It is easy to celebrate the return of Asia, the rise of the Global South, and the resurgence of the Non-Aligned nations of the world. It is harder to chart a course for these countries and regions to strategise the way forward for them.
The Global South, to be sure, has never been stronger than before. The present moment is rife with many possibilities. The US and its allies have effectively lost the moral high ground, though some would correctly argue that it never held that high ground in the first place.
South Africa’s intervention in the ongoing genocide in Gaza is an example of the immense potential of Global Southernism: the trial was launched at the behest, not of China or Russia or any of those countries that have a major issue with the US-led Western alliance, but of a state that had no rivalry or issue with that alliance.
As a foreign policy analyst in Sri Lanka, I welcome these developments unreservedly. We need not beat too much around the bush over them. The future is in Asia and Asia is returning. History is never linear: it curves and detours, it returns to where it began, then veers off course and meanders.
Clearly, the Global South is on course for a comeback. However you may view this, it is a positive development, for the world and the poor nations of the world. Sri Lanka has much to benefit from this, and it should.
Challenges for the Global South
But the Global South cannot rise on its own. Nor can it rise without addressing the inherent, internal, and systemic challenges it confronts on a daily basis.
Five challenges, in particular, need to be addressed immediately.
The first is political. This is an election year, arguably the most crucial election year in recent history. Several of the world’s most populous countries, including Sri Lanka and Russia, are going to the polls. Depending on the political systems which are in place in these countries, they will return – if they already have not – the incumbent. Yet there are cases where the incumbent will be defied and overturned. We are seeing that in Pakistan, where the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party won a resounding victory despite Imran Khan’s incarceration.
The second is economic. The UK has joined a long waiting list of countries that have entered a recession. Much of the Global South is reeling from the fallout that followed Covid-19. With disruptions to supply chains and the prospect of a perpetual war in the Middle East, Asia and Africa are going to have a tough time.
The fundamental contradiction here is between the heterodox policies these countries followed during the Covid period – in Sri Lanka, to give one example, with tax cuts and price controls – and the orthodox neoliberal policies being imposed on them as a prerequisite for debt restructuring. Those policies have generated, and are generating, populist backlashes from people.
The third is geopolitical. Contrary to what many think, we are not seeing an erosion of the West-led rules-based order that has been in operation since at least 1945. What we are seeing now is a period of transition, from the unipolar hegemony of the West to a multipolar order that will find its pivot in Asia.
Amidst these developments, different countries are pursuing different interests, leading to multiple alliances and rivalries. The rules-based order itself is not going to go away anytime soon, but the West no longer dominates it; the Global South does. South Africa is the most powerful example of that.
The fourth is cultural-civilisational. The rules-based order was, and is, associated with a set of values which have long been considered as Western. This version or vision of things, however, is fast fading away. Such a view of the world, though touted as universal, has been criticised as white and Eurocentric. That is what comes out when Hillary Clinton tweets in dismay at Margot Robbie not getting an Oscar nomination for ‘Barbie,’ but fails to notice or acknowledge the hundreds of women and girls suffering in Gaza.
The fifth is intellectual. Nationalist groups in countries like Sri Lanka often couple their criticism of the West with criticisms of what they see as Western knowledge and Western hegemony of knowledge. This line was best articulated by the likes of Nalin de Silva and Gunadasa Amarasekara.
In itself, it is not inaccurate: it is the proverbial West that has, for decades if not centuries, dominated discussions on issues like economic development and dominated the media. As Edward Said observes in ‘Orientalism,’ such a critique can be applied even to radical thinkers like Karl Marx. Yet recent developments, including the Israel-Palestine war, show that the West’s domination no longer holds.
These are developments the Global South will have to contend with – not eventually, but now, the immediate present. Optimistic as many are about its prospects over the next decade, there are still issues that remain to be addressed and resolved.
Forging internal unity
Perhaps the most urgent of these is the issue of internal unity. The West held it for so long because, despite occasional squabbles – of which France’s spat with the US over AUKUS is the best example – it is fundamentally of the same opinion, though as Europe’s and the US’ shifts on Gaza show, even this unity is eroding.
For the Global South, specifically Asia, Africa, and Latin and Central America, to hold the moral and political ground, it is not enough to call out the West’s hypocrisy. There must be real, tangible unity on the ground, there must be a countering of perceptions that the Global South is pitted against the West because it receives aid and support from the West’s geopolitical rivals, in particular China and Russia.
More than anything, though, there must be a consensus on what the Global South entails, what its values are, and how, despite differing views on issues like the Red Sea, this part of the world can sustain some sort of continuity on broader concerns.
When asked what he thought of Western civilisation, Gandhi is reported to have replied: “I think it would be a good idea.” I believe the Global South is an even better idea: perhaps the best and most progressive we can have in the present world system. But it cannot remain just an idea; it should transform into a living, tangible reality. We need to get out of the past. The only way out of the past is to embrace a new future. The Global South embodies that future. All it needs to do now is to reconcile itself to it.
(The writer is the Chief International Relations Analyst at Factum, an Asia-Pacific focused foreign policy think tank based in Colombo and accessible via www.factum.lk. He can be reached at uditha@factum.lk)