February 9, 2026

Only a few years ago, the “rules-based international order” was the northern star of American foreign policy, a recurrent theme in policy statements by senior officials of the Biden administration.

In an interview with  Andrea Mitchell of MSNBC on May 6, 2021, Secretary of State Blinken said, “… we are determined to uphold the so-called rules-based international order that we’ve invested so much in over so many decades and that has been good for us and good for the world, and I think even good for China.”[i] (emphasis added)

At the time, Blinken’s use of the term “so-called” was likely intended as a nod to its common nomenclature. Today, however, that same adjective carries a darker, more literal meaning: an order that is named, but no longer exists.

Where the previous administration spoke of treaties, norms, and human rights, the current administration, under the lion-king of the jungle, has shifted toward a doctrine of raw power. In the past, the phrase embodied the rules, norms, and institutions that governed relations. Among those were treaties, international law, formal structures and institutions, and values that have developed around and through these, such as support and promotion of democracy, equality, and human rights.

Since returning to the White House, President Trump has largely scrubbed the “rules-based order” from the official lexicon. During the past year, he and his officials hardly referred to the so-called “rules-based international order”.

On January  7, 2026, asked in a wide-ranging interview with The New York Times, if there were any limits on his global powers, the US President said: “Yeah, there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.” “I don’t need international law,” he added.

Beyond Trump, in widely reported remarks, White House deputy chief of staff for policy and homeland security, Stephen Miller, said the US was operating in the real world that “is governed by strength, that is governed by force, that is governed by power… these are the iron laws of the world since the beginning of time”.

Toward the end of December 2025, reviving the calls from his first term in office, he declared US ownership of Greenland an absolute necessity.

On January 3, 2026, following a US strike in Venezuela, President Maduro and his wife were brought, handcuffed, to New York.

Trump is now threatening to stop oil supplies to Cuba.

And after the regime’s massacre of thousands of protestors, the world is on edge, wondering whether Trump will again order military strikes against Iran.

Moreover, the New York Times Editorial Board article published last Friday, titled “Trump’s Stifling of Dissent Reaches a New Level”, said that the crackdown on dissent and speech in Minnesota this winter follows a pattern common in countries that slide from democracy to autocracy.

The erosion of the global order is perhaps most visible in the West’s shifting relationship with international courts. In 2023, the West celebrated when the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for President Putin. However, that enthusiasm vanished when the Court turned its gaze toward the West’s allies.

On May 20, 2024, Karim Khan, the chief prosecutor of the ICC, announced that he was seeking arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three other Hamas leaders for war crimes and crimes against humanity. 

On November 21, 2024, the UN-backed ICC issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant, together with a former Hamas commander.

“With regard to the crimes, the [Court’s Pre-Trial Chamber I] found reasonable grounds to believe that Mr. Netanyahu…and Mr. Gallant…bear criminal responsibility for the following crimes as co-perpetrators for committing the acts jointly with others: the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare; and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts,” said the ICC. [ii]

Following congressional hearings, Secretary Blinken said he would work with lawmakers on potential sanctions against the ICC. The US is not a state party to the Rome Statute, the ICC’s founding document.

European countries were divided, but the majority supported the ICC and its independence.

Finally, on May 24, 2024, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the UN’s top court, by thirteen votes against two, delivered its Order on the request for provisional measures submitted by South Africa on 10 May 2024 in the case concerning the Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in the Gaza Strip.

The Court’s Order directed Israel to immediately halt its military offensive and open the Rafah crossing to allow unhindered provision of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance.[iii]

On February 6, 2025, President Trump declared that the ICC has engaged in illegitimate and baseless actions targeting America and our close ally Israel.  “The ICC has, without a legitimate basis, asserted jurisdiction over and opened preliminary investigations concerning personnel of the United States and certain of its allies, including Israel, and has further abused its power by issuing baseless arrest warrants targeting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Former Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant,” a statement by the White House said.[iv]

At the end of January 2026, Israeli media reported that a senior security source had said the military accepts that more than 70,000 Palestinians have been killed during the war in Gaza.

Despite the ICJ’s Order, the so-called ceasefire was agreed to only in October 2025; the Rafah crossing was opened only last week, almost two years later; and humanitarian assistance to Gaza remains a concern.

Courts are often described as the “living voice” of the law. While legislatures write the laws and the executive branch enforces them, courts ensure that laws are applied with fairness and consistency.

With continuing talks among Russia, Ukraine, and the US, an end to the war in Ukraine could be closer. However, this will be a difficult and painful process. I have always believed that the Ukraine story could and should have been written differently. This, however, does not mean that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was not a violation of international law and the UN Charter. Moreover, strikes against cities are also violations of international law.

The foregoing only shows that today, the rules-based international order is a myth.

On February 4, 2026, Presidents Xi and Trump spoke on the phone. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement on the call included the following:

“President Xi emphasized that the Taiwan question is the most important issue in China-U.S. relations. Taiwan is China’s territory. China must safeguard its own sovereignty and territorial integrity, and will never allow Taiwan to be separated. The U.S. must handle the issue of arms sales to Taiwan with prudence.”[v]

The call followed visits by leaders from France, South Korea, Ireland, Canada, Finland, and the UK. The German Chancellor is due to visit China toward the end of February 2026.

Given the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, and the West’s “commitment” to the so-called rules-based international order, it is clear why China’s public discourse on multilateralism appeals to countries of the Global South.

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[i] https://2021-2025.state.gov/secretary-antony-j-blinken-with-andrea-mitchell-of-msnbc-andrea-mitchell-reports-2/

[ii] https://news.un.org/en/story/2024/11/1157286

[iii]https://www.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/192/192-20240524-pre-01-00-en.pdf

[iv] https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/02/imposing-sanctions-on-the-international-criminal-court/

[v] https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/xw/zyxw/202602/t20260205_11851262.html