The End of the End of History

On December 25 of this year we will mark 25 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Many in Russia and the West were optimistic about the seeming imminent integration of Russia into a Western-led liberal democratic global order. The United States, in particular, fresh off its ‘victory’ in the Cold War, could hardly restrain its triumphalism as it stood astride the world as the sole superpower. As the 1990s came to a close, US power and dominance seemed only further augmented as the dot.com boom fuelled economic and technological growth of historic proportions while Russia had endured a decade of massive economic dislocation. Leading US international relations scholars crowed about the ‘durability of a unipolar order’ in 2000 precisely at the moment when the worm began to turn as the boom turned to bust and the United States embarked on a foolish and unnecessary war in Iraq that has cost the country mightily in blood, treasure, and international credibility and reputation.