Careful what you wish for

Many in what is now called the Global South — a catchall term for the developing world

- MIHIR S SHARMA

Many in what is now called the Global South — a catchall term for the developing world, excluding the People’s Republic of China — have multiple complaints about the so-called rule-based order that came into being after the Second World War.

This, they worry, institutionalised and rendered permanent a hierarchy of nations that emerged from the colonial era. They had other concerns about it that were frequently aired — that it covered a multitude of hypocrisies on behalf of the West, that it did not centre development and it minimised the needs of poorer countries.

Some of these voices reacted to the intentions and instincts of United States (US) President Donald Trump with poorly concealed jubilation. If nothing else, he had exposed hypocrisies that were earlier kept hidden. At worst, he might destroy a global order which was biased against the developing world. In actual fact, some argued, he was hardly different from those who came before him: After all, the senior President Bush captured Manuel Noreiga of Panama, his son invaded Iraq, and both Democratic Presidents that followed the Bushes regularly sent bombing raids into countries they deemed untrustworthy, from Sudan to Pakistan.