In today’s world, an increasing number of “countries” exist only as a map, a flag, and a seat at the United Nations. While they still nominally meet the four fundamental criteria of nationhood under international law, i.e., defined territory, permanent population, effective government, and sovereignty, their political “nationhood” has all but vanished.

In Somalia, the central government in Mogadishu controls less than 20% of the country’s territory, while the rest is governed by Puntland, Somaliland, Al-Qaeda affiliates, and the Islamic Courts Union, each levying taxes, issuing identity cards, and operating courts. In Haiti, by 2025, over 80% of the capital Port-au-Prince is under the control of more than 200 gangs; police stations have been burned down, the president assassinated, and the elite fleeing in panic, leaving the state a hollow shell. In Lebanon, daily electricity in 2025 barely exceeds two hours, with public services such as power generation, water supply, and waste management fully privatized. In Khartoum, Sudan, the city is now divided between two governments, with the Rapid Support Forces and the regular army each controlling half, and even traffic lights left unrepaired. In Nepal, the recent Gen Z uprising saw the parliament and administrative centers burned down, leaving young people massively unemployed, overseas remittances halted, and both public security and services paralyzed.

These countries once possessed full-fledged nationhood at certain points in their history, but today all have experienced varying degrees of functional collapse, leaving governments that are largely symbolic. In fact, as the world shifts toward deglobalization, this trend of "denationization" is accelerating.

What is driving this clear trend? The most important factor is deglobalization, which fundamentally reshapes the global structure of interests and networks of influence, causing the external supports that once sustained nationhood in some countries to vanish. The impact and shock of deglobalization have been severely underestimated, and this underestimation is a major reason for the current state of the world.

In the era of globalization, the economic growth, fiscal revenue, and social stability of weaker nations have been highly dependent on external interests. Global market demand has sustained the export-oriented economies of many countries. Multinational capital has brought investment and employment; demand for commodities has maintained the fiscal lifeline of resource-dependent nations; and multilateral aid systems have patched the governance deficits of weaker nations. These external benefits have objectively enabled many countries to function normally, thereby sustaining their nationhood. However, as deglobalization reshapes the international economic system, declining external demand, the friend-shoring and localization of supply chains lead to the withdrawal of foreign investment, multinational companies begin to concentrate production internally, multilateral financing and aid contract, creating fiscal gaps, and the fragmentation of the global trade system makes it increasingly difficult for these countries to remain integrated into global value chains. The disappearance of these external supports severely weakens the economic foundations of nations, ultimately rendering them incapable of functioning properly.

When a nation’s economic capacity and political authority are weakened, conflicts surge across the board. Tensions that had been temporarily suppressed during the era of globalization by external resources and a stable world order reemerge. Sectarian strife, ethnic fragmentation, regionalism, and militia forces begin to grow, while resource plundering and political resistance increasingly dominate internal dynamics. Weak nations can no longer contain violence, local powers rise rapidly, and national-level authority fragments into multiple self-contained but mutually uncooperative centers of power.

In the case of Libya, after 2020, disruptions in supply chains and a global oil price collapse caused the country’s oil revenue as a share of GDP to plunge from about 50% in 2019 to 9.24%, with overall fiscal revenue dropping roughly 40% compared to 2019. Under this fiscal pressure, the Libyan National Army, led by Khalifa Haftar in the east, seized the opportunity to expand, while external powers such as Turkey and Egypt intervened through proxies. This solidified a tripartite power structure, with resource plundering driving the reorganization of authority. In Yemen, by 2025, a 62% decline in economic aid and ongoing blockades left the Houthi forces effectively in control of the northern core areas, sectarian confrontations intensified, and oil smuggling escalated, turning large numbers of unemployed youth into expanding militias. In the eastern mining regions of the Democratic Republic of Congo, the economy has long relied on foreign investment, including Chinese infrastructure loans. When foreign capital sharply declined, local tensions escalated. Recently, the M23 armed group captured Goma and Bukavu, and resource plundering directly affected Chinese mining enterprises, resulting in dozens of Chinese workers being attacked.

At the same time, deglobalization has further eroded the stability of the international system. During the era of globalization, multilateral frameworks such as the WTO ensured predictability in the trade system, major powers were still subject to certain rules, and international organizations provided public goods and a safety net for order. While this structure was far from perfect, it objectively suppressed internal conflicts and helped many fragile nations maintain nominal integrity. With major powers now shifting toward competitive multilateralism, these once-functioning multilateral frameworks have effectively become hollow.

According to WTO forecasts, the global trade-to-GDP ratio is expected to fall to 53% in 2025, a decline of 4% from its 2019 peak. An IMF report notes that geopolitical fragmentation has created a USD 150 billion aid gap for developing countries, undermining the provision of multilateral public goods. Since the WTO Appellate Body was paralyzed in 2019, only eight new disputes have been initiated in 2025, a sharp drop of 79% compared with 2018, with member participation falling by 30%. Meanwhile, the suspension of the U.S. contribution, which accounts for 11% of the WTO budget, has triggered a chain reaction.

Major powers have also become less willing to bear the responsibility of rebuilding other countries. According to OECD data, in 2015, UN peacekeeping forces numbered over 100,000, with annual aid exceeding USD 200 billion, of which the U.S. contributed about 25%, funding reconstruction projects in countries such as Afghanistan and Somalia. At that time, major powers were still quite willing to engage in reconstruction, and China provided substantial infrastructure loans to other countries through the Belt and Road Initiative. After 2020, under the wave of deglobalization, this framework sharply deteriorated. By 2025, the Trump 2.0 administration, pursuing the America First policy, cut USD 60 billion in aid through executive orders, forcing thousands of UN projects to shut down.

Deglobalization has not only led to a re-differentiation, redistribution, and restructuring of the global economy and trade, but has also caused a structural loosening of the “nation” as a unit of modern politics. In the deglobalization era, the collapse of global interest structures has weakened the economic foundations of fragile states. The weakening of state functions then fuels internal conflict, while the dysfunction of the international order and the tendency of great powers to “look only after their own doorstep” render external repair mechanisms ineffective. These three layers reinforce one another, forming a broader trend of “denationization”. In this sense, the deglobalization era is evolving into an era of denationization, where the nominal nation still exists, but nationhood itself is eroding; the formal power structure remains, though its functions have been fragmented; the international system persists, but it no longer retains the capacity to integrate or repair.

This is a profound omen of the epochal risks facing the future world. When the era of deglobalization comes to an end, our world will be far different from the "nations" we know today or have known in the past; a multitude of new nations will inevitably emerge amid bloodshed.

Final analysis conclusion:

Deglobalization has not only reshaped the global economic landscape but also redefined the “nation” as the fundamental unit of modern political organization. The withdrawal of external benefits has weakened the nation’s capacity, leading to a resurgence of internal conflicts, while the fragmentation of the international order and the erosion of great-power responsibility have made external repair mechanisms unsustainable. In this process, the nation has gradually shifted from being a unified governing entity to a fragmented collection of power centers. “Nationhood,” as a political organizational capacity rather than a nominal label, is in decline. It can be said that the era of deglobalization is an era of “denationization”, where the original meaning of the nation has become less relevant, and new centers of power are the ones that hold true significance.