Dominant developments in the post-cold war world.

No doubt there
are other events as well but the dominant developments are
mentioned.
The following were headline events that captured the public
imagination and would be written about in future by some historians.
A standard history of the post-cold war era could easily begin with;
A war --the gulf war
Followed by another conflict, the one that led to the break-up of
Yugoslavia and the death of hundreds of thousands of people
Continue with genocide in Rwanda
The fall of Russian president Boris Yeltsin
NATO war to liberate Kosovo
Historic meeting between the two Korean leaders in 2000
Major development in the post-cold war era:

The single most important trend of the pos communist era: the triumph
of capitalism as a world system
Transformed the character of international politics
One that transformed the lives of most of humanity for better or worse,
swept away all barriers to the operation of the market around the world
(often with devastating social consequences), and transformed the
character of international politics.
The move from bifurcated, two world order in which the market only
operated in some countries, to one in which it was operating in all (or
nearly all)
Victory of Capitalism
The west felt it had won the cold war
If Cold war is treated as ongoing competition between two different
economic systems then one is the victor:
If we think of the cold war as an ongoing competition between different
economic systems, where in one private property dominated
(Capitalism) and in the other means of production were nationalized
(communism), then we can better understand the real significance of
what really happened in 1989. What transpired was not simply the
withdrawal Soviet power from Eastern Europe or even the subsequent
collapse of the Warsaw pact and the reunification of Germany all
important changes in themselves but rather the end of a competition
between alternative economic systems and the victory of one of them
over the other.
No alternative to the market
Existence of communism limited the geographical range of capitalism.
Demise of communism therefore led to a rapid spread of market
principles around the whole world.
Revolutions in Easten European countries saying out loud of Market
system victory: USSR allies shifted to Market oriented system.
What occurred in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary and the like
where revolutions in the late 1980s and early 1999s demanding for
political and economic freedom) had an enormous demonstration effect
on the rest of the world, signaling to those who might have thought
otherwise that there was now no alternative to the market.
Then, when in 1991, the USSR finally disintegrated and withdrew its
support from its diminishing number of allies around the world (Cuba
and Vietnam in particular) it put an increased pressure on these
regimes to change as well.
The west felt it had won the cold war

Consequences of this move from a bifurcated, two world order in which

the market only operated in some countries, to one in which it was
operating in all (or nearly all), had immense and long-lasting
consequences.

1)Increasing the power of those institutions assigned the job of

managing capitalism as an international system: Giving enormous new
powers to financial bodies like IMF and the world bank
These financial bodies were now delegated the critically important tasks
of helping transform the previously planned economic systems and
turning them into functioning market economies.
The program of change they advocated was basically the same
everywhere.
The formula was not specifically American, by the early 1990s it had
become known quite simply, as Washington consensus (The short hand
term used to define global economic policy during the 1990s, describing
a strict set of economic criteria that all countries had to adhere to,
whatever the welfare consequences.
Washington consensus blamed by some for having produced
unnecessary hardships in the less developed countries and disaster in
post-communist Russia
Blamed by others for having transformed once 'basket case' countries
into shining examples of economic efficiency.

These programs of change that is basically same

everywhere;
Privatization of the means of production
Deregulation of all economic activity
Encouragement of competition

Balanced budgets
Strict financial adherence to goals set by those who adhered to the orthodox
neo liberal economic agenda being set in Washington
Integration into the wider world capitalist economy

2)Economically driven foreign policy

Changing the ways in which countries tended to determine their foreign policy
goals

During the cold war foreign policy was basically about military security, and
that in the new era it was primarily concerned with economics.

3)The character of politics ---domestic and international changed out of

all recognition
In this age of Geo-economics, the character of politics --domestic and
international changed out of all recognition.
During the cold war, politics in the West had largely been defined by
the larger strategic relationship with the 'other' The Soviet Union.
With the end of the cold war and the subsequent collapse of the USSR
The focus shifted towards the global world economy and how countries
might survive and prosper within it.
Huge impact on the culture
Inevitably, this had a huge impact on the way people lived, thought, and
entertained themselves on what we might generally call 'culture'.
Even the heroes of popular literature changed in the process
During the cold war
Whereas in the days of the superpower standoff the most respected
individual was the brace warrior.
With the end of the cold war new men and women of distinction were
the entrepreneurs and the new get-rich whizz-kids of the computer
world.
The way people worked changed too
As they had adjusted to new environment. Certainly, they had to work
much harder and realized they had to work harder, for if their company
failed to compete globally.
Nothing was sacrosanct in the new international economy where
globalization did not just seem to describe the way world operated.

Capitalism in its intensive form in its new post-communist

manifestation
Capitalism in its new pos- communist manifestation thus assumed an
increasingly intensive form, where little thought appeared to be given
to human welfare and social cohesion, and everything seemed to
revolve around profit and the balance sheet.

The system did have its radical critics:

a) Inequality and insecurity in the advanced capitalist countries
who could justifiably point to the growth of inequality and
insecurity in the advanced capitalist countries.

b) Hunger and crippling dept in the less developed parts of the

world critics justifiably point to the hunger and crippling dept in the less
developed parts of the world.
c) Unfettered capitalism
capitalist system prone to great fluctuation and many feared that at
some point it was bound to meet its nemesis, as some thought it had
done during the great financial crisis of 1997 and 1998.
Even some of those who were the beneficiaries of the new economic
order, like the financed George Soros, were concerned about the
consequences of this new "unfettered capitalism" and urged
governments to intervene more often and more effectively to protect
society from its ravage. Others went further and took their protest
against the logic of globalization to the streets in the so called 'Battle of
Seattle' in 1999.

Problems critics faced

The critics faced two problems.
a) They could propose nothing as an alternative, other than a more
humane and possibly more regulated of the same

b) Whatever its flaws and weaknesses, the new capitalism did at

least produce the goods: in fact, it overwhelmed them.
Globalized capitalism It also created enormous prosperity (even if
wealth was concentrated in a few hands), generated fantastic
technological changes that were transforming and in ways improving
the lives of ordinary people, and in its new globalized form was rapidly
undermining some of the more traditional reasons why nations used to
go to war. To this extent the liberals were right.

The new Turbo-changed capitalism may well have been ruthless, as the
American journalist William Greider pointed out in his popular "One world ready
or not". It was undoubtedly uncontrollable

However, it did have its progressive side

It also remained extraordinary innovative and as long as it continued to
be so, would remain--as one cynic rather nicely put it--- the only game
in the town.
As Susan Strange observed in her normally pithy way;
Perhaps in the end the system would go on not because it worked
perfectly or even well but because of the difficulty of finding and
building something very much different or better