Middle Power and Powerlessness on a changing World Stage

CLINGENDAEL GEOSTRATEGIC PERSPECTIVE 2026-2040

For this foresight study, eight scenarios were developed which together offer a unique perspective on the role of middle powers in a changing world. Middle powers can play a major role in the creation of a new world order, but do not yet have a decisive role at this point. Middle powers also face ‘middle powerlessness’ on the world stage.

Middle power is a relative concept – a spectrum rather than a binary threshold level of power. A middle power is a country (or region) that can have a substantial influence on the actions of geopolitical actors without being able to change the world order on its own. There is therefore no such thing as ‘the’ middle power. In this study, middle power broadly refers to countries such as India and Russia at the top end of the spectrum and countries such as the Netherlands and Egypt at the bottom end.

On the world stage, middle powers and potential middle powers play an important
role in their ‘intermediate position’ between great powers and minor powers. ©Clingendael

Over the coming years, middle powers will have the opportunity to take a proactive and assertive stance and play a key role in shaping a new geopolitical future. At the same time, like other players, they will be confronted with an unpredictable world stage on which various players, including the great powers, will try to impose their will. Middle powers have diverse worldviews and intentions, diverse visions of their own role and assertiveness in world affairs, diverse political, economic and military capabilities, and diverse strategic positions. This includes attempts to remain multi-aligned, non-aligned or fully aligned, and varying degrees of success in acquiring, maintaining and exercising power.

How protean world affairs really are is illustrated well by the two central themes of this study: conflict resolution and the geopolitics of finance. These two themes were picked because they represent two of the main pillars of the ‘old’ liberal rules-based order. Both are subject to erosion and transformation. Middle powers must relate to this on the one hand but can also exert substantial influence on it. 

In the geopolitical developments towards a new world order, multipolarity is not a given but a key uncertainty. In addition to the precise polarity of the emerging order, the degree of cooperation versus non-cooperation between middle powers is a second key uncertainty. These variables strongly determine the degree of success of different middle power profiles and strategies.

The Netherlands is a middle power, but whether it will remain so is unsure. It sorely needs a new strategic vision on changing relations with the great powers as well as with its middle power peers. In addition, the world stage is rapidly changing in a direction that the Netherlands (and, incidentally, the EU) is not accustomed to. Raw power politics prevails over international law, as demonstrated by the growing use of threats, using conventional and unconventional means. This points to a second urgent need: to find comfort in the uncomfortable and to get used to the unfamiliar. What’s more, neither NATO nor EU membership makes the Netherlands immune to the rise of brutal power politics.

In particular, this study concludes that although strategic indispensability is a cost-effective strategy for smaller middle powers, it is also a particularly vulnerable strategy. Just as excessive dependence on the existing world order is unwise, so too is excessive dependence on a single vulnerable means of power. This foresight study shows that hedging and multialignment are becoming increasingly prominent strategies in the middle power arsenal. These instruments offer middle powers maneuverability in an uncertain geopolitical era. The Netherlands can also benefit from learning to manoeuvre on the basis of these strategies.

The successful middle powers in this foresight study develop broad capabilities in multiple domains and deploy them with maximum effectiveness in strategically important moments and issues. Such middle power acumen requires various skills: (1) adaptability to a changing environment; (2) diversification and deepening of collaborations; and (3) broad resilience and geopolitical fortitude. Insight into, and investment in one’s own strengths and skills (one’s own middle power), but also insight into the limits of one’s own capabilities (one’s own ‘middle powerlessness’) are indispensable for meeting the current and future challenges of a world order in flux. 

-

Authors

Koen Aartsma -  Senior Research Fellow and head of the Strategic Foresight & Intelligence programme at the Clingendael Institute
Gijs Verbossen - Senior Research Fellow at the Clingendael Institute
Liam Klein - Research Fellow at the Clingendael Institute
Chiara Schrader - Researcher at the Clingendael Institute
Bart van der Wal - Researcher at the Clingendael Institute