, security, and prosperity.

Good point. If we do not halt the corrupting forces we will loose out on the above.

Not like the US follows rules it tells others to follow. Hypocrite in charge.

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