The Star Late Edition

COVID-19 AND THE EMERGING WORLD ORDER

- OLUWASEUN TELLA Tella is a senior researcher at the Institute for the Future of Knowledge at the University of Johannesbu­rg

THE recent outbreak of Covid-19 and the great powers’ actions and inactions have ignited debates on the post-pandemic world order.

In a bid to assess the direction of the emerging world order in the postCovid-19 period, the University of Johannesbu­rg’s Institute for the future of Knowledge (IFK), in collaborat­ion with the Johannesbu­rg Institute for Advanced Studies (JIAS), organised a webinar titled “Covid-19 and the Emerging World Order” on May 20.

The event was facilitate­d by Professor Alex Broadbent, director, IFK.

The four key speakers were Dr David Masondo, Deputy Minister of Finance; Grant Harris, former adviser of ex-US president Barack Obama on issues related to sub-Saharan Africa; Professor Dong Wang, executive director, Institute for Global Co-operation and Understand­ing (IGCU), Peking University, Beijing, China; and myself.

Engaging the topic from an American perspectiv­e, Harris noted that it was too early to determine the structure of the world order in the postCovid-19 period, as the current power dynamics are still fluid.

He added that given the current political turmoil in the US, the emerging world order will be determined by the countries that are able to exercise global leadership to mobilise other states to combat the disease.

Harris highlighte­d the US and China’s blunders in their efforts to combat the pandemic, pointing to China’s cover-up and slow response in the initial stages and the US’s slow, reactive and unilateral response.

Professor Wang presented a Chinese perspectiv­e and argued that the fight against Covid-19 should not be a zero-sum game.

He called for a global response to combat the pandemic.

Contrary to Harris’ position, Professor Wang argued for “striking a balance between science and politics”.

Three crises have respective­ly punctured the US’s global image

My contributi­on examined the implicatio­ns of the emerging world order for Africa. I stated that the lone superpower (the US) in the immediate period following the Cold War lost its status following the three major crises it has experience­d in the past two decades, the global backlash resulting from the 2003 war on terrorism, the 2007/08 financial crisis and the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

In my opinion, these crises have respective­ly punctured the US’s global image, economic strength and capacity for disaster management.

It is against this backdrop that it was argued that Africa needs to begin to imagine a world without superpower­s; one with a number of great and middle powers.

Thus, beyond their relations with China and the US, African states should establish and maintain strategic and economic relations with key actors like India, Germany, Brazil, Canada and Iran.

I predicted Covid-19 would lead to a retreat from globalisat­ion, especially at the global level, and thus advocated that Africa should look inward and strengthen regional integratio­n.

Dr Masondo explored the impact of the emerging post-Covid world order on South Africa. He noted growing concern around the rise of economic nationalis­m.

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