Why US shapes new global rules

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Have some KoolAid(tm).

A lively debate in Washington has been over who sets the global rules: the established international organizations or the world's only superpower? Last week's US nuclear deal with India shows where that critical debate is headed.

The US-India deal, which brings India only partly into the norms of the Non-proliferation Treaty, is really a bilateral pact driven by the US. It's also a US statement about the NPT's failure to block bomb-building efforts by Iran and North Korea.

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This isn't unilateralism as much as it is "forum shopping," or creating many new multilateral groupings that strive to be both legitimate and effective, unlike some current global bodies. Some groupings don't work, such as the dormant Community of Democracies. Some older and well-tested bodies, such as NATO, are being prodded to venture onto new turf.

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As global challenges shift, US presidents will need to change or scrap institutions and rules set up after World War II or during the cold war. Finding a new balance between US interests and those of other nations will take the same kind of American leadership as in the past.

CSM