ABSTRACT
Diplomacy will have to adjust to the changes in the global system. It will have to adapt its tools to these changed circumstances. But as a prerequisite for such a changeover, it will have to scrutinize the worldview that underlies and informs its work. The failure to adapt theoretical concepts underlying diplomacy would turn world order back to one in which states and societies lived isolated from another. Diplomatic action based on a theory that is no longer fitting would make for a political reversal into a past, these theories still reflect. Both economic interdependence and international cooperation had intensified in the latter half of the 19th century. The outbreak of World War I showed that such optimism was premature. The United States took the lead in these efforts and supported them though their own example as a benevolent hegemon.
