New BRICS Bank a Building Block of Alternative World Order

In 1990, right after the Berlin Wall fell, NPQ published our Spring edition, titled “The New World Disorder,” about the nationalistic chaos and up‐in‐theair sensibility of that fraught new historical moment. Nearly a quarter of a century later, the regime of globalization that had supplanted the Cold War world of blocs is itself coming apart at the seams. Even Henry Kissinger these days says “the world order is crumbling.” Will this New World Disorder 2.0 revert to a system of conflicting blocs, as during the Cold War, or will we be mature enough to save the interdependence of plural identities that is the foundation of a new global civilization? In this section our contributors offer their perspectives on what the future holds.     

Against Growth Market Pessimism

The great story of the last decade has been the “rise of the rest”—emerging economies such as China, Brazil, Turkey and India—to a position rivaling that of the established, advanced economies. As the aftershocks of the financial crisis of 2008–2009 continue to ripple through the global system, will the rising rest stay or track or be derailed? Some of the world's top economists examine this question in the following section.     

Here Comes the Second World

American‐led globalization has enabled the third great powershift of the last five hundred years—the “rise of the rest” following on the rise of the West and then the rise of the US as the dominant power in the West. When China, India, Brazil, Turkey and the rest sit at the table of global power with the West what will the world order look like? Will it be post‐American? Will it be culturally non‐Western, but play by the same rules of an open international order laid down by the American's after World War II? In the following pages, leading American and Asian intellectuals ponder these questions.