An Open World: How America Can Win the Contest for Twenty-First-Century Order

by Rebecca Lissner, Mira Rapp-Hooper

Two foreign policy experts chart a new American grand strategy to meet the greatest geopolitical challenges of the coming decade
  "Mandatory reading. At a moment of unprecedented change and upheaval, Rapp-Hooper and Lissner provide fresh thinking and a clear guide for United States leadership in a renewed and open twenty-first century international order."—Jim Mattis, former Secretary of Defense   “An intellectually rich argument in favor of increased American involvement in world affairs.”— Kirkus Reviews

This ambitious and incisive book presents a new vision for American foreign policy and international order at a time of historic upheaval. The United States global leadership crisis is not a passing shock created by the Trump presidency or COVID-19, but the product of forces that will endure for decades. Amidst political polarization, technological transformation, and major global power shifts, Lissner and Rapp-Hooper convincingly argue, only a grand strategy of openness can protect American security and prosperity despite diminished national strength. Disciplined and forward-looking, an openness strategy would counter authoritarian competitors by preventing the emergence of closed spheres of influence, maintaining access to the global commons, supporting democracies without promoting regime change, and preserving economic interdependence. The authors provide a roadmap for the next president, who must rebuild strength at home while preparing for novel forms of international competition. Lucid, trenchant, and practical,An Open World is an essential guide to the future of geopolitics.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction, International Relations

216 pages, Hardcover

First published September 15, 2020

Reviews

[Brady Turpin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wish more academic books were like this: right to the point. Every sentence had a purpose and carried its own weight. It was refreshing to read something like this and I will take notes for my own academic writing. Argument and ideas over word and page count.

The content itself was interesting and clearly well thought-out. Both authors were precise in their diagnoses of the United States and the world we are moving into. I especially appreciated their forward looking approach, we cannot bring back some supposed "golden era" but we can chart a successful way forward.

The only thing I wish the authors had spent more time on is addressing or fleshing out how a closed world system in bad for the United States and allies. I believe it is, but this should be explained and not taken as an obvious fact. What specifically might a world without an engaged United States look like both domestically and internationally? Here the authors chose a more abstract approach where I think a concrete one would have strengthened their argument more.

[Charlotte · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5 stars for this one.
I really enjoyed the parts on:
- technology policy and the „tech“ cultural divide between the DoD and the private sector;
- „grey zones“ that adversaries might exploit for their objectives;
- especially enjoyed the policy recommendations at the end.

Very happy to read a book on international relations, global power balance and order, written by two female experts. We need more female perspective on these matters.

Overall the book was a bit lengthy and often redundant. I feel like I could have taken more away if it had been more concise or structured differently.

[bussy barbecue · Rating 3 out of 5]

If not a guide for America to handle an increasingly multi-polar and tumultuous world, An Open World is a sharp and prescient read on foreign relations—albeit one that was a little dense for me to read cleanly. I doubt I am the target audience and I will revisit this book again, but I found this book illuminative about the modern geopolitical challenges the US faces. The authors ultimately argue for a nuanced "openness" policy, one that concedes America's rescinding and wavering worldwide hegemony yet emphasizes our present primacy in order to thwart authoritarian and closed-sphered influences. They highlight our ability to lead on unexplored collaborations on technological and outer space governance, to reform sclerotic international organizations, and to cooperate with inevitable adversaries on shared challenges, like climate, migration, and pandemics, that will pose existential and disastrous impacts on all polities around the globe.

The international rules-based order is winding down, but the US still has a unique opportunity to craft an alternate international order that promotes a competing vision of free trade, democracy, and an open global commons against the rise of a balkanized and closed-sphered and disordered world antithetical to our values.

[Joseph Stieb · Rating 4 out of 5]

A useful, thoughtful, an concise argument for an open world order as distinct from a liberal one. RL and MRH envision an open order in which trade, information, the internet, services, etc flow through open but rules-based channels. They want to avoid any kind of bloc in which a great power segments off a part of the world as an exclusive sphere (CH may want to do this, but the extreme example is the SOviet bloc during the CW). The US main goal is to build military capacity, alliances/partnerships/networks/coalitions (depending on the issue) new institutions, and tools to maintain openness.

However, this is not a liberal internationalist vision in which world order is based on the spread of democracy. Sovereignty returns with a vengeance in this book, as states are more or less free to rule their internal affairs as they see fit. The US won't try to spread democracy (other than through example and appeal) but it will help existing democracies avoid backsliding. Regimes of many types are welcome in this system as long as they accept openness and exchange as the ground rules (as well as no interstate aggression). This is an obvious correction for the failures of post 9-11 democracy promotion, although one possible weak point is the assumption that regimes that do not accept openness at home (this is the liberal internationalists' comeback to this book). It is also not a primacist grand strategy, as this is impossible in an increasingly multipolar world. Instead, the US is a balancer, an order-builder, and a preserver of openness.

I usually avoid books like this because they can age so rapidly, but RL and MRH avoid doing too much prediction, and their argument for openness still applies as a distinct grand strategic option. The reading is actually a little dense and technical and maybe assumes a decent amount of foreign policy knowledge already, but you certainly don't have to be a national security specialist to follow along.

My main beef with this argument is that openness has long been a major goal of US foreign policy and its thought about the world. The post WWII LIO is in large part about openness, it just also had a bloc-basis because of the COld War. OPenness even goes back the founding when figures like Madison envisioned the federal government as an "umpire" that would maintain both hemispheric openness and openness btw the new states, who beforehand operated in large part as separate nations with trade barriers. That being said, this is definitely a strategy worth considering, as it corrects some of the excesses of post-Cold War USFP and puts the US on a more sustainable grand strategic track. Throughout much of history, liberalism and openness were significantly overlapping concepts, as the old British liberals believed that the core of liberalism was open exchange between and within nations. To some extent, authors just do this; you maybe exaggerate the distinction btw your work and other ideas/scholars to highlight your originality. It also has the advantage, I think, of possibly appealing to both Democrats and non-insane Republicans, although a lot of progressives wll probably make the old imperialist critique of openness.

[Paul Crider · Rating 4 out of 5]

The main thrust of An Open World is that America has to find its place in a multipolar world. The days of unipolar hegemony are gone and they're not coming back. American foreign policy (and domestic supporting policies) should aim to preserve openness along several dimensions: trade, Internet commons, multilateral institutions, etc. To put it differently, the US should work to prevent or frustrate closed spheres, for example, a Chinese splinternet.

A lot of the book felt like common sense from a conceptual perspective, but the book provides ample details useful for folks like me who don't read much about foreign policy.

[Sarah Min · Rating 5 out of 5]

A concise and linear history of how we arrived at our current geopolitical situation, this book outlines a clear and understandable plan for what the U.S. needs to prepare for in the modern world. What I liked about this book is that it is not just for foreign policy wonks, but also written for everyone else. Even though it was written pre-2020, much of the recommendations remain as urgent and proven as ever.

[Derek · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book, relevant today (while it’s not timeless, I do think it’s valuable reading for those interested in national security in 2020 and, more to the point, 2021).

[Aimen Sultana · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really helpful book

[Andrew Winner · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very worthwhile read. The authors have posited a new way for the U.S. to look at its grand strategy in a world that has and continues to change fundamentally. While the authors talk about this as a post-Trump strategy (either in 2021 or 2025), they are clear that the need for change is not solely due to the Trump presidency. They outline how both the world in which the United States operates and the U.S. itself have changed over the past several decades, requiring some fundamental rethinking (and associated new or modified policies) to enable the U.S. to protect and advance its interests. For those interested in big-think U.S. foreign policy, this is a quick and thought-provoking read. There are lots of questions -- to my mind -- about implementation, but the book is meant to be brief and lay out the framework, not to provide a nitty-gritty roadmap for policymakers. Even if you do not agree with the authors' premises or arguments, the U.S. needs more creative thinking of this sort going forward. Look for a lot more from the authors -- part of the newer generations of grand strategy and foreign policy experts.

[Joel Tannenbaum · Rating 5 out of 5]

The final two chapters of this book are where it really shines. "Toward an Open World" explains how Lissner and Rapp-Hooper's concept of an open world differs from past US policy and the prevailing liberal internationalism of the post cold war era. Its goal is to create a world without closed spheres of influence, more of an 'internet' rather than a unipolar or multi-polar world. Common goals and cooperation are emphasized, even in relations with illiberal states. This form of openness is self-conscious, practical, and reflexive, doing away with neo-containment notions (pg 103) and rejecting armed regime change in pursuit of liberal aims (pg 114). "A Policy for the Day After" provides a solid framework for the incoming administration, acknowledging the challenges that will arise in opposition to a policy of openness in the long term. I truly hope someone in the incoming presidential administration picks up this book and gives it some serious attention.