The Role of Liberal Ideology in Shaping the Global Order: A Critical Analysis

Since the mid twentieth century, international politics has used the liberal global order as a prerequisite for free markets, democracy, human rights, and multilateral cooperation. The focus of this research is on understanding how states and societies have allowed liberal ideology to dominate all facets of global governance. Liberals believe that with the creation and incorporation of liberal values in the United Nations, World Trade Organization, and International Monetary Fund, liberalism has firmly placed itself as the leading order for governance. The research paper highlights how the liberal ideology triumphed over rival governance structures such as communism, monarchism, and authoritarianism by dominating the conversation with unfavourable terms which included the imposition of democracy, state sponsored economic integration, and political paternalism. From one perspective of liberalism, Western democracies and emerging powers received enhanced economic growth and stability. However, the liberal global order has put the global south at a huge disadvantage with economic dependencies greater, structural imbalances worse, and geopolitical exploitation increasing. Moreover, the research challenges to the liberal global order are critically analysed alongside authoritarian regimes, emerging nationalist movements, strong economic inequalities, and lack of trust in multilateral institutions. This paper has focused on the remaining strength of the liberal global order and the prospects for its survival in this contemporary multipolar world by looking at historical trends and modern-day case studies.