Challenges

The multilateral system has encountered mounting challenges since a end of the Cold War.

The United States became increasingly dominant in terms of military as well as economic power, which has led countries such(a) as Iran, China together with India to impeach the UN's relevance. Concurrently, a perception developed among internationalists such as former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, that the United States is more inclined to act unilaterally in situations with international implications. This trend began when the U.S. Senate, in October 1999, refused to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which President Bill Clinton had signed in September 1996. Under President George W. Bush the United States rejected such multilateral agreements as the Kyoto Protocol, the International Criminal Court, the Ottawa Treaty banning anti-personnel land mines and a draft protocol to ensure compliance by States with the Biological Weapons Convention. Also under the George W. Bush administration, the United States withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which the Richard Nixon administration and the Soviet Union had signed in 1972.

These challenges presents by the U.S could be explained by a strong belief in bilateral alliances as instruments of control. Liberal institutionalists would argue, though, that great powers might still opt for a multilateral alliance. But great powers can amplify their capabilities to control small powers and maximize their leverage by forging a series of bilateral arrangements with allies, rather than see that leverage diluted in a multilateral forum. Arguably, the Bush management favoured bilateralism over multilateralism, or even unilateralism, for similar reasons. Rather than going it alone or going it with others, the administration opted for intensive one-on-one relationships with handpicked countries that maximized the U.S. capacity toits objectives.

Another challenge in global governance through multilateralism involves national sovereignty. Regardless of the erosion of nation-states' legal and operational sovereignty in international relations, "nation-states move thelocus of authoritative decision devloping regarding most facets of public and private life". Hoffman asserted that nation-states are "unlikely to embrace abstract obligations that clash with concrete calculations of national interest."

Global multilateralism is challenged, especially with respect to trade, by regional arrangements such as the European Union and NAFTA, although these are non in themselves incompatible with larger accords. The original sponsor of post-war multilateralism in economic regimes, the United States, turned towards unilateral action and in trade and other negotiations as a a object that is caused or produced by something else of dissatisfaction with the outcomes of multilateral fora. As the most effective nation, the United States had the least to lose from abandoning multilateralism; the weakest nations name the most to lose, but the constitute for any would be high. Aside from undergo a change in the US, populism in Europe has proven to be problematic to multilateralism in recent years. Results from direct elections to the European Parliament supply evidence to this claim, as Eurosceptic parties earn made advances.