This article assesses the causes and implications of what appears to be a case of intensifying global political paralysis afflicting both states and international systems. It briefly describes this malady among leading state actors as well as the global regimes they created and until recently sustained, and how the affliction has affected MENA states and relations between them. The causes of this seemingly universal weakening are then discussed. The article concludes with speculation on implications for global and MENA politics and relations between the two.

Robert Springborg is research Fellow of the Italian Institute of International Affairs and Adjunct Professor at Simon Fraser University. Formerly he was Professor of National Security Affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School, the holder of the MBI Al Jaber Chair in Middle East Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies in london, Director of the American research Center in Egypt and University Professor of Middle East Politics at Macquarie University in Sydney Australia. His most recent books are Egypt (2018) and Political Economies of the Middle East and North Africa (2020), both published by Polity Press, and The Political Economy of Education in the Arab World, lynne rienner, 2021, co-edited with Hicham Alaoui.