This article is written by yours truly. I'm a historian by study and have been thinking more and more about civilizational politics. I'm willing to bet this is going to be a big mover of geopolitics in the next decade onward.
With the ongoing 'rise of the rest,' we're living in a time of great narrative-building by rising powers who want a seat at the table. Although I'm not a subscriber to the 'clash of civilizations' thesis by Huntington at all, I do think that civilizational narratives are potent justifications for spheres of influence. They are so malleable and vague, thus making them valuable chips for geopolitics.
With globalization as we knew it waning, there have been efforts to repackage the nation-state order into looser blocs justified by culture. Many people take liberal universalism for granted, but I believe cultural particularism could potentially become the dominant form of international relations. Alliances are already forming on these grounds. It's arguably the single biggest obstacle to Fukuyama's "End of History" thesis.
In this piece, I first open with some background on 'civilizational theories of history' and why they were initially a fad. I then profile four states who are now leveraging such narratives to project power abroad.
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Interesting post - the four examples are an extremely useful and valuable update for people who haven't been paying attention to important countries that don't get adequately covered in US media.
One area where I think you need to be more careful if you are trying to attempt an analysis is the distinction between a clash of civilisations and a clash between civilisation and barbarism. The post-2001 "war" on Salafi jihadi groups including Al-Quaeda, ISIS and Boko Haram was widely billed as a clash between Western and Islamic civilisations, but the jihadis turned out to be barbarians, and civilised Muslims recognised this and ended up playing a key role in the struggle against them.
Vlad the Gasman may claim that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is a move in a civilisational conflict between Rossiya and the West (he may even honestly believe this), but the masses on both sides are treating the war like a barbarian invasion of a civilised country. The only thing motivating Russian troops to fight is the prospect of rape and plunder, and when the rape and plunder dries up we see a rush for the exits. And Russophones in eastern Ukraine have notably failed to rally to the Russian cause in the way we would expect if this was a civilisational conflict.
The case which would be an unambiguous clash of civilisation vs civilisation is a conflict between the West and China. Although this is getting more likely, it is obvious that neither side wants even a cold war, heaven forfend a hot one.
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