Crisis of the Old Order - Liberal Leviathan: The Origins, Crisis, and Transformation of the American World Order - page 8

system on lines that would enable them, or so they believed, to avoid a further war.” 7 The
violence of great-power war tears apart the old order. The war itself strips the rules and ar-
rangements of the prewar system of its last shreds of legitimacy. Indeed, great-power war
is perhaps the ultimate sign that an international order has failed. Revisionist states seek to
overturn it through aggression, while status quo states cannot defend it short of war. And in
the aftermath of war, victors are empowered to organize a new system with rules and arrange-
ments that accord with their interests. Armistice agreements and peace conferences provide
opportunities to lay down new rules and principles of international order. 8
In this way, the settlements of great-power conflicts have become ordering moments when
the rules and institutions of the international order are on the table for negotiation and change.
The major powers are forced to grapple with and come to agreement on the general principles
and arrangements of international order. These ordering moments not only ratify the outcome
of the war, they also lay out common understandings, rules and expectations, and procedures
for conflict resolution. They play a sort of constitutional function, providing a framework in
which the subsequent flow of international relations takes place. 9
International order is manifest in the settled rules and arrangements between states that
define and guide their interaction. 10 War and upheaval between states—that is, disorder—is
turned into order when stable rules and arrangements are established by agreement, impos-
ition, or otherwise. Order exists in the patterned relations between states. States operate ac-
cording to a set of organizational principles that define roles and the terms of their interac-
tion. 11 International order breaks down or enters into crisis when the settled rules and ar-
rangements are thrown into dispute or when the forces that perpetuate order no longer oper-
ate.
International orders can be distinguished and compared in many ways. Some international
orders are regional, others global. Some are highly institutionalized, others not. Some are
hierarchical. The distribution of power in international orders can also vary. Power can
be centralized or decentralized. Order can be organized around various “poles” of
power—multipolar, bipolar, or unipolar. 12 The challenge for scholars is to use these various
features or dimensions to capture the alternative logics and characteristics of international or-
der.
At the outset, it is useful to characterize and compare types of international order in terms
of the ways in which stable order is maintained. Generally speaking, international order can
be established and rendered stable in one of three ways: through balance, command, or con-
sent. Each involves a different mechanism—or logic—for the establishment and mainten-
ance of order. 13 In different times and places, international order has been organized around
each of these mechanisms or by a combination of these mechanisms. As we shall see, the
American-led liberal hegemonic order has relied in important ways on all three.