New Forces, Old Forces, and the Future of World Politics

Book excerpt: This is an argument for reform of the traditional norms and structures of international relations. Brown's argument in this book, maintains that world politics is in a crisis of incongruence between the world's traditional structure of governance (the nation-state system) and the most important interactions of people. Symptoms of this systematic crisis include: the epidemic of violent inter-ethnic conflicts; secessionist and self-determination movements; waves of international terrorism; contraband in weapons and drugs and ecological threats to the health of living organisms. This text's analysis probes beneath the surface of these events to determine their underlying causes and to find new policies and institutions conducive to a more safe and just world order.