Is global chaos the new normal?

The reason isn’t that the great powers are no longer powerful; the difference is that their opponents — balky local governments, insurrectionists and jihadists alike — are more potent than they used to be. They’re better equipped, better funded and more skilled at guerrilla warfare.

At the same time, outside powers like the United States have lost their appetite for fighting long counterinsurgency wars. It’s become harder and more costly to keep a lid on the developing world’s disorders, so we’re more reluctant to try.

The result is what one scholar, Randall Schweller of Ohio State, has called “an age of entropy” — a leaderless world with no superpowers to enforce order.