More broadly, for many people globalization has come to mean greater vulnerability to unfamiliar and unpredictable forces that can bring on economic instability and social dislocation, sometimes at lightning speed. There is mounting anxiety that the integrity of cultures and the sovereignty of States may be at stake. Thus, instead of leaving billions of people behind in squalor, we have somehow to give the global economy a solid foundation in shared values and institutional practices, so that as well as creating bigger markets it advances broader and more inclusive social purposes. The second issue is the persistence of conflict. The end of the cold war has not opened an era of perfect peace and harmony.
Conflicts continue in many parts of the world but mainly in developing countries.
Most of them today are internal conflicts, although the recent one between Ethiopia and Eritrea reminds us not to be complacent about the danger of renewed war between States, as well. But whatever their nature, the conflicts have a disastrous impact on the development prospects not only of the countries directly involved but of the entire surrounding region. This problem is particularly acute today in Africa, where many millions of lives and livelihoods have been destroyed in conflicts over the past few decades. Nothing is more inimical to economic growth, or more certain to perpetuate poverty. Nearly 22 million people have died of AIDS since the epidemic started in the late 1970s.