Opinion

When will the Western-led global order catch up with the world and include Asia?

The world order has not kept pace with the shifting economic dynamics. The US and EU retain control of the IMF and World Bank despite Asia’s economic might, and the US dollar remains predominant despite Trump’s weaponisation of it

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Then International Monetary Fund managing director Christine Lagarde (right) waves from her office in Washington on September 20 after meeting her successor Kristalina Georgieva. The anachronistic “gentlemen’s agreement” that has kept an American in charge of the World Bank and a European in charge of the IMF has proved resilient. Photo: AFP

Kishore Mahbubani, a distinguished fellow at the Asia Research Institute of the National University of Singapore, is the author of "Has China Won?"

Published: 10:30am, 27 Dec 2019Updated: 11:33am, 27 Dec 2019

The world turned a corner in 2019. The problem is that the world order didn’t turn with it. This disconnect could have disastrous consequences.

The biggest global change has been the start of the “Asian century”. Today, Asia is home to three of the world’s top four economic powers (in purchasing power parity terms): China, India and Japan. The region’s combined gross domestic product exceeds that of the United States and of the European Union.

The US is no longer even the most globalised power; that title now goes to China. Already a larger trading partner to more countries than the US, China is signing on to more free-trade agreements as well, including potentially the largest in history, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership.

The US, by contrast, is abandoning FTAs such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has kept alive without the Americans. The US share of global trade continues to shrink.