Finnish president’s prediction about the end of Western hegemony

Finnish President Alexander Stob wrote in an article for the Economist magazine: What we are witnessing today is in many ways the same as what happened in 1918, 1945 and 1989.

According to the Al-Mayadin report, Ashtob further explained: There are moments in international relations where we realize that the world is changing, but we do not know exactly where it is going. We are living in one of these moments, those moments in which an era dies and a new era is born.

Finland’s president declared in his article: “The things that were supposed to bring us together, such as trade, technology, energy, information and currency, are now tearing us apart.” 

Ashtob admitted: He was among many who believed that the end of the Cold War would mean the end of history, but this did not happen. The era of Western hegemony, as we knew it before, is over.

The President of Finland added: Now the question is how global power will be divided in the future, while we are now witnessing the reorganization of the balance between the three power regions, which include the global West, the global East and the global South, the classification of the power triangle. If oversimplified, it helps clarify how the world has changed.

Ishtub summed up the equation by saying that the West and the East are fighting for the minds and hearts of the South (Third World countries) and it is the South that will determine the direction of the New World Order. He believed that the West is wrong if it thinks that the South is attracted to it only because of what he calls the values ​​or power of freedom and democracy, and the East is mistaken if it thinks that the huge infrastructure projects and direct financing will help it fully penetrate the South.

The Finnish president concluded in his article that it is ultimately about values ​​and interests and that the South will choose what it wants because it can do it. Ashtob believes that the West must choose between continuing to believe in the illusion that it can prevail as it has for centuries, or accept the realities of change and act accordingly, especially towards the South.

The Finnish official emphasized what Indian Foreign Minister Vinay Mohan Kwatra did when he noted that Europe needs to get rid of the mentality that Europe’s problems are the world’s problems, but the world’s problems are not Europe’s problems. He pointed out that one of the reasons that make the East a more convincing partner for the South is related to the systematic infrastructure, financial and development programs that China implements in different parts of the world and described China’s strategy as successful.

Ashtob concluded his article by asserting that if the West returns to its previous ways of direct or indirect hegemony or outright arrogance, it will lose the battle.

Translator: Mina Azimi