The space race is back on, but the terms of the contest have changed. Unlike the first moonshot, which played out in groundbreaking scientific and technological feats by the two superpowers, this one is more about who gets to set the rules in space. Winning this race requires not only technological know-how but also the ability to attract other countries to a particular vision of space governance. If the United States is to successfully shape the global rules in outer space, it will need to start by recognizing that it cannot unilaterally impose the terms.
The Era of Rival Space Blocs?
At first glance, the United States looks to be the early winner in the new space race. Twenty-nine countries have signed on to the Artemis Accords, a set of principles introduced by NATO and the State Department for nations and private companies operating on the moon. The accords are part of the wider Artemis Program, led by NASA, which aims to establish a lunar base by the end of the decade. The accords themselves mainly reaffirm existing space norms, establishing that the “extraction of space resources does not inherently constitute national appropriation under Article II of the Outer Space Treaty.” Through Artemis, Washington seeks to ensure that global space governance reflects U.S. national interests and democratic values. In the words of the Biden administration’s Strategic Framework for Space Diplomacy, the United States “will compete where necessary against countries that seek to impose a different view of outer space governance.”
At the same time, Beijing is signing up countries to its own rival space initiative. In April 2023, China opened its future lunar base to other countries and established the International Lunar Research Station Cooperation Organization (ILRSCO) to coordinate multinational participation. The China-led project similarly seeks to establish a base on moon—also targeting the southern pole—but currently lacks a set of competing principles like the Artemis Accords. As an alternative to the US-led initiative, however, China’s International Lunar Research Station has only managed to sign up a handful of countries. As a head-to-head matchup, the new space race is a blowout for Team America.
Multi-Alignment in Space
But appearances can be deceptive. What looks like rival space blocs vying for supremacy is more complex than it seems. Rather than bloc-based competition, the current landscape is a mix of overlapping—but not exclusive—partnerships between some 70 national space and international agencies, inter-agency organizations, and private companies. Even traditional U.S. allies and partners like France and Brazil—both signatories of the Artemis Accords—have continued to collaborate with China on various space ventures. Today, many countries prefer diversified space partnerships, continuing to work with not only the United States and China but also rapidly expanding their cooperative ties with each other.
Space operations in many ways necessitate wide collaboration as they are capital intensive and technologically advanced. Funding major space projects is significantly easier when countries distribute component development. This model has led to partnerships that go against prevailing narratives about closed-off economic or ideological blocs. For example, China has an active partnership with the European Space Agency (ESA) that goes back more than 25 years. While European astronauts will not travel to China’s space station as originally planned, there continues to be joint work done on a major satellite program, with the ESA even allowing China to use its facilities to conduct tests.
It is not just the established space powers collaborating with one another. China has a variety of projects with national space agencies in Africa, largely focused on satellite launches. The incentives for both sides are clear: African states gain access to advanced space capabilities, and China gains additional access to satellite launch sites and advances its Belt and Road Initiative. But many of those same African states are also collaborating with the ESA and NASA. Take South Africa. Even though the country has a partnership with NASA to conduct lunar exploration, it has also signed an agreement with Beijing to join China’s lunar base project. These simultaneous collaborations with both the United States and China are merely a means to an end, as the country seeks to develop the space capabilities it needs to address pressing socioeconomic issues, from climate change and environmental monitoring to internet access and economic growth.
As important, countries are also building cooperative networks with each other. To date, for example, India has signed space cooperation agreements with 61 countries and five multilateral organizations. Such cooperation has grown not only wider but deeper, expanding into new areas, like human spaceflight and space situational awareness with France, and lunar exploration, satellite navigation, and earth observation with Japan. Similarly, Israel and the United Arab Emirates have launched a series of joint space ventures, while other countries have opted to pool their financial, technical, and human resources into new regional space agencies, including the African Space Agency and the Latin American and Caribbean Space Agency. There is also now talk of the BRICS+ and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations playing a greater role in the space domain. These developments suggest that the trend is toward multi-alignment in space, casting doubt on the popular notion of a world dividing into opposing space blocs.
Thoughtful Governance is Needed
If the United States wants to shape the rules of the road in space, it will need to come to terms with this reality. So far, it has pursued a bloc-based strategy to space governance that emphasizes U.S. values and leadership, but this “with us or against us” approach is poorly suited to today’s multipolar space environment. Recognizing that all of humankind has widely shared interests in space, the United States should build off the wide range of collaborative relationships on space issues to pursue an equitable and inclusive space governance system. Such a system would avoid attempting to bifurcate states based on their purported values and instead would frame space as a domain open to all, but requiring careful shared management to enable scientific and commercial exploits.
The Multi-Aligned in Orbital Space
By Evan Cooper • Kelly A. Grieco
Grand Strategy
Everything old is new again. Over fifty years ago, Cold War rivalry between the United States and Soviet Union started a race to the moon—a race the United States won on July 21, 1969, when Neil Armstrong stepped foot on the lunar surface. Today, strategic rivalry with China has the United States racing once again to the moon. “It is a fact: We’re in a space race,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson confirmed earlier this year, warning Beijing could try to claim the moon—and its resources—as its own territory.
The space race is back on, but the terms of the contest have changed. Unlike the first moonshot, which played out in groundbreaking scientific and technological feats by the two superpowers, this one is more about who gets to set the rules in space. Winning this race requires not only technological know-how but also the ability to attract other countries to a particular vision of space governance. If the United States is to successfully shape the global rules in outer space, it will need to start by recognizing that it cannot unilaterally impose the terms.
The Era of Rival Space Blocs?
At first glance, the United States looks to be the early winner in the new space race. Twenty-nine countries have signed on to the Artemis Accords, a set of principles introduced by NATO and the State Department for nations and private companies operating on the moon. The accords are part of the wider Artemis Program, led by NASA, which aims to establish a lunar base by the end of the decade. The accords themselves mainly reaffirm existing space norms, establishing that the “extraction of space resources does not inherently constitute national appropriation under Article II of the Outer Space Treaty.” Through Artemis, Washington seeks to ensure that global space governance reflects U.S. national interests and democratic values. In the words of the Biden administration’s Strategic Framework for Space Diplomacy, the United States “will compete where necessary against countries that seek to impose a different view of outer space governance.”
At the same time, Beijing is signing up countries to its own rival space initiative. In April 2023, China opened its future lunar base to other countries and established the International Lunar Research Station Cooperation Organization (ILRSCO) to coordinate multinational participation. The China-led project similarly seeks to establish a base on moon—also targeting the southern pole—but currently lacks a set of competing principles like the Artemis Accords. As an alternative to the US-led initiative, however, China’s International Lunar Research Station has only managed to sign up a handful of countries. As a head-to-head matchup, the new space race is a blowout for Team America.
Multi-Alignment in Space
But appearances can be deceptive. What looks like rival space blocs vying for supremacy is more complex than it seems. Rather than bloc-based competition, the current landscape is a mix of overlapping—but not exclusive—partnerships between some 70 national space and international agencies, inter-agency organizations, and private companies. Even traditional U.S. allies and partners like France and Brazil—both signatories of the Artemis Accords—have continued to collaborate with China on various space ventures. Today, many countries prefer diversified space partnerships, continuing to work with not only the United States and China but also rapidly expanding their cooperative ties with each other.
Space operations in many ways necessitate wide collaboration as they are capital intensive and technologically advanced. Funding major space projects is significantly easier when countries distribute component development. This model has led to partnerships that go against prevailing narratives about closed-off economic or ideological blocs. For example, China has an active partnership with the European Space Agency (ESA) that goes back more than 25 years. While European astronauts will not travel to China’s space station as originally planned, there continues to be joint work done on a major satellite program, with the ESA even allowing China to use its facilities to conduct tests.
It is not just the established space powers collaborating with one another. China has a variety of projects with national space agencies in Africa, largely focused on satellite launches. The incentives for both sides are clear: African states gain access to advanced space capabilities, and China gains additional access to satellite launch sites and advances its Belt and Road Initiative. But many of those same African states are also collaborating with the ESA and NASA. Take South Africa. Even though the country has a partnership with NASA to conduct lunar exploration, it has also signed an agreement with Beijing to join China’s lunar base project. These simultaneous collaborations with both the United States and China are merely a means to an end, as the country seeks to develop the space capabilities it needs to address pressing socioeconomic issues, from climate change and environmental monitoring to internet access and economic growth.
As important, countries are also building cooperative networks with each other. To date, for example, India has signed space cooperation agreements with 61 countries and five multilateral organizations. Such cooperation has grown not only wider but deeper, expanding into new areas, like human spaceflight and space situational awareness with France, and lunar exploration, satellite navigation, and earth observation with Japan. Similarly, Israel and the United Arab Emirates have launched a series of joint space ventures, while other countries have opted to pool their financial, technical, and human resources into new regional space agencies, including the African Space Agency and the Latin American and Caribbean Space Agency. There is also now talk of the BRICS+ and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations playing a greater role in the space domain. These developments suggest that the trend is toward multi-alignment in space, casting doubt on the popular notion of a world dividing into opposing space blocs.
Thoughtful Governance is Needed
If the United States wants to shape the rules of the road in space, it will need to come to terms with this reality. So far, it has pursued a bloc-based strategy to space governance that emphasizes U.S. values and leadership, but this “with us or against us” approach is poorly suited to today’s multipolar space environment. Recognizing that all of humankind has widely shared interests in space, the United States should build off the wide range of collaborative relationships on space issues to pursue an equitable and inclusive space governance system. Such a system would avoid attempting to bifurcate states based on their purported values and instead would frame space as a domain open to all, but requiring careful shared management to enable scientific and commercial exploits.
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