When Destruction Becomes Policy: What the Munich Security Report Reveals About the Future of Global Governance

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The Munich Security Report 2026, released ahead of this year’s conference, offers a diagnosis that should concern anyone invested in rules-based international order. Its title, Under Destruction, is meant literally. The report documents a deliberate turn toward what it calls “wrecking-ball politics”: political forces across Western democracies that favour institutional demolition over incremental reform.

The most prominent actor in this pattern is the current United States administration. In January 2026, President Trump announced withdrawal from 66 international organisations, including the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the World Health Organization and the Paris Climate Agreement. This is not a routine policy recalibration. It represents a strategy of withdrawal and defunding that risks institutional collapse or forces radical restructuring. The cumulative effect is to place at risk core elements of the multilateral architecture constructed after 1945.

The report’s central insight is that this turn toward destruction is not driven by policy disagreement alone. It is rooted in what sociologists call Zerstörungslust—a lust for destruction born from a pervasive loss of trust that gradual reform can deliver meaningful change. In all G7 countries surveyed for the Munich Security Index 2026, only a tiny proportion of respondents say that their current government’s policies will make future generations better off. When publics lose faith that institutions can reform themselves, demolition becomes politically rational.

The erosion extends beyond funding decisions. The report warns that core post-1945 norms—territorial integrity, adherence to international law and the assumption that multilateral rules constrain as well as empower states—are increasingly treated as negotiable rather than foundational. It cautions that the alternative to principled cooperation may be “a world shaped by transactional deals rather than principled cooperation, private rather than public interests, and regions shaped by regional hegemons rather than universal norms.” This is not speculative. It is already emerging in personalised, envoy-driven deal-making, in bilateral tariff negotiations that bypass WTO disciplines and in explicit linkage of foreign assistance to policy compliance.

What makes the Munich Security Report compelling is its refusal to treat this as a temporary aberration. It identifies structural drivers: affordability crises, rising inequality, stagnating living standards, and the erosion of upward social mobility in many Western societies. In such contexts, institutions associated—fairly or not—with stagnation become targets for politically organised resentment. The report argues that the “grand narrative” of steady progress has lost persuasive power. In its place, demolition is framed as renewal.

The strategic question the report poses is stark. Will actors still invested in rules-based order become “bystanders to bulldozer politics,” finding themselves “at the mercy of great power politics” with cherished rules and institutions in rubble? Or will they fortify essential structures, design frameworks less vulnerable to single-state leverage and become, in the report’s phrase, “bolder builders” themselves?

There are early signs of adaptation. European defence cooperation is accelerating. Middle-power coalitions on climate, digital governance and trade are exploring arrangements that function even when major powers defect. The “coalition of the willing” supporting Ukraine demonstrates a form of variable-geometry governance: sustaining cooperation among willing actors while insulating essential functions from unilateral withdrawal. Such experiments reflect an emerging recognition that universal consensus may no longer be available, yet functional cooperation must continue.

But the report also identifies a hard constraint: material capacity. Middle powers cannot sustain multilateral functions through rhetorical commitment alone. They require defence spending sufficient to deter aggression without guaranteed US backing, economic resilience capable of withstanding coercive tariffs and technological capacity that reduces dependence on systems controlled by actors hostile to their interests. Pooling resources through closer cooperation is not optional. It is the price of retaining agency in a world where interdependence is increasingly weaponised.

For peacebuilding and prevention actors, the implications are sobering. Multilateral mechanisms can no longer assume great-power consensus as a foundation. They must be designed to function amid fragmentation and strategic rivalry. That requires institutional redesign as well as political will.

The dual imperative is demanding. Middle powers must build capacity while also demonstrating that reformed institutions can deliver security and prosperity. If multilateral frameworks cannot show tangible results, publics will conclude that demolition advocates were correct. The Munich Security Index data suggest that the window for restoring trust is narrowing. Trust will not be rebuilt through declarations. It will be rebuilt through performance.

Three implications stand out.

First, the crisis is structural, not cyclical. It reflects legitimacy erosion across economic, political and institutional domains rather than a temporary divergence in policy. Even improved economic performance will not automatically restore confidence in institutions perceived as distant or unresponsive.

Second, middle powers face a forced choice between capacity and irrelevance. They can invest in defence, economic resilience and technological capability sufficient to sustain multilateral functions when major powers defect, accepting the costs that entails. Or they can become bystanders, acquiescing to a world shaped by spheres of influence and transactional bilateralism. There is no viable third path in which existing institutions continue to function as designed without material investment from willing actors.

Third, defence of existing institutions is insufficient. The Munich Security Report is explicit: those invested in rules-based order must become bolder builders. That means designing governance frameworks that address the legitimacy deficits fuelling demands for destruction. Variable-geometry coalitions, reformed financing mechanisms and accountability not only to member states but to affected populations are not optional enhancements. They are conditions for institutional survival.

The Munich Security Report 2026 documents a world entering an era of wrecking-ball politics. More than 80 years after construction began, the US-led post-1945 order faces sustained assault. The report does not predict whether destruction will clear ground for more equitable arrangements or simply entrench the power of the already strong. It makes clear, however, that passivity is not a neutral stance.

The question is not whether the post-1945 order survives in its existing form. It is whether what replaces it is shaped by collective governance capable of reform and renewal, or by unconstrained great-power competition and transactional dominance. That answer will be determined not by rhetoric, but by the willingness of states and institutions to invest, to reform, and to build. The time available to make those choices is narrowing.

Related articles by this author:

International Law Meets an Age of Impunity (3-minute read)

Middle Powers After Davos (3-minute read)

The UN’s Withering Vine: A US Retreat from Global Governance (3-minute read)

The Danger of a Transactional Worldview (3-minute read)

Jordan Ryan is a member of the Toda International Research Advisory Council (TIRAC) at the Toda Peace Institute, a Senior Consultant at the Folke Bernadotte Academy and former UN Assistant Secretary-General with extensive experience in international peacebuilding, human rights, and development policy. His work focuses on strengthening democratic institutions and international cooperation for peace and security. Ryan has led numerous initiatives to support civil society organisations and promote sustainable development across Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. He regularly advises international organisations and governments on crisis prevention and democratic governance.