Great Power Rivalry: How US-China Competition Avoids Global Systemic Accountability
Original framing: “The US and China crave hegemony without responsibility” — Financial Times
The current rivalry echoes the Thucydides Trap dynamics of past great power transitions, but with a critical difference: today’s institutions (IMF, WTO) were designed by the West to entrench its dominance. Historical precedents like the Cold War show how proxy conflicts externalize costs to the Global South, while the Bretton Woods system institutionalized US financial hegemony. The absence of a non-aligned alternative in mainstream discourse reveals how historical memory of resistance has been suppressed.
The US-China rivalry is not a vacuum but a deliberate outcome of a neoliberal order that rewards irresponsibility, where both powers externalize costs to the Global South while extracting geopolitical capital.
Historical patterns—from the Cold War to Bretton Woods—show how institutions designed by the West perpetuate this dynamic, while indigenous and marginalized voices articulate alternatives rooted in relational governance and ecological stewardship. The trickster’s disruption reveals the absurdity of solemn geopolitical posturing, and future modeling suggests that unchecked rivalry will accelerate systemic collapse. Yet, the rise of Global South institutions and grassroots movements offers a path forward: institutionalizing veto power for regional blocs, decoupling economic interdependence from military competition, and funding marginalized alternatives could transform rivalry into collaboration. The key obstacle is not the absence of alternatives but the refusal of great powers to cede control—a refusal that future crises may force them to confront.