The Trilemma of Hegemonic Order Competition

Great powers engaged in hegemonic order competition can pursue three desirable policy objectives: to maximize their influence abroad, to advance an international order that promotes their interests and values, and to avoid war. How do these objectives interact? I argue decision-makers face a trilemma. The central takeaway is that only two out of these three objectives can ever be mutually consistent, and order-makers must forsake one. This trilemma emerges from the interplay between two features of hegemonic competition: that competition is zero-sum and that a fundamental tension exists between maximizing influence and advancing an order that promotes one’s interests. Three case studies illustrate how different order-makers—(1) Britain during the 1895 Venezuela Crisis, (2) Russia regarding Ukraine after of the Cold War, and (3) then again after the Euromaidan protests—navigated this important yet thus far unidentified limit on the international ambitions of great powers.