“All Politics Is Regional”: Emerging Powers and the Regionalization of Global Governance

Tip O'Neill famously claimed, “All politics is local.” As global governance falters and US leadership wanes, will “all politics” become regional with emerging powers (China, Russia, Brazil) taking responsibility for leadership at the regional level? While regional powers are providing effective leadership on free trade and financial stability, they have made much less progress on security issues where their approaches to certain problems, such as human security, diverge from those adopted by the West. Their ability to provide regional leadership is hampered by the increasing complexities of the modern world, including the conflicting dynamics of regionalism itself. The emergence of a centralized system of regional governance based on the hegemony of regional leaders is therefore unlikely. Instead, we are seeing the emergence of a complex and dynamic system of governance that includes a broad range of actors operating on multiple and overlapping levels.