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'The old order is not coming back,' Carney says in speech at Davos

233 points by martythemaniak

by jleyank

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Yup, the middle powers have to organize and work together to avoid being chum. The economic power is there, and they can shift from purchasing US weaponry (thus paying US workers) into purchasing middle-power weaponry (thus paying middle-power workers). Car/truck plants can be repurposed, and if Ukraine's lesson is valid then smaller, portable weaponry is now the preferred solution. Cheaper, and the middle powers don't have huge investments in tanks and ships.

by CodingJeebus

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> First, it means naming reality. Stop invoking rules-based international order as though it still functions as advertised. Call it what it is: a system of intensifying great power rivalry where the most powerful pursue their interests using economic integration as coercion.
Nobody leading a western country would’ve dared be this direct about America a decade ago.
The great irony with the current political climate is that America has truly been first for many decades, leading the world order to tremendous financial, military and material success. But nothing lasts forever.
We won’t know for many years if this moment represents America’s true descent into a has-been empire, but the message from our closest allies is very clear: world leaders don’t speak that kind of truth to a power like America unless they mean it.

by beloch

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The Theucydides quote Carney leads with, of course, recently rolled off the tongue of the white house deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller. The days of might making right are, apparently, back.
Just in case anyone thought the genie could be stuffed back into the bottle once Trump is gone, Carney goes on to state that the rules-based world order we've been living under since WWII is somewhat of a sham. The rules have not been applied equally. Some nations, the powerful ones, have been given much more latitude to do what they want. Middle nations have gone along with this to avoid trouble.
The reward for avoiding trouble for so long is... big trouble (e.g. invasion threats for an ally of a big power and economic terrorism applied to its allies). So, why pretend the old system works to avoid trouble if the trouble lands on your doorstep anyways?
The answer seems obvious. Middle powers of the old rules-based order need to band together and put bigger powers in their place. It's not impossible. Just very, very difficult. France and Germany may be sticking up for Greenland, but where's Hungary (another EU member)? For this to work, you need everyone. Also, looking ahead, how would you prevent such an alliance of smaller powers, were it successful, from behaving like a bigger power?
Trump is currently showing off AI photos where he's meeting with world leaders in front of a map where both Greenland and Canada are a part of the U.S.[1]. As a Canadian, I think Carney gave a stirring speech here, but I suppose I'm biased given that he's our PM and his vision is one of the few things between us as being swallowed up by Trump's MAGA empire while the other big powers fall upon the respective apples of their eyes.
[1]https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/article/trump-shares-altered-m...

by jpster

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> "great powers" are using economic integration as "weapons."
This is so true and I think economic sanctions should be recognized as the weapons they actually are.
Just a taste: No Amazon, No Gmail: Trump Sanctions Upend the Lives of I.C.C. Judges President Trump’s retaliation against top officials at the International Criminal Court has shut them out of American services and made even routine daily tasks a challenge. https://archive.is/KflDP
Now consider the US has been doing this to entire countries for decades. Cuba, Venezuela, Iran. Forget Amazon, the inability to use the SWIFT banking system has all sorts of nasty consequences that get elided by a clinical sounding term.
From the Lancet:
Our findings showed a significant causal association between sanctions and increased mortality. We found the strongest effects for unilateral, economic, and US sanctions, whereas we found no statistical evidence of an effect for UN sanctions. Mortality effects ranged from 8·4 log points (95% CI 3·9–13·0) for children younger than 5 years to 2·4 log points (0·9–4·0) for individuals aged 60–80 years. We estimated that unilateral sanctions were associated with an annual toll of 564 258 deaths (95% CI 367 838–760 677), similar to the global mortality burden associated with armed conflict. https://www.thelancet.com/journals/langlo/article/PIIS2214-1...

by beardyw

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> "Many countries are drawing the same conclusions. They must develop greater strategic autonomy: in energy, food, critical minerals, in finance and supply chains.
Sounds like an economic NATO (without the USA). It's good that other counties are waking up at last. Taking the hit now (and blaming it on Trump) will make them stronger on the long run.

by enaaem

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Trump fundamentally misunderstands how power really works. Power doesn’t mean others kiss your boot and give you peace prizes. People hate being ruled over. They absolutely hate it. So you have to hide your power through, ideology, laws and institutions. Galeev explains it well [1].
This is how American imperialism works. The American led western liberal order was an unprecedented alliance and America was the house. The house doesn’t win all the time, but everything is rigged in its favour.
The issue is that there is no 4d chess at play here. Trump has a narcissistic personality disorder combined with dementia and has surrounded himself by yes-men.
[1] https://kamilkazani.substack.com/p/might-makes-right

by daft_pink

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It’s very ironic that his support is falling apart at home while his worldwide support is exploding.

by josefritzishere

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It's absolutely wild that one mentalliy ill octogenarian can cause so much chaos. You are living through history, assuming you survive.

by kwar13

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I highly recommend listening to the whole speech

by ChrisArchitect

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Transcript linked inside the submitted article: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/mark-carney-speech-davos-ru...

by cal_dent

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One of those speeches that makes you feel like you're living in history^TM

by throw0101c

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From the transcript:
> We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false, that the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, that trade rules were enforced asymmetrically, and we knew that international law applied with varied rigor, depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.
> This fiction was useful, and American hegemony in particular helped provide public goods, open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security, and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.
An interesting observation I came across today:
> The genius of American foreign policy since 1941 was that it found a way to be both the single strongest state and the leader of the strongest coalition of states: power and legitimacy, together. That's the achievement Trump has jeopardized - and possibly permanently wrecked.
* https://x.com/davidfrum/status/2013735844721349115#m
* https://xcancel.com/davidfrum/status/2013735844721349115#m

by polotics

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All well meaning and good and all that, thank you Canadians. . . but...
Invoking Thucydides's "and the weak suffer what they must" at a time when weak-on-strong warfare has fundamentally changed, in a fluid still-small world where for example:
-Some russian goons can poison someone on a bench in England.
-Some north korean hireling lady can poison someone in any airport.
-Some radicalized youths will go on rampages using easily-accessible assault weapons.
-So many systems that "strong" societies depend on are so so fragile and running close to many edges.
-Lethal FPVs are cheap cheap.
...is I think falling into the trap of adopting the mindset of the loudest man in the room (initials DJT) who's thinking in early 20th century terms, instead of looking at the world and conflict the way they really are.

by AtlasBarfed

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Peter Zeihan has been predicting this for a decade which means there has been a lot of academics also predicting since he generally repackages academic work.
Really it isn't just a different order. Imo it is a reversion to imperialism with us eyeing Latin America, Russia Ukraine, China Taiwan.

by Herring

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I genuinely love the speech but scanning the WHR, Canada has been dropping in happiness almost as fast as America.
https://data.worldhappiness.report/chart
They would have gone right-wing in Carney's election if not for Trump meddling. He needs to get those cost of living issues fixed ASAP, probably starting with housing.

by hulitu

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> Carney said Canada must be "principled and pragmatic" and turn inward to build up the country and diversify trading relationships to become less reliant on countries like the U.S., now that it's clear "integration" can lead to "subordination."
They surely needed some decades to underestand this. Much quicker than the Europeans, though.

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by treetalker

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Consider for a few minutes the contrast between Carney's speech and what daily babbles out of Trump's gaping maw. Carney's coherence is refreshing.

by trhway

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the current world split starts to eerily look, while still far from it of course, like the 1939 split in Europe - totalitarian regimes of Stalin and Hitler allied together against Europe's democratic countries. Here we have authoritarian leaning Trump starting to ally himself with totalitarian Putin and China against democratic countries by dividing the world in very similar way as Stalin and Hitler divided Europe between themselves.

by ParonoidAndroid

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by cwst66

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by cwst66

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by hhhthrow

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Canadian here: speeches are great, but you can’t take a speech to the bank and get a mortgage. The country is owned by the bankers and they’re looking out for each other. Carney is their mouthpiece. Large companies have preferential treatment and run monopolies. Everyone else? Get fucked. Pandemic in Canada was one great spectacle of corruption. Read up on ArriveCan and realize that’s just one (very public) example. There was much, much worse involving companies that would never get called out like ArriveCan did.
Rhetoric doesn’t make the economy recover and we are teetering on the brink of things. Businesses are struggling and many industries have hit a standstill. The best we can do is shift from being a vassal state of US to being a Chinese one.
The country is massive and yet we are so unproductive that Bank of Canada issued a warning late last year saying if productivity and wages don’t go up, the situation will get worse. Canada was one of the least productive countries in their analysis. Things have gotten worse since then. The only light at the end of this tunnel is the impending train wreck. Wages going up? Don’t make me laugh. My colleagues have moved to the US and are buying real estate with their tech salaries.
I wouldn’t blame Trump for Canada’s failings. I’d blame every layer of the government that is playing to lose and has brought this country to its knees. We are paying out of our asses in interest rates and taxes and our money is going nowhere. Inflation has eaten everything up and people have been getting progressively poorer over the decades. That’s got absolutely zero to do with Trump’s blowhard attitude.
Stop getting hoodwinked by professional speechwriters.

by calf

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This is all eloquent and game-theoretic, but who is this being said too? Other davos attendees, and it will be the small people who must pay for this shift, through rising prices, worse labor conditions, austerity, etc. His astute observation about competing powers running to the lowest common denominator is intrinsically a property of capitalism.

by vdupras

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The speech was surprisingly good. I think it's going to prove effective. This "taking the sign off" thing, good imagery.
But I can't help notice the inconsistency in this imagery. First, he says it himself a few minutes later. He doesn't "take the sign off" for NATO. We can understand why it's important to keep this facade.
But another one that bothers me is "energy, both clean and traditional". Oh, you didn't go for "clean and dirty"? Categories are clearer thus. Oh, not ready to take the sign off on the climate front? Too bad.

by qart

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> For decades, countries like Canada prospered under what we called the rules-based international order.
As an Indian listening to this, this comes across as absurd. Trudeau constantly invoked this phrase when dealing with India about the murder of Hardeep Singh Nijjar. It basically meant Trudeau could level allegations, not provide any evidence, and strut as if he as won. In due course, the murderers turned out to be their own terrorists.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardeep_Singh_Nijjar#Diplomati...

by dlcarrier

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As someone from the US, I thought we were the leaders in choosing strange government figureheads, until Canada elected the head of a foreign bank as their's.
That speech reminds me of the conclusion the main character in the movie Antz settled on. Being forced to be a cog in the machine is awful and no one should accept it. Instead we should be happy to volunteer ourselves to be cogs in the machine.