For more than seven decades, liberalism constituted the institutional and normative model of the Western political order. It was not simply a system of government, but a complete political edifice, in which popular sovereignty was exercised through institutions, power was limited by the rule of law, and political legitimacy was inextricably linked to accountability and the protection of rights. On this synthesis, the transatlantic relationship and the post-war international order, which defined itself as an order of rules and not of simple power, were founded.
At present, this model is undergoing a structural transformation. The publication of their National Security Strategy on 4 December is a historic milestone in this transition. It is a text that consciously moves away from the language and logic of post-war strategic documents.
It is not organized around principles, commitments and normative references, but around a conception of politics as a field of competition, hierarchy and enforcement. The absence of any positive reference to democracy, international law and human rights is not an omission, but a clear political statement.
The significance of this shift becomes clearer when viewed historically. Even during times of intense American unilateralism – from the Truman Doctrine to the 2003 Iraq crisis – it remained central to the American self-concept. For the first time, official US strategy is explicitly disengaged from this value framework and redefined as a strategy of sovereignty and direct interest, without normative commitments. The international order ceases to be understood as a system of rules that binds the powerful, and reappears as a field of power relations.
In this context, . It represents a qualitative historical change in the way in which democratic legitimation is understood.
Liberal democracy is not outright rejected; it is redefined. The executive power assumes a dominant role, the electoral majority is recognized as an almost absolute source of legitimacy, and institutional controls are viewed as obstacles to political effectiveness. Democracy remains as a process, but gradually disconnected from its liberal contents.
This rearrangement acquires central importance in the relationship with Europe. Unlike other great powers, the European Union is not treated in the new strategic narrative as a simple geopolitical partner or competitor, but as an institutional and cultural problem. European integration is presented as an undertaking that undermines national sovereignty, weakens political power and erodes collective identities. This criticism does not concern individual policies, but the very institutional and value base of the Union.
The historical originality of the present moment lies in the fact that the transatlantic relationship is now conditioned by ideological conformity. Cooperation is not understood as a partnership of equal partners sharing common democratic principles, but as a relationship of political alignment. In this context, the political support of forces that openly challenge liberal democracy and European integration is part of a broader strategy of reshaping the European political landscape.
The . The concentration of power, the control of public speech and the systematic weakening of the rule of law are not deviations, but a stable pattern of governance. The Trump-Orban axis is not constituted as a communicative or personal confluence, but as a coincidence of power models: on the one hand, the reshaping of democratic legitimation at the international level; on the other, the institutional consolidation of this shift within the EU.
What is taking shape today is not simply a return to the classical realism of international relations nor a repeat of the Cold War. It is a post-liberal form of power that preserves the democratic process but systematically disconnects governance from its liberal institutional boundaries.
Historically, this phenomenon is not identified with either interwar authoritarianism or postwar American hegemony. It draws elements from interwar national self-sufficiency and the rhetoric of sovereignty, from , but combines them with a contemporary deconstruction of the liberal rule of law from within.
Historically, this marks the end of post-war exceptionalism, in which power was legitimized through rules and institutions, and the entry into a phase where legitimacy derives primarily from efficiency, discipline and political alignment. It is not, therefore, a regression, but a qualitatively new regime of power, in which democracy survives as a form, while it is radically transformed as a content.
The consequences of this development go beyond the level of foreign policy and touch the political culture itself. Politics is redefined as the exercise of power, conflict becomes a key mechanism of legitimation, and institutional complexity is presented as a weakness. In this way, practices that were once considered incompatible with democratic normality tend to be incorporated into the new regime of normality.
The critical stake is not the formal survival of democracy. It is about its content. Liberal democracy is not catalyzed by spectacular ruptures; it is gradually eroded through shifts in the way power is understood, exercised, and legitimated. Europe thus stands at a historic crossroads: either it will actively defend its liberal democratic model, or it will accept the transition to an international order where power, compliance and political enforcement replace rules, limits and accountability.
The lady Vera Tika is a research associate at the Center for Political Research, Panteion University, and an expert on far-right radicalization
