With the end of the Cold War, the world order has arrived at a new crossroads. The United Nations system, which was related to the needs of the immediate post-Second World War period and the then three major issues of detente, decolonization and development, is ripe for radical restructuring. Such restructuring must take account of the emerging New World Order, characterized by the move away from the nation-State as the basic building block and the aspiration for peaceful conflict resolution, political democratization and economic liberalization on a world scale. More importantly, it must also take account of the question of sub-Saharan Africa’s economic marginalization. The ever-widening gap between the poor and the rich of the world is ultimately more explosive than the ideological world divide. What is at stake is not just a conditional structural adjustment programme as directed by the World Bank and the IMF, but short and medium-term adjustment with an eye to long-term transformation. Ref.
