The Ballpark Podcast

Contributor(s): Dr Theresa Squatrito, Rohan Mukherjee, Agnes Yu, Farsan Ghassim, Tim Murithi | The US-led international order is under strain from without and within. Authoritarian powers such as Russia and China are challenging the core tenets of global cooperation and conflict management. Rising states of the Global South like India, Brazil, and South Africa demand reformed multilateralism in the institutions of global governance, and the US and its Western allies face a domestic surge of right-wing populism that seeks to reverse the eighty-year-old open and interdependent system of international relations. At stake is democracy, a core tenet of American political life and foreign policy. To discuss and consider these issues, in May 2025, the LSE Phelan US Centre held the conference: International relations and Democracy in a Multipolar World. The conference brought together scholars and experts to examine how important these democratic discourses and practices are in the broader context of challenges to th