The risk of misperception of a systematic conflict

Risk alert is a natural predisposition of those who confront it, perceive it or are willing not to ignore it. Its pessimistic dimension appears when the ability to overcome it does not seem sufficient. Even more so if its increase (eg the escalation of war tension in Ukraine) was not adequately prevented.

On the alert to global risks in 2022 reports the recent report of the World Economic Forum (WEF). In it, the general weakness in caring for them is expressed in the predominance of more or less pessimistic perceptions about the global situation (61.2% feel uneasy, 23% worried and only 16% are positive or optimistic).

Criticism of this type of report focuses on the presentation of a wide variety of global risks whose complexity is not organized, however, in terms of their proper management while their best summary is a generality (in this case, the growing divergence between countries in the process of economic reactivation and modernization that will impede cooperation).

And in relation to local risks, this criticism contrasts with the schematic simplicity with which they are presented (eg, in the case of Peru, extreme scenarios are contemplated -the collapse of the State-) or general ones (prolonged economic stagnation, employment crisis, digital inequality , environmental damage and illicit economic activities).

This does not imply that the risks that make up global complexity are not, as a whole, adequately identified or that they are illegitimate because we do not agree with the order in which they are presented (in the next decade, according to the WEF, the first are environmental risks, the second social -loss of cohesion in small and large countries- and health, the third are linked to natural resource crises, the fourth linked to emerging debt and finally those referred to “geoeconomic confrontations”).

In the same way, the schematic simplicity with which local risks are presented does not imply that they are false or illusory (eg, in the Peruvian case, the risk of collapse of the State is today a scenario to consider; the prolongation of economic stagnation has been signaled by projections of low growth; growing informality and unemployment are liabilities of our supposed recovery; digital inequality is an old problem of technological access; and the proliferation of illicit activities is a top national concern).

In both cases, global and local, the problem lies in the fact that the presentation of risks does not seem oriented by the WEF to their adequate confrontation. Moreover, not only may their social and environmental priorities not be the correct ones to make decisions in this regard, but the list presents risks without the necessary emphasis. This can distort or blind the respective decision-making processes.

On this particular point, the economistic distortion of the WEF has prevented it from stating the obvious: “geoeconomic confrontations” are only one aspect of “geopolitical confrontations”. And these, only mentioned in passing and related to other scenarios, are today of the greatest concern. Especially if they concern the process of redistribution of power in the structure of the international system.

As is evident, the extremely dangerous belligerence of the Ukrainian conflict destabilizes the entire international system by directly confronting the leading power (USA) and the main military alliance (NATO) with a great power (Russia) without complementary interests today and in a scenario of the greatest strategic significance. This risk has not been adequately warned by the WEF.

In it, neither the United States nor NATO want to recognize areas of influence that Russia claims, nor does the military alliance want to give in to its “open door” policy, nor to its presence in territories into which the alliance has expanded. Moreover, the principles of territorial integrity and state sovereignty that the West invokes for Ukraine are properly considered by Russia.

On the contrary, Russia demands that NATO stop expanding towards the East, that it withdraw from ex-Soviet territories, that it not deploy weapons in those territories, that it provide security guarantees in this regard and that it recognize the principle of self-determination (in the case of Crimea -stolen from Ukraine in 2014- and Donbas).

The Russian challenge is supported by 100,000 Russian troops on the Ukrainian border that increase the risk of invasion. And it is presented as part of a process that Russia has gone through from the consolidation of its national territory (the domain of Chechnya, eg), to the real projection on the “nearest neighbors” (eg Georgia and Ukraine) and, now against the powers of the West. This transition claims the status of a great power and not only a regional power.

The effects of this greater risk in Latin America are various, but they have focused today on the Russian mention of a possible military deployment in Cuba and Venezuela.

To manage this risk, a country like Peru must explicitly and energetically oppose this possibility. And in the global arena, where Peru is a minor country, it must support the Russian-North American-Atlantic diplomatic process. And this is how it should be raised at the UN by convening it, taking a position with like-minded neighbors and in relation to our peripheral Western presence. Silence and neutrality do not fit in times of serious global risk.

The WEF has not adequately presented this problem by minimizing the dimension of the Ukrainian conflict and linking it to other problems such as migration, the militarization of space, economic stagnation and the fragility of the State. This shows a poor perception of the risk that complicates the reaction of the States without more information.