They look at the variety of national responses to the new problems and at international initiatives. Particular attention is given to the growing role and specific position of women in the various economic sectors. For scholars and policymakers alike, the wide range of issues analysed, the unparalleled scope of regional and country experiences examined, and the policy implications explored, make this two-volume study of utmost and timely importance. In this collection, globalization and multilateralism are linked to questions of epistemology, ontology and strategy. Epistemology entails critical questioning of the nature of knowledge and its foundations.
Ontology concerns the significant factors in global political economy.
A critical stragety involves how to move world affairs from its present condition towards the promotion of our collective ability to channel structural change in a more democratic direction. With this framework in mind, the purpose of this book is to examine the political economy context for consideration of a range of cultural and civilizational possibilities on our planet. Illegitimate in the eyes of most people in the world, a failure in the eyes of yet others, the United Nations cannot possibly meet the challenges of the twenty-first century unless it is significantly reformed. But the history of UN reform is dismal and there seems little likelihood that the pattern will change. Thus less traditional forms of multilateralism are looked toward to cope effectively with the consequences of current global structural changes, especially the polarization of rich and poor and the fragmenting and weakening of political authorities.