Global Governance and Conflict Prevention

Abstract

In order to analyse something as apparently diverse and unmanageable as that which has come to be known as the anti-globalisation movement (hereafter, AGM) it is necessary to make some initial clarification. In this chapter my intention is to focus on that part of the AGM that is seen as being concerned, broadly speaking, with issues of social justice. In short, those groups who have sought to carry on the mantle of progressive social change that has marked earlier internationalist movements such as liberalism and socialism. I make this distinction precisely because to be ‘anti-globalisation’ is potentially to be aligned with groups that possess radically contradictory agendas. Thus I distinguish those concerned with social justice from what I would classify as the self-consciously reactionary wing of the AGM. By this I mean those groups that have sought to oppose globalisation and global governance on the belief that it is a threat to their nation or, more pointedly perhaps, their race. For example, the by now well known US white militia movement have a general critique of global governance and the new world order that places them firmly in the AGM camp (Ronson, 2001). However, there are two crucial differences between the reactionary and the progressive AGMs: first, the former base their critique upon a need to preserve a form of political separatism.KeywordsSocial JusticeSocial MovementGlobal GovernanceWorld OrderNorth American Free Trade AgreementThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.