There is an iron lining to this silver plate. If an international model congruous with the principles mentioned above emerges, those not wishing to participate can choose to stay outside - and such a choice should be respected.

However, they cannot choose to attack or disrupt the international system chosen and built by others just because it does not reflect a set of values preferred by them. The justification of violence and destruction is very rarely supported by the large majority of members of the same culture, ethnicity and religion - far from it. Violence is contradictory to and not in conformity with the teachings of all major religions.

The model should respect the rights of minorities and prevent the majority from imposing its will on those having chosen to stand aside. At the same time, no minority can arrogate to itself the right to prevent the majority from living in peace and stability inside a cultural framework chosen by them and for them.

If minorities and/or groups of minorities, by acts of violence, seek to destroy wealth, undermine stability and engineer cultural upheavals, such violence has to be resisted and, if necessary, by force. It then becomes a question of defense of the trend making seen for centuries toward a more civilized mankind. War, terror and fear have gradually been replaced by negotiations, civility and a genuine rule of the law.

No country, no nation, no culture, no civilization, no religious or ethnic group has the right per se to use power be it politically, economically, militarily or culturally. The use of power must be justified by being weighed, measured and judged against the principles outlined earlier and the right to do so must be earned by self-discipline, self-restraint, respect and no double standards.

The Alternative

There is always an alternative. And the alternative to this new kind of internationalism may be found among the following models: The United States as a global empire, a coalition of the willing run by the US, some kind of "three block" system with North America, Asia and Europe governed by competing centers, a return to the rivalry among nation-states or sheer and outright international chaos.

None of them represent the rule of the law, negotiations, mutual respect or whatever most of us would prefer. Instead they augur a back-pedalling to some kind of power play in a more or less repulsive form, unless of course we end up with some nice kind of chaos sending civilization back to the jungle.

 

J. Ørstrøm Møller is Ambassador of the Kingdom of Denmark to Singapore and an Adjunct Professor at Copenhagen Business School.