Korean Education and the Politics of Incitement

A few days ago, a writer who had a pretty rational discussion attacked the president. Even if I write logically, they are different people, just as I cannot do the president's job. They live in different worlds even though it is called a confrontation between the brain and the practitioner. In my opinion, the practitioner is unconditionally correct on the premise of working hard.

 

When it comes to politics, there is a chronic disease in Korea. Koreans are vulnerable to instigation because of cramming education and competitive education. As a result, politicians and citizens try to move the hearts of the people rather than immerse themselves in policies.

 

Today, when I start a discussion with AI

 

1. Does biased thinking connect with madness?

2.What is the difference between crazy and not crazy?

3.Is the far right or far left insane because they are both out of their minds?

4. Is religion easy to convert to madness because logical compromise is impossible?

 

I tried to put in the back thesis.

 

Artificial intelligence developed logic using absolute and relative philosophy as a frame. It is said that the far-right or far-left cannot be directly linked to madness because the spectrum is prone to change with the times. And it is said that religion itself is less upsetting because it admits that it does not move within logic from the beginning. However, ideologies such as scientific socialism (Marxism) are said to commit atrocities in the mask of rationality. In fact, yes. We have seen many cases where smart humans go crazy and the world goes crazy. They always use the tool of rationality to make strong arguments, but the substance is crazy. Artificial intelligence also says that ideologies that wear the mask of rationality cause bigger problems than such religions.

 

It is said that the reason why Koreans' spiritual world is unstable with ideology and religion is that they have no rational thoughts and no ability to resist agitation. And it is said that it is because of cramming and competitive education.

 

Let's not think about anything and believe in artificial intelligence unconditionally - this is how crazy it is.

Education, Epistemic Closure, and Political Fanaticism

A Note on Ideological and Religious Polarization in Korean Society

Lee Hyeong-chun

I. Introduction

The term “political fanaticism” is used widely in everyday discourse, yet its criteria remain vague. The common intuition — that a position is “more deranged” the further it sits toward either pole of the left-right spectrum — does not hold up analytically. Abolitionism was extreme by the standards of its day yet proved historically correct, while “moderation” under totalitarian regimes has often amounted to silent complicity. Position on the spectrum, then, cannot by itself serve as a marker of mental soundness or truth. This paper proposes that the more reliable criterion lies not in position but in the structure of reasoning — specifically, openness to falsification and the degree of epistemic closure — and examines this hypothesis in relation to Korea’s educational structure.

II. Defining Fanaticism: Procedure, Not Position

Karl Popper argued that a theory lacking falsifiability should be classified not as science but as pseudoscience. This criterion can be applied analogically to political and ideological belief systems. When a position absorbs every piece of counter-evidence into itself, reinterpreting it as further confirmation rather than disconfirmation, the problem lies not in the intensity of the position but in the epistemic structure through which it operates. In this sense, “political fanaticism” can be defined not by ideological content but by a state in which openness to evidence, falsification, and the perspective of others has ceased to function.

III. Psychological and Physiological Mechanisms

1. Need for Cognitive Closure

The need for cognitive closure (NFC) theory developed by Arie Kruglanski describes a motivational intolerance of ambiguity and a corresponding drive for quick, definite answers. Research indicates that individuals high in NFC tend to adopt rigid belief systems, conform to group norms, and defer to authoritarian leadership. This tendency cuts across left and right alike, and is reported to respond especially strongly to black-and-white narratives that frame the world in terms of good versus evil. Empirical work has also linked experiences of significance loss to heightened NFC, which in turn fosters radicalization.

2. The Authoritarian Personality

Theodor Adorno and colleagues’ 1950 study The Authoritarian Personality identified a cluster of traits — conventionalism, authoritarian submission, authoritarian aggression, and rigid, stereotyped thinking — as a coherent personality syndrome. One of the study’s most consequential implications concerns education: pedagogy that emphasizes critical thinking, open-mindedness, and exposure to diverse perspectives can help temper authoritarian tendencies, whereas education built around conformity and rote memorization of correct answers risks reinforcing rigid, typological thinking.

IV. Korean Education and Resilience to Demagoguery

Korean education has repeatedly been characterized in the academic literature by an exam-centered, competitive structure and rote-based learning. Studies examining why the critical-thinking movement has failed to take root in Korea point to teacher-centered instruction and exam-driven memorization as structurally entrenched features. This is not merely a question of academic achievement; it concerns the internalized habit of accepting conclusions handed down by authority without independent verification.

This structure appears to operate on two levels. First, one-directional instruction without debate internalizes a reasoning habit in which the conclusion comes first and evidence is mobilized afterward to support it — leaving adults without the epistemic capacity to test unfalsifiable ideologies or conspiracy theories when they encounter them later in life. Second, chronic ranking-based competition keeps threat perception persistently activated, reinforcing a binary worldview that divides peers into allies and enemies — a disposition that can carry over into adult political polarization.

When these two mechanisms combine, the cognitive habit of accepting conclusions without verification and the physiological habit of reasoning under constant perceived threat reinforce one another, producing individuals with markedly diminished resistance to ideological or religious demagoguery. This offers a structural hypothesis for the recurring intensity of ideological conflict and religious dysfunction observed in Korean society.

V. Religion and Ideology: Two Paths to Fanaticism

Within this framework, religion and ideology follow distinct paths toward fanaticism. Certain religious beliefs explicitly declare themselves beyond the domain of rational verification, claiming an overt exemption from argument. Ideology — particularly ideology that invokes the rhetoric of being “scientific” — instead conceals its avoidance of falsification. The conclusion is fixed in advance, and evidence is retroactively assembled to support it, in what amounts to an institutionalized confirmation bias; yet because the adherent genuinely believes the process to be rational and scientific, they remain unaware of their own fanaticism. In this sense, ideological reasoning that masquerades as science can be more dangerous than religious faith that openly declares itself outside reason — though this danger is not confined to any single ideological camp, and applies equally to any political position that invokes rhetoric of “necessity” or “law” to immunize itself against falsification.

VI. Conclusion and Recommendations

Political fanaticism is more consistently and durably defined not by left-right position but by the cessation of epistemic procedure. The recurring ideological and religious dysfunction observed in Korean society can be understood as a consequence of one-directional, debate-free instruction combined with chronic competitive structures that erode citizens’ capacity for falsification and epistemic openness. This connects to existing analyses of credentialism and governance failure as two symptoms of the same root cause: an education system that simultaneously produces credentialed elites who have never learned to think and a public vulnerable to demagoguery for want of verification skills. Education reform should therefore extend beyond restructuring entrance examinations, toward a pedagogical philosophy that embeds the lived experience of debate and falsification.

References

Adorno, T. W., Frenkel-Brunswik, E., Levinson, D. J., & Sanford, R. N. (1950). The Authoritarian Personality. New York: Harper & Row.

Kruglanski, A. W., Szumowska, E., Kopetz, C., Vallerand, R. J., & Pierro, A. (2021). On the psychology of extremism: How motivational imbalance breeds intemperance. Psychological Review, 128(2), 264.

Kruglanski, A. W., Pierro, A., Mannetti, L., & DeGrada, E. (2006). Groups as epistemic providers: Need for closure and the unfolding of group-centrism. Psychological Review, 113(1), 84–100.

Lee, S. et al. Educational Fever and Credentialism in South Korea. ERIC (ED665166).

Popper, K. (1959). The Logic of Scientific Discovery. London: Hutchinson.

Roets, A., Kruglanski, A. W., Kossowska, M., Pierro, A., & Hong, Y. (2015). The motivated gatekeeper of our minds: New directions in need for closure theory and research. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 52, 221–283.

Webber, D., Babush, M., Schori-Eyal, N. et al. (2018). The road to extremism: Field and experimental evidence that significance loss-induced need for closure fosters radicalization. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 114(2), 270–285.

“Why has the critical thinking movement not come to Korea?” Asia Pacific Education Review (Springer).

한국 교육과 선동의 정치

몇 일전 꽤 합리적인 토론을 하는 작가가 대통령을 공격했다. 내가 글을 논리적으로 쓴다고 해도 대통령의 일을 할 수 없는 것처럼 서로 다른 사람들이다. 브레인과 실천가의 대립이라고 하기에도 서로 다른 세상에 살고 있다. 내 성향으로는 열심히 일한다는 전제하에 실천가가 무조건 옳다.

 

정치와 관련해서는 한국에 고질라 아니 고질병이 있다. 한국인들은 주입식 교육과 경쟁적인 교육 때문에 선동에 취약하다. 그러다보니 정치인과 시민들이 정책에 몰입하기 보다는 국민들의 마음을 움직이기 위해서 노력하게 되는 불상사가 일어난다.

 

오늘은 인공지능과 토론을 시작할 때

 

1.편향적인 생각은 광기와 연결되는가?

2.미친 것과 미치지 않은 것의 차이는 무엇인가?

3.극우나 극좌는 둘 다 정신을 잃은 상태이므로 광기인가?

4.종교는 논리적인 타협이 불가능하기 때문에 광기로 변환되기 쉬운가?

등의 논제를 넣어보았다.

 

인공지능은 절대적인 철학과 상대적인 철학을 프레임으로 삼아 논리를 펴 나갔다. 극우나 극좌는 스펙트럼이 시대에 따라 변하기 쉽기 때문에 광기와 직접적으로 연결을 시킬 수 없다고 한다. 그리고 종교는 처음부터 논리안에서 움직이지 않음을 인정하기 때문에 속을 덜 썩인다고 한다. 그러나 이념 특히 과학적 사회주의(마르크시즘) 같은 이념은 합리성이라는 가면 속에서 만행을 부린다고 말한다. 사실 그렇다 똑똑한 인간이 미치면 세상이 난리가 나는 사실을 우리는 많이 보았다. 항상 합리성이란 도구를 내세워 강한 주장을 펴지만 실질은 미쳐있기 때문이다. 인공지능도 그런 종교보다 합리성의 탈을 쓴 이념이 더 큰 문제를 일으킨다고 말한다.

 

이래 저래 한국인들의 정신 세계가 이념과 종교로 불안한 이유는 이성적인 생각이 없이 선동에 저항하는 능력이 없기 때문이라고 한다. 그리고 그 이유는 주입식 교육과 경쟁적 교육 때문이라고 한다.

 

아무 생각 말고 무조건 인공지능을 믿자-이렇게 미쳐간다고 한다.

교육, 인식적 폐쇄, 그리고 정치적 광기

한국 사회의 이념·종교적 양극화에 관한 소고

이형춘

I. 서론

"정치적 광기"라는 표현은 일상적으로 널리 쓰이지만, 그 기준은 모호하다. 흔히 통용되는 직관 — 좌우 스펙트럼의 극단에 위치한 입장일수록 더 "미쳤다"는 가정 — 은 분석적으로 성립하기 어렵다. 노예제 폐지론처럼 당대에는 극단적이었으나 후대에 정당했던 입장이 있는 반면, 전체주의 체제 하의 "중도"가 실질적으로 침묵의 동조였던 사례도 있다. 따라서 스펙트럼상의 위치는 그 자체로 정신적 건강이나 진리값을 판별하는 기준이 될 수 없다. 본고는 위치가 아니라 사고의 작동 방식 — 특히 반증 가능성에 대한 태도와 인식적 폐쇄(epistemic closure)의 정도 — 가 더 신뢰할 수 있는 기준이라는 가설을 세우고, 이를 한국 사회의 교육 구조와 연결하여 검토한다.

II. 광기의 기준: 위치가 아니라 절차

Karl Popper는 어떤 이론이 반증 가능성(falsifiability)을 결여할 때 그것을 과학이 아니라 사이비과학으로 규정해야 한다고 주장했다. 이 기준은 정치적·이념적 신념 체계에도 유비적으로 적용할 수 있다. 어떤 입장이 제시되는 모든 반대 증거를 체계 내부로 흡수하여 오히려 그 체계를 강화하는 증거로 재해석한다면 — 이는 정치적 입장의 강도가 아니라 그 입장이 작동하는 인식적 구조의 문제다. 이런 의미에서 "정치적 광기"는 특정 이념적 내용이 아니라, 증거·반증·타자의 관점에 대한 개방성이 정지된 상태로 정의될 수 있다.

III. 심리적·신체적 기제

1. 인지적 종결 욕구(Need for Cognitive Closure)

Arie Kruglanski가 발전시킨 인지적 종결 욕구(NFC) 이론은 모호성을 견디지 못하고 빠르고 확정적인 답을 추구하는 동기적 성향을 설명한다. 연구에 따르면 NFC가 높은 개인은 경직된 신념 체계를 채택하고, 집단 규범에 순응하며, 권위주의적 지도력에 의존하는 경향을 보인다. 이는 좌우 이념을 가리지 않고 나타나는 성향으로, 흑백논리적 서사 — 선악, 옳고 그름의 이분법 — 에 특히 강하게 반응하는 것으로 보고된다. 또한 의미 상실(significance loss) 경험이 NFC를 자극하여 급진화(radicalization)로 이어진다는 실증 연구도 존재한다.

2. 권위주의적 인성

Theodor Adorno와 동료들의 1950년 연구 「권위주의적 인성」은 인습주의, 권위에 대한 복종, 권위주의적 공격성, 경직된 고정관념적 사고 등을 하나의 성격 구조로 묶어 분석했다. 이 연구가 남긴 가장 중요한 함의 중 하나는 교육적 처방이다 — 비판적 사고와 개방성, 다양한 관점에 대한 노출을 강조하는 교육이 권위주의적 경향을 완화할 수 있다는 것이다. 반대로 순응과 정답 암기를 강조하는 교육은 경직된 유형적 사고를 강화할 위험이 있다.

IV. 한국 교육의 구조적 특성과 선동 저항력

한국 교육은 학문적으로도 입시 위주의 경쟁 구조와 암기 중심 학습이라는 특징으로 거듭 지적되어 왔다. 비판적 사고(critical thinking) 교육 운동이 한국에 정착하지 못한 이유를 분석한 연구들은 교사 중심 수업과 시험 대비 암기가 구조적으로 고착되어 있음을 보여준다. 이는 단순히 학업 성취의 문제가 아니라, 학생들이 권위가 제시한 결론을 검증 없이 수용하는 습관을 체화하는 과정이라는 점에서 중요하다.

이러한 구조는 두 층위에서 작동한다고 볼 수 있다. 첫째, 토론 없는 일방적 교육은 학생에게 "결론이 먼저 주어지고 증거는 그것을 뒷받침하기 위해 동원된다"는 사고 습관을 내면화시켜, 성인이 되어 반증 불가능한 이념이나 음모론을 만났을 때 이를 검증할 인식적 근육을 갖추지 못하게 한다. 둘째, 만성적인 등수·서열 경쟁은 위협 인식을 상시화하여, 또래 집단을 적과 동맹으로 양분하는 이분법적 세계관을 강화하고, 이는 성인기의 정치적 양극화로 전이될 수 있다.

이 두 메커니즘이 결합하면, 검증 절차 없이 결론을 받아들이는 인지적 습관과 상시적 위협 속에서 사고하는 신체적 습관이 합쳐져, 이념적·종교적 선동에 대한 저항력이 현저히 약화된 개인을 만들어낼 수 있다. 이는 한국 사회에서 반복적으로 관찰되는 이념 대립의 격렬함과 종교적 파행 현상을 설명하는 하나의 구조적 가설로 제시할 수 있다.

V. 종교와 이념 — 광기로 이어지는 두 가지 경로

이 틀에서 보면 종교와 이념이 광기와 결합하는 경로는 서로 다르다. 일부 종교적 신념은 스스로를 "이성으로 검증할 영역 밖"이라 선언함으로써 논증 면제권을 명시적으로 주장한다. 반면 이념 — 특히 "과학적"이라는 수사를 동반하는 이념 — 은 반증 회피의 구조를 감춘 채로 작동한다. 결론이 먼저 정해지고 증거가 그 결론에 맞춰 거꾸로 채집되는 확증 편향의 제도화가 일어나지만, 행위자 자신은 스스로 합리적·과학적이라고 믿기 때문에 그 자신도 광기를 인지하지 못한다. 이런 의미에서 "과학을 사칭하는" 이념적 사고는 스스로 비합리성을 선언하는 종교적 신앙보다 오히려 더 위험할 수 있다 — 단, 이 위험은 특정 진영의 이념에만 국한되지 않고, 반증을 회피하기 위해 "필연", "법칙"과 같은 수사를 동원하는 모든 정치적 입장에 동일하게 적용되어야 한다.

VI. 결론 및 제언

정치적 광기는 좌우의 위치가 아니라 인식적 절차의 정지 상태로 정의하는 것이 더 일관되고 통시적으로 적용 가능한 기준이다. 한국 사회에서 반복되는 이념적·종교적 파행은 토론 없는 일방적 교육과 만성적 경쟁 구조가 결합하여 시민들의 반증 검증 능력과 인식적 개방성을 약화시킨 결과로 이해할 수 있다. 이는 기존에 제기되어 온 credentialism과 지도자 통치 실패 분석과도 같은 뿌리에서 나온 두 증상으로 연결된다 — 위에서는 사고 없이 자격증만 쌓은 엘리트를, 아래에서는 검증 없이 선동에 휩쓸리는 대중을 동시에 생산하는 교육 시스템이다. 따라서 교육 개혁의 방향은 단순한 입시 제도 개편을 넘어, 토론과 반증의 경험을 체화시키는 교육 철학으로 전환하는 데 있어야 한다.

참고문헌

Adorno, T. W., Frenkel-Brunswik, E., Levinson, D. J., & Sanford, R. N. (1950). The Authoritarian Personality. New York: Harper & Row.

Choi, J., & Rhee, S. (2013) 외; 한국 비판적 사고 교육 관련 선행 연구 — Asia Pacific Education Review에 수록된 "Why has the critical thinking movement not come to Korea?" 논의 참조.

Kruglanski, A. W., Szumowska, E., Kopetz, C., Vallerand, R. J., & Pierro, A. (2021). On the psychology of extremism: How motivational imbalance breeds intemperance. Psychological Review, 128(2), 264.

Kruglanski, A. W., Pierro, A., Mannetti, L., & DeGrada, E. (2006). Groups as epistemic providers: Need for closure and the unfolding of group-centrism. Psychological Review, 113(1), 84–100.

Lee, S. 외. Educational Fever and Credentialism in South Korea. ERIC (ED665166).

Popper, K. (1959). The Logic of Scientific Discovery. London: Hutchinson.

Roets, A., Kruglanski, A. W., Kossowska, M., Pierro, A., & Hong, Y. (2015). The motivated gatekeeper of our minds: New directions in need for closure theory and research. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 52, 221–283.

Webber, D., Babush, M., Schori-Eyal, N. et al. (2018). The road to extremism: Field and experimental evidence that significance loss-induced need for closure fosters radicalization. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 114(2), 270–285.

 

 

The world of war / the weakening of buffers

Everyone thinks that the United States will not stand still when China is showing off its muscles. China has a misunderstanding of global power. We forget that we live in an era where not only economic and military power, but also cultural and cooperative leadership are more important. I thought China was very classical and conservative. China still thinks that it can use its own domestic market and large population as a last resort without external cooperation. -지대물박(地大物博) All Things in Prolific Abundance -

 

I thought the world could be divided into China and other countries at a time when China's conflict-based worldview was far more serious. However, the United States was also motivated to use China as an excuse to enter the hegemonic competition and wage more aggressive wars. Originally, the founding ideology of the United States was not actively involved in external wars, but the oath has long been broken. Unfortunately, the world is losing hope because the United States withdrew from the United Nations, which served as a buffer, and the world met this rubble. 

- If you think about it, a World War is reserved, would a small citizen like me be happy to live? I had a hard time because of the war in my parents' era. However, bizarre and strange leaders appeared in Korea and the world and wanted to do something bizarre called war. -.

 

These days, I still remember the past whenever I walk by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs building. I regretted for 40 years that I had refused a letter of recommendation from my department assistant to me because I had not studied English to study for the bar exam. I was also a bizarre person. However, I feel sorry for the situation in which the United Nations is becoming increasingly powerless as the United States, a pacifist and money supplier, has left.

 

 

The Erosion of the Buffer: A Critical Note on the Collapse of Conflict-Absorbing Institutions in the Age of Multipolar Hegemonic Rivalry

이형춘(Lee Hyeong-chun)

2026년6월

Abstract

This essay analyzes the present crisis of international order as a four-stage chain: China's hegemonic challenge, the United States' reactive hardening under security-dilemma dynamics, the erosion of America's non-interventionist tradition, and the loss of institutional buffers as multilateral bodies are abandoned. Its central claim is that even granting the realist premise that conflict is the default state of international politics, the postwar order's stability rested not on the absence of conflict but on institutional buffers (UN, WTO, IMF) that absorbed conflict to a manageable level. The ongoing 2026 US-Iran war and the U.S. withdrawal from multilateral bodies are presented as evidence that these buffers are rapidly weakening.

I. Introduction: Framing the Problem

The realist tradition in international relations treats anarchy as the default condition of relations among states, with cooperation arising as a secondary product layered atop that default rather than as an end in itself. Yet the eighty years without a great-power total war since the end of the Second World War constitute important empirical evidence of how the variable of cooperation has operated atop the constant of conflict. This essay frames that cooperative mechanism through the concept of an institutional 'buffer,' and traces the simultaneous weakening of those buffers as of 2026.

The chain this essay traces runs as follows. First, China under the Xi Jinping leadership abandoned the 'hide your strength, bide your time' (taoguang yanghui) doctrine and began mobilizing a hegemonic legitimacy narrative rooted in Sinocentric thought. Second, the American response followed the classic pattern of a security dilemma, hardening reactively. Third, that hardening spilled into the Middle East, producing the 2026 US-Iran war and a break from the non-interventionist tradition dating to the American founding. Fourth, in the same period the United States withdrew from a series of UN-affiliated multilateral bodies, contracting the very institutional buffer that had long absorbed international conflict.

II. China's Hegemonic Challenge: The Political Mobilization of Sinocentrism

China's hegemonic challenge can be diagnosed as resting on an overconfidence in 'vast territory, abundant resources' (didao wubo). Reducing this to an essential cultural flaw, however, risks an Orientalist essentialism. A more precise diagnosis is that a latent, constant hierarchical worldview embedded in Sinocentric thought was politically mobilized by the specific agent Xi Jinping. As the Northeast Project (2002-2007) illustrates, attempts to preemptively construct historical legitimacy over border regions were relatively restrained under Hu Jintao, only to resurface under Xi (from 2012) through the Belt and Road Initiative, 'wolf warrior diplomacy,' and the militarization of the South China Sea.

Notably, Xi has borrowed Mao's techniques of statecraft while simultaneously restoring the Confucian tradition and the Sinocentric legitimacy narrative that Mao himself had destroyed during the Cultural Revolution — an asymmetric combination. Slogans such as the 'Chinese Dream' and the 'great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation' are not Maoist in origin but the culmination of a neo-Confucian turn that began under Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao.

III. The Security Dilemma and America's Reactive Hardening

Security dilemma theory holds that one state's defensive measures are read by a rival as offensive intent, producing an arms race that neither side desired. China has interpreted the Obama administration's 'pivot to Asia' as containment, and has likewise reinterpreted the post-2017 Indo-Pacific strategy, the Quad, AUKUS, and semiconductor export controls as containment. Because Xi's hardening (from 2012) preceded the American hardening (from 2017) in chronological terms, the diagnosis that China's behavioral shift was the initial trigger of the security dilemma carries analytical weight.

This diagnosis, however, rests on chronological sequence rather than normative judgment, and remains contestable, since China can counter-argue that the Obama pivot itself constituted prior containment.

IV. The Break from Non-Interventionism: The 2026 US-Iran War

The diplomatic principle of the American founding generation was non-interventionism, rooted in Washington's Farewell Address and the Monroe Doctrine. This principle had already been bent repeatedly through twentieth-century Wilsonian liberal interventionism and Cold War containment, yet the 2026 episode carries a distinct character: it is not merely historical recurrence but a direct contradiction of the current administration's own 'America First' pledge of non-intervention.

On February 28, 2026, the United States and Israel launched a surprise strike on Iran without a declaration of war, citing support for anti-government protesters and the prevention of nuclear weapons development. The strike killed Supreme Leader Khamenei and much of Iran's senior leadership; the Iranian Red Crescent estimated more than 600 civilian deaths. Iran retaliated by blockading the Strait of Hormuz and striking U.S. bases in the region, and the war spread across West Asia through the Israel-Hezbollah front and statements of position from Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Even after an April ceasefire, direct strikes resumed on June 7, prompting assessments that President Trump had 'lost control' of the conflict; a ceasefire agreement was reached on June 19, though the prior collapse of the April truce makes its durability uncertain.

Notably, the roughly 90-day deadline under the War Powers Resolution embroiled the administration's exercise of commander-in-chief authority in constitutional controversy — evidence that the break from non-interventionism is straining not only executive policy choices but the constitutional check mechanism itself.

V. The Loss of the Buffer: Withdrawal from Multilateral Bodies and the Weakening of the UN System

On January 7, 2026, the Trump administration signed a presidential memorandum directing withdrawal from 66 bodies and agreements — 31 UN-affiliated organizations and 35 non-UN international bodies — including the World Health Organization, UNESCO, the UN Human Rights Council, UNFPA, the ILO, and the UNFCCC. The White House stated that many of these bodies pursue 'radical agendas' contrary to American sovereignty and economic competitiveness. This stance directly contradicts the United States' position as a permanent Security Council member and the largest financial contributor, bearing 22 percent of the UN regular budget and 26.15 percent of the peacekeeping budget.

Legally, the United States has not withdrawn from the UN itself, and retains its Security Council seat. Yet as the UN Secretary-General's office has noted, the U.S. paid none of its regular budget assessment the previous year, leaving arrears of roughly $1.5 billion — a de facto non-fulfillment of its legal obligations under the UN Charter. Given that the UN's founding purpose in 1945 was precisely to institutionalize collective security and prevent the recurrence of war, this withdrawal and non-payment sit at the exact point where America's rationale of 'restoring sovereignty' collides with the international community's concern over the 'hollowing out of the conflict-absorbing apparatus.'

The central diagnosis of this essay is that the conflict intensification described in Sections III and IV — the US-China security dilemma and the US-Iran war — is occurring in precisely the same period as the weakening of the very institution (the UN system) that should be buffering that conflict. If one accepts the liberal-institutionalist insight that the eighty-year absence of great-power total war reflected not the disappearance of conflict but the presence of a buffer, then the simultaneous weakening of buffers across multiple fronts creates conditions under which conflict can more easily cross a critical threshold.

VI. Conclusion: From a Third-Party Vantage Point

Taking a third-party vantage point that does not unilaterally vindicate any single camp's legitimacy, this essay has redefined the present crisis not as the emergence of conflict but as the simultaneous erosion of the institutional buffers that have long absorbed it. China's mobilization of Sinocentric hegemonic legitimacy, America's reactive hardening under the security dilemma, the break from the non-interventionist tradition, and withdrawal from multilateral institutions should be read not as discrete events but as a single structural chain. The practical implication of this diagnosis is that the task ahead must move beyond apportioning 'blame' to one side or another, toward the question of how the weakening buffer institutions might be rebuilt.

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