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By Hillary Rodham Clinton September 4 at 3:00 PM

Hillary Rodham Clinton was the 67th secretary of state.

When Americans look around the world today, we see one crisis after another. Russian aggression in Ukraine, extremism and chaos in Iraq and Syria, a deadly epidemic in West Africa, escalating territorial tensions in the East and South China seas, a global economy that still isnt producing enough growth or shared prosperity the liberal international order that the United States has worked for generations to build and defend seems to be under pressure from every quarter. Its no wonder so many Americans express uncertainty and even fear about our role and our future in the world.

In his new book, World Order, Henry Kissinger explains the historic scope of this challenge. His analysis, despite some differences over specific policies, largely fits with the broad strategy behind the Obama administrations effort over the past six years to build a global architecture of security and cooperation for the 21st century.

During the Cold War, Americas bipartisan commitment to protecting and expanding a community of nations devoted to freedom, market economies and cooperation eventually proved successful for us and the world. Kissingers summary of that vision sounds pertinent today: an inexorably expanding cooperative order of states observing common rules and norms, embracing liberal economic systems, forswearing territorial conquest, respecting national sovereignty, and adopting participatory and democratic systems of governance.

This system, advanced by U.S. military and diplomatic power and our alliances with like-minded nations, helped us defeat fascism and communism and brought enormous benefits to Americans and billions of others. Nonetheless, many people around the world today especially millions of young people dont know these success stories, so it becomes our responsibility to show as well as tell what American leadership looks like.

This is especially important at a time when many are wondering, as Kissinger puts it, Are we facing a period in which forces beyond the restraints of any order determine the future?

For me, this is a familiar question. When I walked into the State Department in January 2009, everyone knew that it was a time of dizzying changes, but no one could agree on what they all meant. Would the economic crisis bring new forms of cooperation or a return to protectionism and discord? Would new technologies do more to help citizens hold leaders accountable or to help dictators keep tabs on dissidents? Would rising powers such as China, India and Brazil become global problem-solvers or global spoilers? Would the emerging influence of non-state actors be defined more by the threats from terrorist networks and criminal cartels, or by the contributions of courageous NGOs? Would growing global interdependence bring a new sense of solidarity or new sources of strife?

President Obama explained the overarching challenge we faced in his Nobel lecture in December 2009. After World War II, he said, America led the world in constructing an architecture to keep the peace. ... And yet, a decade into a new century, this old architecture is buckling under the weight of new threats.

I was proud to help the president begin reimagining and reinforcing the global order to meet the demands of an increasingly interdependent age. In the presidents first term, we laid the foundation, from repaired alliances to updated international institutions to decisive action on challenges such as Irans nuclear program and the threat from Osama bin Laden.

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Hillary Clinton reviews Henry Kissingers World Order