‘The West’ Is Near Death. It’s Also Worth Fighting For
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization embodies the slippery concept of what constitutes “the West.”
Photographer: Haiyun Jiang/AFP/Getty Images
“The West” is a club on life support, skewered on the lance of Donald Trump’s Hobbesian view of the world as a series of protection rackets carved up by countries strong enough to command a seat at the table. With America’s traditional allies now part of the buffet, this seismic development begs a question: Is the West worth saving, and can it be?
As a concept, the West has always been frustratingly vague and slippery. So much so that at various times and publications of my journalistic career, editorial fatwas were issued against its use. It can’t be determined by geography, because it also includes parts of the East. It can’t be just NATO, or a Christian club, for similar reasons. And yet, none of those editorial bans stuck. The term soon squirrelled its way back into use, because there was no substitute. It was too useful as a shorthand description of a tribe of market democracies that readers and writers alike understood to exist.