The rules-based order was a useful fiction: Why Canada’s PM says the bargain is over

Not too long ago, US President Donald Trump joked that Canada should become America’s 51st state. He went on to threaten tariffs against allies and partners who challenged him, revived trade penalties as instruments of political pressure, and is openly pressing for the acquisition of Greenland, brushing aside Danish sovereignty.

These episodes did not suddenly break the global order. But they gave away what many countries had long accepted — that the rules-based system worked unevenly, that the strongest exempted themselves when it suited them, and that trade and law were enforced asymmetrically.