The world is experiencing a time of profound changes, not least in the international order. The foundational structures that we had taken for granted since the end of the Second World War, including the establishment of the United Nations and the Bretton Woods system, the expansion of international trade, and the development of a set of laws, rules and norms, are now being challenged. The United States, which had long acted as the world’s hegemon underpinning this liberal international order, appears to be shifting towards isolationism, while revisionist powers such as Russia defy international conventions.
In her lecture, the renowned Canadian historian Margaret MacMillan will help us understand our present situation by drawing upon historical examples of systemic crisis and the mechanisms through which world orders have evolved. She will examine the various types of international orders that have existed in the past, ranging from imperialism and spheres of influence to the so-called liberal, rules-based order, and consider what possible scenarios might emerge in the future.
Margaret MacMillan is an emeritus Professor of History at the University of Toronto and Professor of International History and the former Warden of St. Antony's College at the University of Oxford. Her books include Women of the Raj (1988, 2007); Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World (2001), for which she was the first woman to win the Samuel Johnson Prize and Nixon in China: Six Days that Changed the World (2007). Her most recent book is War: How Conflict Shaped Us (2020), which was in The New York Times’ Ten Best Books of the Year. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, the Royal Society of Canada, the Royal Geographical Society of Canada, and an Honorary Fellow of the British Academy. MacMillan is also a Trustee of the Imperial War Museum and a Board Member of the IWM.
IWM Rector Misha Glenny will begin the evening with a few welcoming remarks and introduce the speaker.
