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His internal and external initiatives – ranging from the effort to overturn the election in the past to recent incursions and warnings – undermine not only domestic and international law. However, the issue goes deeper.

They endanger the core idea of a civilized world.

A ethical foundation of civilized society is to prevent the dominant from harming and taking advantage of the less powerful. Otherwise, we risk being locked in a state of nature where might makes right prevails.

This ideal is central of America’s founding documents. It is equally the core of the postwar international order supported by the America, emphasizing international cooperation, democracy, fundamental freedoms, and the legal authority.

Yet, it is a vulnerable principle, frequently ignored by those who choose to misuse their power. Maintaining it requires that the influential have the moral fortitude to refrain from seeking temporary advantages, and that society ensure they answer for their actions if they don't.

Unfettered might does not make right. It leads to uncertainty, disruption, and conflict.

Whenever individuals, companies, or nations that are wealthier and stronger prey upon those that are less so, the fabric of society frays. If these actions are left unchecked, the system fails. If not stopped, the world can fall into instability and violence. It has happened before.

Our current reality is a international landscape grown vastly more unequal. Political and economic power are more concentrated than in recent memory. This creates conditions for the elite to exploit the disadvantaged because they perceive themselves as above the law.

The wealth of a handful of ultra-wealthy individuals is almost beyond comprehension. The reach of global industrial giants extends over much of the globe. Artificial intelligence is likely to further concentrate economic and political clout even more. The destructive power of the leading countries is without parallel in the annals of time.

Supported by political allies and an accommodating high court, the presidency has been turned into the most powerful and unaccountable agent of the state in recent memory.

Consider this confluence and you see the danger.

An unbroken thread connects earlier breaches of norms to current menaces. Both were based on the arrogance of omnipotence.

There is parallel dynamics in the actions of other powers: in military conflicts, in coercive diplomacy, and in the rampant monopolization by industrial titans.

However, strength without restraint does not make right. It produces uncertainty, upended order, and bloodshed.

The lessons of the past reveal that frameworks designed to constrain the influential also shield them. Absent these limits, their insatiable demands for more power and wealth in time cause their collapse – along with their enterprises, countries, or domains. And threaten global conflict.

This blatant contempt for legal order will plague international stability – and the very idea of a rules-based order – for the foreseeable future.