Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

The international system is constantly pulsating between order and disorder. While the exact definition of what constitutes order and disorder remains disputed, order is most commonly associated with the relatively peaceful period in between great power wars. But why and how – seemingly inevitable – does international order decline over time? The current literature on the decline of order features references to automatisms such as friction, erosion, and the self-reinforcing nature of disorder. However, these concepts remain insufficiently operationalized and separate from each other.

Using the process-tracing method to analyze the decline of the international order that emerged in Europe from the Congress of Vienna in 1815, I formulate a systemic causal mechanism explaining how order can be conceptualized to erode over time. I show that contradictions in the design of the order, such as competing claims to authority and institutional rigidity, acted as initial sources of friction in the operation of Europe's 19th century political order. Defining the procedural and substantive dimensions of this particular order, I observe empirical manifestations of increasing friction over the following decades. Gradually, unable to resolve both the original points of friction as well as new challenges, this friction eroded the concentrated power upon which the order was built. In the Crimean War (1853 – 1856), and ultimately in the Franco-Prussian War (1870 – 1871), the friction inhibiting the operation of the order could only be resolved by the destruction of the order itself, i.e. war between the great powers.

Formulated on the system-level of analysis, the proposed mechanism offers a minimally sufficient explanation for the decline of order in 19^th century Europe and makes a larger theoretical claim about the phenomenon of the decline of order in general. This claim can be tested in subsequent studies. In the final part of the paper, I explain how the findings are relevant to the current debate about the state of the US-led liberal world order. While the US nominally remains the most powerful country on earth, its ability to uphold and reshape the international order is diminished and further decreasing. Understanding the systemic forces that drive the decline of Pax Americana as well as potential ways of mitigating further decline, or managing a peaceful transition to a different ordering principle, is a matter of national security and global stability.