Recasting order in the Indo-Pacific: Europe, Asia, and the future of the Liberal International Order

Abstract

The Liberal International Order (LIO) is increasingly under threat—not only from revisionist and authoritarian states like China and Russia but also from within the USA itself. Unlike his predecessors, who recognized significant benefits for the USA in upholding and defending the rules-based order globally and in the Indo-Pacific, President Donald Trump views the existing LIO as detrimental to American interests. This special issue brings together scholars in Europe and the Indo-Pacific to examine the mounting challenges facing the LIO in the Indo-Pacific. Crucially, the contributions highlight that there has never been a shared consensus on what the LIO—or more neutrally: the rules-based order—entails, but a fragile coexistence of visions. The Indo-Pacific, as a geopolitical and normative crossroads, offers an unparalleled vantage point to test whether pluralism can coexist with rules, and whether middle powers and regional and minilateral organizations such as the European Union (EU), the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), or the Quad can act as custodians of order rather than bystanders to intensifying great-power rivalries, likely resulting in a fragmented and divided rather than truly multilateral and inclusive order in the Indo-Pacific. In fact, the debate surrounding the future of the Liberal International Order has intensified in recent years as geopolitical rivalries, institutional fragmentation, and competing governance models reshape global politics. Nowhere are these tensions more visible than in the Indo-Pacific where the intersection of European and Asian strategic interests reveals both the vulnerabilities and adaptive possibilities of the existing order. This special issue brings these two regions into a shared analytical frame to examine how their interactions shape the evolving contours of the rules-based international system.