Welcome to the age of Transaction Realism, where democracy has a price tag, climate targets have an escape clause, and international solidarity lasts precisely until somebody discovers a cheaper barrel of oil. The grand language of Western foreign policy is being stripped of its expensive packaging, revealing the familiar machinery underneath: money, resources, leverage and the eternal political fear of voters paying too much at the petrol station.
Apparently, principles are wonderful things, provided they do not interfere with business. For years, Western governments presented sanctions as instruments of moral and strategic pressure against aggression, authoritarianism and violations of international law. They promised that economic consequences would make hostile governments reconsider their behaviour. Then energy markets became unstable, domestic prices climbed, and suddenly yesterday's untouchable adversaries became tomorrow's potential suppliers.
The United States' move to accommodate Russian diesel shipments while its war against Iran has disrupted energy markets captures the contradiction perfectly. Washington can declare Moscow a strategic adversary in the morning and explore commercial opportunities with it in the afternoon. Somewhere between the presidential announcement and the next fuel delivery, geopolitical morality apparently requires a small administrative adjustment.
This is not diplomacy with a conscience. It is diplomacy with a calculator. Of course, governments have a responsibility to keep energy affordable, protect industrial production and prevent economic shocks from devastating ordinary households. Nobody can heat a home with a declaration of democratic solidarity. No truck driver can fill a tank with international law, and no struggling family should be expected to finance an endless succession of geopolitical mistakes without asking questions.
But acknowledging economic reality is not the same as surrendering every strategic principle whenever the market becomes uncomfortable. That distinction is disappearing. The climate crisis provides another spectacular example of this political double bookkeeping. Governments promise decarbonisation, announce ambitious targets and congratulate themselves on their environmental leadership. Then an energy emergency arrives, and fossil fuels are suddenly indispensable, drilling becomes patriotic, and long-term climate obligations are pushed into the cupboard beside the Christmas decorations.
The problem is not that emergency measures are sometimes necessary. The problem is that emergencies increasingly become excuses for avoiding the structural changes that would make societies less vulnerable in the first place.
Energy independence cannot be achieved simply by changing the flag on the tanker. Replacing dependence on one authoritarian supplier with dependence on another powerful supplier is not independence; it is rearranging the furniture in the same burning house.
Renewable energy, storage, interconnected electricity grids, efficiency and diversified supply are not merely environmental luxuries. They are instruments of strategic autonomy. Every country that reduces its exposure to volatile fossil-fuel markets acquires a little more freedom to make foreign-policy decisions without looking nervously at the next oil-price announcement.
Yet political leaders often prefer the immediate spectacle of a deal to the slower, less glamorous work of building resilience. Transaction Realism thrives on this short-termism. It measures success in contracts signed, shipments secured, tariffs imposed and investment figures announced. It asks whether a transaction benefits the national balance sheet today, but rarely whether it creates a dangerous dependency tomorrow.
The same logic threatens international alliances. If cooperation is reduced to a sequence of commercial exchanges, allies become customers, adversaries become potential business partners, and security guarantees begin to resemble subscription services whose conditions can change without notice.
For smaller countries, this is particularly dangerous. They cannot always match the economic or military leverage of superpowers. Their protection depends partly on predictable rules, functioning institutions and the expectation that agreements mean something beyond the immediate interests of whoever occupies the presidential palace.
When great powers treat commitments as disposable, the resulting uncertainty spreads far beyond the original dispute. International law faces a similar problem. Treaties cannot eliminate power politics, and no serious observer should pretend that states have ever pursued foreign policy through pure altruism. But rules provide a framework within which competing interests can be managed without every disagreement becoming a contest of economic or military coercion.
If commercial convenience consistently overrides those rules, the strongest states acquire greater freedom while weaker states inherit greater insecurity. That is not a new international order. It is an old hierarchy wearing a modern business suit. The next decade will certainly be shaped by energy security, critical minerals, supply chains, artificial intelligence and competition for technological dominance. Trade agreements and resource partnerships will influence geopolitical relationships. But the conclusion should not be that democratic values are obsolete or that international law has become an expensive historical curiosity.
Pragmatism should help governments defend their interests without destroying the foundations of cooperation. It should identify sustainable alternatives, strengthen alliances and make economic pressure more effective. It should not become a sophisticated vocabulary for explaining why yesterday's promises no longer apply.
The real test of Western leadership is not whether it can negotiate a profitable deal with an adversary. It is whether it can do so without sacrificing the security of its allies, abandoning its climate commitments or turning international law into a rulebook reserved for weaker countries. Because when everything becomes transactional, eventually everything has a price, including trust. And once trust becomes just another commodity, the bill for its replacement can be considerably higher than the price of oil.
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