Tibi Blasts 'New World Order'

President Bush's goal of establishing a "New World Order' is an unattainable dream, a fellow at the Center for International Affairs told approximately 20 people gathered in Emerson Hall last night.

In a speech focused on post-Cold War politics, Bassam Tibi, a German professor of international relations, called Bush's foreign policy goals unrealistic and vague.

The U.S. simply doesn't have the capabilities to structure a 'New World Order' valid for the entire world," said Tibi, who teaches at Goettingen University in Germany.

In addition, Tibi criticized U.S. policy for being too provincial and not concentrating sufficiently on non-Western nations.

"With the end of the bipolar power split, debate over world at large, not simply the U.S. and Europe, he said.

Tibi said that Europeans understand this necessity Europe is close to Middle Eastern and African countries which do not share its values.

The Gulf War offered an example of the fundamental difference in value system of Western countries and Middle East nations, he said.

"Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait was seen by Westerners as a violation of sovereignty and international law, Tibi said. "But sovereignty is a Western formula."

According to Tibi, such conflict of belief systems makes it necessary to abandon the idea that a single "New Order" can function for the entire world. he offered instead the more humble ideal of a "less disorderly world."

Tibi said such a world cannot be achieved through the imposition of a single ideology such as "Communism, the American way of life, or Islamic Fundamentalism."

Instead, Tibi maintained, nations need to establish "shared views about acceptable conflicts."