The New World Order and the Islamic World

Abstract

During a triumphant speech before the Congress on September 11, 1990, President Bush announced that the pursuit of a “new world order” would be an objective of American foreign policy. The speech’s tone and emphasis marked a new phase in international politics, for only a few months earlier the United States and the Soviet Union, former Cold War foes, had demonstrated an unprecedented level of cooperation to eject Iraq- a former Soviet client-from Kuwait. In that speech, Bush stated that The crisis in the Persian Gulf, as grave as it is, also offers a rare opportunity to move toward an historic period of cooperation. Out of these troubled times, our fifth objective - a new world ordercan emerge: a new era-freer from the threat of terror, stronger in the pursuit of justice, and more secure in the quest for peace. An era in which the nations of the world, East and West, North and South, can prosper and live in harmony (Freedman 1991, 195). The idea of a new world order, as it appears, entails and conveys the collapse of the old system and the emergence of another, different one. This paper is concerned with identifying and analyzing the premises of this new world order. How different are they from the tenets of the “old” order? Or more precisely, to use the Economist’s words: “What is new? Which world? And whose order?” (Economist, February 23, 1991, 25-26). What are the agendas of this order and to what extent do they reflect the interests of the Third World? How will this new order affect the Islamic world, the Third World, or ”the residents of the South?” ...