Inchoate Aspirations for World Order Change

InchoateAspirations for World Order Change I Tariq ~ s r n a n Hyder I w h a t is the significance of the Special Session?What are the various parties likely to call for?What should their strategy be? What will this event lead to? These are the obvious questions that come to mind. Since the Southern countries, in particular, the nonaligned , have been the prime movers behind this Special Session, this essay will briefly tackle these questions from essentially a Southern point of view. The history of what passes for disarmament, particularly since World War 11, clearly shows that the institutional framework, the goals set, the driving premises , the modalities of negotiation and the instruments arrived at, are the products of superpower interaction. Of course, this situation reflects the postwar domination of the world in political, economic, and military terms by the superpowers and their allies. However, changes in the world order partially caused by the addition of independent developing countries, the emergence of China, the Vietnam conflict, and the growing economic/political significance of oil, have led correspondingly to shifts in the procedure and substance of nearly all multinational negotiations. Despite at times divergent interests, the Southern world (imbued with a sense of ”us” and “them” principally using the mechanism of the Group of 77) has increasingly tried to harmonize a position on many political, social and economic issues. This harmonization, at first dismissed as rhetoric, originally focused on decolonization and international economics. But no matter how distasteful this process has been to the developed countries, it has led to a recognition of goals that differ substantially from the status quo characterized by great power dominance. It is generally recognized that the current platform of the Southern world will continue to be the demand for a New International EconomicOrder. The developed world has grudgingly come to the view that whatever the merits of this demand and the chances of its realization, the NIEO will provide the main arena for interaction , be it by dialogue or confrontation, between the developed and the developing world. Events since the United Nation’s 6th Special Session’s call for the NIEO have shown that in fact Southern demands have remained inchoate in implementation though not in formulation. Simply put, the South lacks the political and economic Tariq Osman Hyder is a Director in the Pakistan Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He is currently on leave of absence as a Research Fellow, Harvard Law School, and as an Honorary Research Fellow at the Program for Science and lnternational Affairs, Harvard University. The views expressed are his own and not necessarily those of his government. 56 World Order Change [ 57 leverage to get what it wants. To some extent this is due to a lack of internal cohesiveness ; however, North-South differentials in power are the primary reasons. The next logical field to tackle in the world order matrix is that of "disarmament "-to Southern ears a term used euphemistically to reflect power and its potential . It is within this context that the UNSSOD must be viewed. The field of disarmament has been in a sense unique since it has not reflected the shifts in power between the developed and developing worlds. This is largely understandable since disarmament negotiations have revolved around nuclear and other issues outside the immediate purview of most developing countries. In part, the Southern world has only itself to blame for this state of affairs. Primary consideration has always been given to economic matters. There are few militarily significant Southern states and fewer still seriously study the global impact of disarmament negotiations. The superpowers have used a salami cutting approach in these negotiations. Priority is given to purely bilateral negotiations, and those matters which require universal participation are generally agreed to before being presented one by one in the Conference of the Committee on Disarmament (CCD) to a disorganized Southern world. Take, for instance, the biological weapons convention. These weapons were not included in any Southern arsenal but they do represent the cheapest and by now most effective countervailing weapons option available to the developing countries. The primary task for Southern strategists is to postulate a credible and attainable field theory...