Why Marco Rubio Is Bringing the Clash of Civilizations Back: When Propaganda Is Dressed Up as a Civilizational Crusade

Marco Rubio’s Athens speech presented American global dominance as the noble defence of Western civilization, but behind the historical scenery lies a cruder political order — restore Western supremacy and make Europe follow Washington.

But remove the theatrical scenery and the message becomes remarkably crude. Rubio declared that the West must maintain its place “at the head of the world” and celebrated the “unapologetic pursuit of national power” under Donald Trump. This was not principally a philosophical reflection on civilization, history or shared values. It was a political argument for restoring American-led Western dominance.

The irony is that Rubio appears to believe that dressing an imperial ambition in the language of civilization makes it intellectually sophisticated. It does not. His speech revived an old geopolitical strategy: portray the interests of a dominant power as the universal interests of an entire civilization, then present resistance to that dominance as a threat to its culture, values and historical survival.

The question is not whether Western societies possess important intellectual, scientific and cultural traditions. Of course, they do. The question is why these achievements should entitle Washington to lead the world indefinitely—and why other societies should accept a subordinate position.

The Imperial Ambition Behind the Civilizational Rhetoric

Rubio’s speech belongs to a familiar tradition of geopolitical thinking associated with Samuel Huntington’s The Clash of Civilizations, although he had academic sophistication in his arguments – Rubio, none. In the post-Cold War era, Huntington argued that cultural and civilizational identities would become major sources of international conflict. The Trump administration is reviving this framework, presenting Western Christendom as a political bloc threatened by China, Russia and the Muslim world.

Yet, Rubio’s own language exposes the real objective. He warned that the West risked losing its position at the head of the world and called for renewed national power. The concern is not simply that Western traditions might disappear. It is that Western governments – Rubio has above all the United States in mind — might lose their ability to determine international outcomes.

There is a considerable difference between defending cultural heritage and defending geopolitical supremacy. The former is a legitimate objective for any society. The latter is a claim to power that other countries have every right to challenge.

China’s economic and technological rise, Russia’s resistance to Western strategic pressure, and the growing international ambitions of countries such as India, Pakistan, Turkey, Iran, Brazil, South Africa, and Indonesia reflect a world in which power is distributed less exclusively than before. These developments do not automatically constitute an assault on Western civilization. They challenge the assumption that Washington and its allies should remain the principal architects of the international order.

Rubio’s civilizational narrative turns that challenge into an existential struggle, bringing in Christianity to justify a supposedly moral superiority of the West. Economic competition, disputes over resources, access to markets and technological rivalry become secondary to an alleged confrontation between........

© New Eastern Outlook