Development

While the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have drained American
resources, the unrest in the Middle East might herald the beginning of
a transformative period, one in which semiperipheral nations either
replace the existing core states or increase their number by becoming
core states themselves.

History demonstrates that global conflicts often prefigure the
evolution of the international system. The failure of the Concert of
Europe resulted in the First World War, which in turn culminated in
the Treaty of Versailles and the League of Nations. The fundamental
flaws within the peace treaty rendered the League of Nations impotent
in the face of the rising tide of fascism during the 1930s that
inspired the horrors of the Second World War.

From the devastation of World War II arose the United Nations with the
Bretton Woods monetary system. The resistance toward concerted efforts
at restructuring both the UN Security Council and the global economic
consensus and trade regime as sustained by the International Monetary
Fund and the World Trade Organization serves as a concrete
representation of the latent conflict between the "global north" and
the "global south." Within the Security Council in particular, the
"permanent five" aim to maintain the status quo in order to prolong
their ability to assert and implement their interests, possibly at the
expense of developing nations.

The "world system" however, as it was described by sociologist
Immanuel Wallerstein (1930), may not be static but dynamic instead to
the extent that the classification of various states as core,
peripheral or semiperipheral can evolve over time. Modern day examples
include Brazil, India and South Africa which are rising to the status
of core power. China, it may well be argued, has already achieved that
status.

Economist Ricardo Hausmann (2001), argued that the sustainable
development of the peripheral states of the “global south” is dependent upon their ability to overcome the natural barriers imposed by their geography.
If Hausmann is correct then the continued growth of the “global south” requires the
investment and involvement of the developed nations in the “global north”