2025: A world at crossroads of power and change

As a personally painful year for me ends, I think the year that’s ended has been terrible for the world. The war in Gaza, which is never-ending, is taking such a huge toll on babies, civilians, doctors, and even journalists, and has exposed our conscience as selective.

The world seems to have one standard for the West and another for the Palestinians, and while this may not have any immediate impact on them, it is a civilizational lesson the rest of the world has taken note of.

Lecturing the world on human rights and democracy while looking the other way as innocent babies are bombed is not a good look for those who preach universal human rights as fundamental to our world.

The double standards are sharply exposed in the Western mainstream media, which has lost its readers and viewers in droves as its credibility has sunk.

The Ukraine war and the war raging in Gaza have also drained the reputation, efficacy, and any semblance of authority that remained with world bodies like the United Nations (UN) as they watch Gaza and Russia helplessly.

A new, uncertain world is coming into being where brute force and “my way or the highway” seem to be the animating principles. Consider incoming United States President Donald Trump’s expressed desire to take over the Panama Canal and buy Greenland, while repeatedly referring to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “Governor”.

Uncertain world order

While Trump had talked about both Panama and the Greenland buying bid during his last term in office, it was considered jocular — an exemplar of his real estate investment mindset. Now, though, it has a certain air of menace in a completely uncertain world order.

What if Trump is completely serious, wonder anxious op-eds across the world? We have no new world order to even exercise any modicum of control over the current hyperpower in the world. How will China, the new superpower on the block locked in terminal competition with the US, react? This is before Trump has even been inaugurated.

To think that the Panama Canal — an artificial 51-mile waterway which connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean — was signed over by President Jimmy Carter in 1977 to ratify Panama’s control over it. Now Trump says that the US is getting ripped off at the rates charged by Panama and declares, “I am not going to stand for it.”

The President-elect wants control back with the US. This will inevitably push Panama towards a warmer embrace with China, something Trump is unlikely to want to facilitate. Trump also wants to stop illegal immigration from Latin America, and alienating Panama is hardly the way forward.

But, in an earlier era — say, that of George Bush Senior — it was simply unthinkable that a US President would publicly mull over taking control of the world’s most significant trade route in this way, or even about buying another country like Trump has twice now offered to buy Greenland.

If the US was the global policeman earlier, it is now only fulfilling the role of arming and supporting Israel as it seems to run amok in Gaza. Without US support, Israel cannot stand for a day, yet we see no US pressure to broker a deal in Gaza and end the worst-ever siege of humanity currently ongoing.

Prognosis is dim

China, bracing for Trump’s tariffs, is already signalling that it will not be accommodating to a trade regime it views as completely unfair. China has repeatedly called out what it terms the “double standards” of the West when it comes to giving China a seat at the highest superpower table. China doesn’t view democracy or Western values as a way forward and is clear that its unique rise has to be accommodated.

The wave of anger over H1 visas, which allow skilled Indians to work in the USA, in the MAGA Trump universe has spilled over into nasty racist name-calling on social media. Elon Musk, the richest man in the world and pre-eminent Trump insider, has squared off against the MAGA base, leaving India’s technology industry extremely worried. The government is also looking for clarity from Trump once he takes over.

We are currently in a very fraught space in the world. Our future and that of our children will depend on wise leadership steering the world to safe harbours. Currently, the prognosis is dim.