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Harsh V Pant, Ed., “The World in 2024: An Epilogue,” ORF Special Report No. 243, December 2024, Observer Research Foundation.
The world in 2024 was turbulent. Despite election cycles across the world dominating the year, the distance between the governed and the governing elite seemed to have only grown, as leaders lost credibility faster than they could craft a credible narrative. From Europe to Asia, and from Latin America to Africa, political systems struggled to respond to the rapidly evolving aspirations of the people who in turn seemed perpetually disillusioned with the leadership on offer. If the return of Donald Trump to White House was a manifestation of the melding of global and local, the fall of Bashar al-Assad was a reminder of the inherent fragility of authoritarianism. As domestic challenges continued to dominate the political mind space, the global order faced a void with an all-round collapse of the architecture put in place in the aftermath of the Second World War.
And in that void, the primal urge of inherent anarchy in the international system reverberated with the return of force as the preferred instrument of inter-state relations. Yet, fighting wars has always been a nasty business. The political, economic, and moral corrosion caused by wars is often difficult for distant onlookers to decipher. For people who are not involved directly, wars can be a largely audio-visual experience, to be imbibed merely as information or entertainment, devoid of their political and strategic contexts. For a large part of the developed world, which had lulled itself into believing that wars would only be fought in faraway lands without imposing any massive direct costs, 2024 was a moment of reckoning.
The revival of geopolitical competition, particularly between Western liberal democracies and authoritarian powers like Russia and China, as well as the wars in Europe and the Middle East, have all challenged the post-Cold War optimism about the stability of liberal democracy. They have highlighted the vulnerabilities in the global order, the challenges of economic interdependence, and the fragility of international institutions. The return of traditional power politics, where military force is used to redraw borders, has revealed the limits of liberal triumphalism and reaffirmed that ideological and geopolitical conflicts remain very much at the core of the international order. The wars in Ukraine and the Middle East are a stark reminder that history continues to unfold in unpredictable and often violent ways. Conflicts in regions like the Sahel and the South China Sea illustrate how global powers now compete in indirect, localised conflicts, influenced by resource competition, territorial disputes, and ideological rivalry. Technological advancements are reshaping military strategies and battlefields.
Today’s world is one that is being moulded by the forces of geopolitics in more than one way. The Ukraine war, the Israel-Hamas conflict, the flaring up of threats to sea-lanes that are critical for global trade, and, of course, the China challenge—all these are forcing policymakers across the globe to look at this crisis-ridden world through a new lens. The earlier hubris that economic forces would drive global politics is now being shunned, as some of the most forceful defenders of economic globalisation are being forced to have a rethink.
The rise of Donald Trump in US politics was itself a response to the uneven benefits of globalisation, and he dramatically changed the American political discourse on the issue. Trump’s arrival with a bigger bang in 2024 than in 2016 has demonstrated that his earlier victory was no fluke, and it heralded a wider shift in America’s engagement with the rest of the world. The US Vice President and Democratic party nominee Kamala Harris and Trump represented two strikingly different visions of the US—as seen in their positions on immigration, trade, cultural issues, and foreign policy—and American voters have given their verdict. Trump’s first term in office laid the foundations of a dramatic re-orientation in America’s engagement with the world, economically and strategically. The isolationist streak now dominating American body politic is a warning to the rest of the world that has become far too dependent on the US as the key guarantor of global security.
As disillusionment with the major powers sets in, it is the voice of the Global South that needs amplification. It is the Global South that is likely to drive global growth in the coming years, if present trends are anything to go by, with India being one of the top performers. It is therefore imperative for the developing world to have this reality better reflected in the agenda of global governance. From climate and energy transitions to the regulation of artificial intelligence, the role of the Global South and nations such as India should be critical. For that, new coalitions and a more focused agenda will have to be formulated.
This is India’s moment, as New Delhi finds itself in a geopolitical and geo-economic sweet spot when the China story has lost some of its sheen. With the developed world looking inwards and China’s aggressive orientation towards the outside world, there is a leadership vacuum that needs to be filled. In 2024, New Delhi continued to make its impact on the global order by making choices and shaping outcomes reflecting not only its own concerns and interests but also those of a large part of the world often missing from global discourse.
This annual report from ORF researchers takes stock of the year gone by. It delineates three key trends that shaped different geographies and domains in 2024. The first section looks at major powers as the US-China contestation sharpened and the rise of Trump continued to roil Europe. Russia also seems much better placed as the year ends with the Trump factor also impacting the possible conclusion of the Ukraine war in 2025.
The second section tackles key geographies. If the Indo-Pacific saw a broadening of agenda in terms of facilitating cooperation and collaboration among regional states against the backdrop of a worsening security environment, the Middle East saw the rise of non-state actors reconfiguring an already volatile region. The Central Asian Republics moved toward greater regional integration amid intensifying great-power competition, even as China made rapid strides in Latin America—an economically laggard region. Africa demonstrated democratic resilience, and closer home in South Asia, perennial economic challenges continued to shape countries’ politics and geopolitics.
The final section examines some key global themes and issues of the past year; the shadow of geopolitics loomed large everywhere. On the battlefield, unmanned capabilities took centre stage even as the enduring relevance of attrition and adaptation has been made clear by all the ongoing conflicts. Trade War 2.0, focused on the control of new technologies, intensified in the past year even as resilience, agility, and reliability of the global value chain network was tested to its limits. The world grappled with the widening gap in climate adaptation efforts between the Global North and Global South. A fragmented world struggled with technology governance issues while the regulatory frameworks for emerging health technologies also struggled to keep pace with the breakneck speed of innovation. The global development agenda remained fragile but saw the Global South taking centre stage, reconfiguring economic diplomacy and partnerships.
As we move into 2025, the key trends identified in this report will continue to influence our external environment. Our aim is for the insights presented here to inspire deeper discussion and promote more constructive policy conversation—not only to gain a better understanding of the world, but also to navigate it effectively with a forward-looking perspective.
Read the report here.
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Professor Harsh V. Pant is Vice President – Studies and Foreign Policy at Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi. He is a Professor of International Relations ...
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