The Rise of the Technopoles

For some optimistic observers, the end of the Cold War offered a chance to build a new world order. Goods and services, ideas, and even people would flow freely among interconnected, liberal democratic states. Global problems would be met with collaborative solutions—and science diplomacy would be an essential component of the foreign policy toolkit.

If that vision of globalization was realized over the past three decades, it’s now clearly in retreat. Isolationist policies and geostrategic competition—or outright conflict—have fractured alliances and disrupted cooperation on science and innovation. As Vaughan Turekian and Peter Gluckman write, “The multipolar world is now defined as much by distinct approaches to technology and innovation as it is to ideology.” Technopoles is their term for these increasingly independent, technologically sophisticated nations.

The rise of technopoles strains attempts to deal with global issues such as climate change, pandemic prevention, and sustainable development. Turekian and Gluckman explore how science diplomacy can adapt. “Science diplomacy,” they write, “has an important, even existential imperative to help the world reconsider the necessity of working together toward big global goals.”

Read more about how science diplomacy can evolve to address shared challenges in a multipolar international order.