Tectonic Shifts Signal the End of the Colonial Era

On Saturday, Sept. 9 — the opening day of the G20 summit in India, shortly after the BRICS summit in South Africa, and amidst the growing danger of a new world war — the Schiller Institute, with the support of E.I.R., will hold an international online conference titled “Let Us Join Hands with the Global Majority to Create a New Chapter in World History!”. What is at stake in the current strategic situation is outlined in the invitation to that event:

“The world is presently undergoing changes, changes which occur only once in a thousand years: The age of colonialism, which began in the 16th Century, and has lasted almost 600 years, is coming to an end. The countries of the Global South, which represent by far the majority of mankind, are shedding the remnants of colonial suppression, as it still exists in the form of international control over their resources, unfair conditions of trade, and financial subjugation and looting by the City of London and Wall Street. The countries of the Global South are asserting their right to process these resources and produce value-added goods as a means of becoming middle-income societies in the foreseeable future through high-technology industrialization. Lyndon LaRouche, for decades, specified the needed concepts and policies in physical economy to expedite that transition.

“It can be expected that the summit of the BRICS countries, to take place Aug. 22-24, will reflect the tectonic shift going on [cf. below and SAS 32/23]. Twenty-three countries have applied formally for membership in this organization and more than twenty informally. Rather than regarding this process as a threat to the West, the nations of Europe and even the U.S. should take up the offer of cooperation. If the countries of the Global North go forward with their stated intent to ‘decouple’ or ‘de-risk’ from China, which is the largest trading partner of many countries of the Global South, this will be especially devastating for the economies of Europe, which are already in the process of deindustrialization. Even more fundamentally, if the West sticks to a policy of geopolitical confrontation with Russia and China, and tries to maintain a unipolar world by creating a Global NATO, the present conflicts around Ukraine now and soon Taiwan, could escalate into a third, this time thermonuclear world war.

“The fact that the old order has failed to solve the problems of poverty, hunger, and the underdevelopment of billions of people in the developing countries, is demonstrated by the horrendous migrant crisis, where thousands and thousands of desperate people are assembling on national borders — be it between the U.S. and Mexico, or along the Mediterranean, which has already become a mass grave. Instead of resorting to cruel and inhumane methods to keep the human beings out, we should join hands with China and other emerging countries to help the countries of the Global South industrialize. There is no need for rivalry; there is so much for everyone to do to meet the existential needs of people now suffering.

“Which way we decide to go, will in all likelihood determine if we end up in a world war resulting in the annihilation of the human species, or if we keep our humanity and open a new, more beautiful chapter in the history of mankind.”

A preliminary program for the conference will be available soon on the Schiller Institute website. You can register for the conference and receive access to a simultaneous translation in French, German and Spanish at the same address.