When The Spectator asked me whether I would write an essay on ‘Why we need to strengthen the West’, I was delighted – and bemused. Why is this even up for debate? That we must explain and justify ‘the West’ at all indicates just how weak it has become. It would be better if it did not need strengthening at all but the truth is that the West has become an invalid.

What exactly, though, needs to be strengthened? The West is an idea, not a location. It is not a matter of geography, it is a way of life. The idea of the West rests on four pillars: Athens – where democracy was born. Rome – the cradle of the rule of law. Jerusalem – where Judeo-Christian values placed the inviolable dignity of the individual at the centre. And finally, the Enlightenment – whose great thinkers in London, Paris and Königsberg anchored humanism, individual civil liberties, the separation of powers and the division of church and state.

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Herodotus observed a phenomenon after the fall of the Peisistratid tyranny which remains the most vital lesson in political philosophy to this day. The Athenians, he noted, had fought no better than their neighbours as long as they were ruled by tyrants. Yet the moment they threw off the yoke of tyranny, every individual was motivated to give his utmost, proving decisively stronger and more successful in battle. Why? Because he was now working for himself, not for a master. In that single observation Herodotus formulated the timeless argument in favour of self-determination and liberty – the core idea of the West.

This idea also shapes a view of humanity articulated by Immanuel Kant. Man is not perfect. Kant famously wrote that ‘out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made’. In the western mind, the implication is: nor should it ever be.

Freedom’s most important word is ‘no’. Dissent is self-determination. It is liberating to say: ‘No, I see it differently.’ With ‘no’, the freedom to think and act begins. The freedom to say ‘no’ stands in stark contrast to the unfreedom of having to say ‘yes’. Democracies are no-saying societies, while dictatorships are yes-saying. Liberty is inherently critical of authority: it permits and encourages contradiction – precisely that which autocrats cannot abide. That is why dictators wish to weaken the West. And it begins, as so often, with words.

The word ‘West’ has become suspect and has long been cancelled in politically correct circles. The mandated terms in geopolitical discourse are now the ‘Global South’ and the ‘Global North’. For those using the phrase ‘Global South’, linking the West to colonial guilt is no accident – it is the very purpose of the narrative. UN Secretary-General António Guterres put it bluntly in 2020: ‘The Global North, specifically my own continent of Europe, imposed colonial rule on much of the Global South for centuries, through violence and coercion.’

There are growing indications that China is actively fuelling AI-sceptical sentiment across western social media

There are growing indications that China is actively fuelling AI-sceptical sentiment across western social media

The goal is to weaken the idea of the West through the association with guilt. Yet this new terminology is intellectually absurd. It possesses neither moral nor geographical logic: what does China have in common with Peru, Qatar with Haiti or Thailand with Sierra Leone? Where is the common denominator regarding human rights and the rule of law?

As a community of ideas, however, vastly different nations such as Japan, Singapore, New Zealand, the United States or those of Europe can readily identify with the concept of the West.

Yet in academia, ‘cancelling the West’ has become mainstream. Entire movements (‘epistemologies of the South’, ‘decolonising sociology’) rest on the claim that........

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