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?” ...