The end of the Cold War era has not brought greater security to the world community. Although the likelihood of a global strategic nuclear war has been reduced significantly, we have already witnessed the impact of other challenges to international peace. The Gulf War raised the spectre of expanding regional conflicts adopting the means and methods of the previous superpower confrontation. The disintegration of the Horn of Africa, the Civil War in the Balkans, and the resurgence of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia all reveal the continuing power of historic ethnic, religious, and national rivalries, and the seeming inability of the international community to deal effectively with these tragedies. Weapons technologies, modern telecommunications and transportation, demographic changes and resource imbalances, and the globalization of production together raise enormous challenges as we move into the 21st century. Are the international institutions with which we have lived since the end of the Second World War up to the task? This book addresses many of these basic and profound issues.
