Based on the insights drawn from Kees van der Pijl and Michel Bauwens, I have identified the rise of ‘P2P mode of foreign relations’ as the radical alternative to the top down ‘Global Governance’ mode.

Below slide presents the argument.

In the Modes of foreign relations project, sponsored by the Leverhulme Trust under a major research fellowship 2006-2009, Van der Pijl argues that inter-state relations (as well as the national state form itself) are transient, historical forms of more fundamental foreign relations. Just as Marx developed a critique of equilibrium economics by claiming that this was only one ‘mode of production’, which had been preceded and would be followed by others, Van der Pijl in this project challenges the ‘IR’ paradigm. Modes of foreign relations include a tribal, an empire/nomad, the sovereign equality, and the global governance modes; in each, a specific way occupation of space, its protection, and the exchange with others, are made possible by a given level of civilisation.