Today Estonia celebrates its Independence Day. It is a day that serves as a potent reminder of the sovereign nation-state as the only true guarantor of liberty. As it happens, in the evening we will hear President Trump’s State of the Union Address. The global order has changed a lot during his first year as the 47th president of the USA. Simultaneously, today marks four years since Russia’s brutal, full-scale invasion of Ukraine. An event that, for many in the West, acted as the final wake-up call from the “globalist dream.”
In the latest issue of Foreign Affairs, Nadia Schadlow, (who served as U.S. Deputy National Security Adviser for Strategy in the first Trump administration) dissects this phenomenon in her article “The Globalist Delusion.” Her thesis is as lucid as it is necessary for a European audience: we are witnessing a clash between two operating systems. On one side, a “global-first” approach, where processes, supranational institutions, and multilateral rules are believed to be the panacea for all ills. On the other, the realization that the nation-state remains the bedrock of legitimate authority and effective action.
Europe Values Process Over Outcomes
Schadlow highlights how a devotion to global processes has, for decades, replaced a focus on actual results. We see this vividly within the European Union. The Commission in Brussels often operates as if universal regulations and bureaucratic meddling were a substitute for strategic capability. While the EU elite has been preoccupied with identity politics and over-regulation that stifles innovation, actors like China and Russia have exploited the inherent inertia of the system.
Looking at this from the viewpoint of one of my favorite sayings, “If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.” It seems Europe is still today often measuring the wrong data. We measure compliance with bureaucratic directives instead of geopolitical strength or economic dynamism.
Schadlow’s analysis resonates with a healthy, “Thatcherite” brand of Euroskepticism. We need a strong Europe, anchored in its roots and a genuine common defense against foes from abroad. A good example is that Russia’s actions over the past four years have proven that a “lofty bureaucratic architecture” cannot end a war. What is required is national capacity, political will, and concrete coalitions of the willing.
For us in the Nordics and Baltics, sovereignty is not an abstract concept. It is the difference between freedom and oppression. Schadlow argues that democratic states must stop delegating their destiny to a bureaucratic global order. I agree. We need a “subsidiarity with teeth,” where decisions are made close to the citizens and where member states reclaim responsibility for their own security and future.
As we honor Estonia’s independence today and remember the sacrifices of Ukraine, we should also bury the globalist delusion once and for all. The future does not belong to the faceless institutions, but to the nations that dare to be strategic, that uphold individual responsibility, and that understand that liberty requires more than signatures on international treaties. It requires a new operating system built on reality, not wishful thinking.