Resilience, Influence, and Agency: How Small States Navigate a Fragmented World
Gezim Vllasi argues that small states can preserve autonomy and influence by investing in resilience, diversified partnerships, and networked cooperation in an increasingly fragmented global order.
Small states are operating in an increasingly fragmented international system, where institutional predictability is eroding under intensifying great-power competition. Traditional reliance on multilateral frameworks no longer guarantees security, prosperity, or autonomy. As Mark Carney has warned, “it seems that every day we're reminded that we live in an era of great power rivalry,” signalling the return of power politics as a structuring force in global governance. Similarly, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has argued that ideas can only be implemented if states learn to speak the language of power politics.
For small states, these observations carry particular significance. They underline a structural reality in which formal rules still exist, but enforcement is uneven and influence increasingly flows through leverage rather than rules. The key challenge is how small states can maintain autonomy and influence while remaining exposed to coercive pressures embedded in asymmetric interdependence.
In a world marked by persistent fragmentation, compliance alone no longer ensures strategic autonomy. Maintaining agency now requires flexibility, diversification, and the use of complementary channels of influence. Small states must therefore reassess how autonomy, resilience, and influence are generated under these conditions. Three interlinked approaches are particularly relevant: recognizing structural constraints and reclaiming agency, building resilience as the basis of autonomy, and exercising influence through cooperative and institutional engagement.
Fragmentation and the Limits of Institutional Protection
The international environment confronting small states today is not merely in transition but is fragmenting into a dense web of overlapping institutions, coalitions and initiatives. Intensifying great-power competition, the weaponisation of economic interdependence, and pressure on multilateral institutions are reshaping the geopolitical landscape of the 21st century.
For small states, these dynamics have concrete implications. Adherence to international rules and participation in alliances no longer reliably guarantee protection, market access, or political leverage. The principal risk today lies less in rule-breaking than in structural dependence, particularly in areas such as energy, finance, and critical supply chains.
Under these conditions, the strategic question is no longer how to maximise protection through existing institutional arrangements, but how to preserve autonomy in an environment of prolonged uncertainty. Acknowledging the limits of institutional protection is therefore a prerequisite for effective policy responses. This recognition has encouraged governance innovation, including flexible coalitions and issue-specific cooperation, which allow small states to advance their interests while remaining committed to multilateral engagement.
Reclaiming Agency under Conditions of Power Asymmetry
A core challenge for small states lies in the persistence of institutional compliance despite declining protective capacity. Agency now requires a realistic assessment of power asymmetries, structural vulnerabilities, and dependencies embedded in economic, technology, and security.
This does not imply confrontation or withdrawal from multilateralism. Rather, small states must weigh the hidden costs of passivity. A state may remain fully compliant with international norms while remaining dependent on a single supplier for energy, food, or critical minerals that leaves it vulnerable to coercion. Recent disruptions in energy markets, supply chains, and digital governance illustrate that formal compliance cannot substitute for resilience and diversification.
Why Resilience Determines Autonomy
For small states, autonomy in a fragmented world depends on the ability to manage vulnerability, not simply to rely on external guarantees. Small states face limited resources and exposure to external shocks making resilience essential to survival and policy flexibility.
Resilience is not synonymous with self-sufficiency. It is about reducing exposure to single points of failure and building redundancy where possible. Integration into global networks can itself become a source of leverage for others. The theory of weaponized interdependence shows how control of key economic and technological networks can be used coercively, highlighting the strategic importance of diversification and infrastructure resilience.
Partnerships play a crucial role in strengthening. Regional cooperation frameworks allow states to pool resources, infrastructure, and expertise, strengthening collective responses to systemic risks. Nordic and Baltic cooperation on total defence and societal resilience illustrates how small states can enhance security collectively while remaining open and internationally engaged.
Crucially, resilience enhances small states’ capacity to uphold commitments on issues such as human rights, climate security, and international law. Domestic capacity translates into freedom of manoeuvre abroad, reinforcing the role of small states as stabilizing actors in contested international spaces.
Exercising Influence Through Cooperation
In a fragmented system, influence flows through networks rather than hierarchy. Small states rarely have the scale to project hard power but can exert influence through coalition-building, agenda-setting, and norm entrepreneurship. Diplomatic experience, credibility, and institutional positioning allow smaller states to “punch above their weight.”
Small states have often demonstrated an ability to shape outcomes in areas such as cyber governance, climate-related security, and emerging technologies, where regulatory frameworks and norms remain under development. Small states have shaped policy outcomes through participation in UN ‘groups of friends,’ climate diplomacy platforms, and emerging technology coalitions. By contributing expertise and convening stakeholders, they influence rulemaking and agenda-setting even without material power. Such engagement illustrates that cooperative, network-based influence is a practical instrument of policy, not theoretical abstraction.
Through these roles, small states contribute to coordination across institutions and policy communities, helping to stabilize areas of contested global governance and support collective action. Influence is exercised not through coercion, but through sustained engagement and cooperative capacity.
Conclusion
Acknowledging structural realities, investing in resilience, and exercising networked influence form a roadmap for small states seeking autonomy in a fragmented world. Agency favors anticipation over reaction, diversification over dependence, and cooperation over isolation.
As geopolitical and technological competition intensifies, small states that embed resilience, diversify partnerships, and actively engage in cooperative governance will be better positioned to anticipate risks, shape outcomes, and sustain credible influence in the international arena.
By translating these principles into context-specific policies, small states can adapt to fragmentation while remaining autonomous, credible, and effective. Strengthening resilience, maintaining principled engagement, and contributing to cooperative governance allow small states to play a constructive role in sustaining international stability, even under conditions of persistent disruption.
Dr. Gezim Vllasi serves as a Programme Officer in the Global Fellowship Initiative and Creative Spark at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy (GCSP) in Geneva, Switzerland.
Photo by Pixabay
