Global Governance: Past, Present and Future

By Oleg Karpovich

The theoretic aspects of the global phenomena of modern civilization are reviewed; the issues of global management and global development are analyzed.
The analysis of the major threats to and the problems and risks of the world civilization is conducted. Modern political conflicts are reviewed and classified; the difficulties of their reconciliation and resolution are analyzed based on modern approaches, concepts and technologies.
The major approaches to the study of the role and place of political technologies in the management of the international conflicts. The modern cultural and civilized approach to the study of the international conflicts and the technologies of their peaceful resolution is reflected and developed in the new political schools, for instance, in political constructivism, which is extremely popular in the West and which is today a powerful competitor of the neo-realism and neo-liberalism.
The book is aimed at the wide readership.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Nov 14, 2013
• ISBN: 9781491825273

Oleg Karpovich

Oleg Karpovich, a doctor of law science, a doctor of political science, professor, the head of the Department on Comparative Studies of the Institute for USA and Canada studies, Russian Academy of Science. The author of a number of publications on the international relations, international law, criminal law of the Russian Federation. The chief editor of Geopolitics magazine. Andrei Manoilo, a doctor of political science, professor of department on Russian politics of Moscow State University. A member of consulting council before the Council on Security of the Russian Federation.

Book preview

2013 Oleg Karpovich All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 11/05/2013

ISBN: 978-1-4918-3169-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4918-2527-3 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CONCLUSION

ENDNOTES

INTRODUCTION

T he global problems of human civilization are not a simple topic as it might seem at first glance. They appear due to the objective laws of civilization development, during which the existing world view is radically restructured. In this case, the world itself is undergoing revolutionary changes on a planetary scale. These changes really affect all the basics of life and prosperity of human civilization: under the present conditions, not a single country in the world will be able to avoid these changes or the involvement in the processes of globalization, regionalization, and integration.

The development of civilization, which is now on the path of planetary change, generates a set of new challenges and threats that also take on global nature under the present conditions, becoming the global challenges in the development of humanity. The effort of only developed countries is not enough to overcome these problems; combined efforts of the entire international community are required.

However, even when constantly faced with new global problems and challenges, we still remain incorrigible optimists in spite of the chaos in international relations, which some politicians call manageable. We continue to believe that even though the world is rapidly plunging into the abyss of conflict and war, it is still changing for the better. Even today, in the minds of many citizens, there is still a myth that with the end of the Cold War the world finally ended its existence in the conflict paradigm and moved to a new, higher quality and level of development, characterized by reduction of conflict in all the world regions.

Yet the problems of management and resolution of international conflicts continue to apply; on the contrary, we clearly see that when the United States carried out a conscious dismantling of the Yalta-Potsdam system of the world order, it resulted in the collapse of the entire system of international security; the world is rapidly sinking into chaos of big and small wars and ethno-political and religious conflicts.

As the war in Libya has shown and it is now demonstrated by the armed conflict in Syria, in response to increasing global leaders’ struggle for power, regional conflicts can easily outgrow their initial frame and spill out into the broader impact, up to global wars.

Activities of the United States and their partners (NATO, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar) for peace enforcement and forcing the democracy in different regions of the world do not only eliminate the root causes of political conflicts occurring there, but in many cases lead to the escalation and the transition to a new, more ambitious level. In the majority of countries, where the United States intervenes as a peacemaker of internal affairs, they place a bet and cooperate with the very political forces and regimes that are known worldwide as terrorists and extremists. In Afghanistan, for example, the United States is actively collaborating with the Taliban (at the partnership level); and in the civil war in Libya, have a decisive role in the destruction of the army units loyal to Gaddafi was played by the Al-Qaeda militias standing on the edge of the blow dealt by the joint forces of NATO and the rebels. And now, at least a half of the so-called warlords of the united Syrian opposition are heads of the Al-Qaeda’s fighting cells that were released from the underground where President Bashar al-Assad has put them.

We live in difficult times: the world is changing right before our eyes. The pace and speed of these changes are continuously increasing: it took Western political consultants only one year to turn a peaceful and prosperous North Africa, where some countries’ standard of living (e.g., in particular, Tunisia) is almost indistinguishable from the southern departments of France, into a focus of brutal civil war, international terrorism, and radical Islam. Now the same fate awaits Syria, and then the entire Middle East, including the main irreconcilable opponent of the U.S., Iran.

Since March 2011, when an armed militant group of the so-called free opposition began to penetrate the territory of Syria, the world is constantly balancing on the brink of another major war, which is not limited to the Middle East, Syria, and Iran: the wave will definitely reach Russia and China. Today we can say that the hour has struck: the U.S. and NATO have finished the concentration of strike force intended for Syrian invasion and its transformation into a new Iraq. Apparently, American strategists have decided that it is time to finally solve the Syrian issue: only the stubborn Bashar al-Assad is holding them back on the way to Iran, who for some reason does not give up and who did not learn anything from the example of his brother Moammar Gadhafi, who was captured and then brutally murdered. After all, it is thanks to the stubbornness of Bashar al-Assad that the substantial invasion forces are idle in Afghanistan, wasting taxpayers’ money, and Iran is openly laughing at the efforts of Western countries to reformat the entire Greater Middle East.

On July 16, 2012, the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, spoke publicly for the first time about the fact that Western countries apply the elements of blackmail towards Russia, demanding to approve the draft of the UN Security Council resolution on Syria, which Russia and China are successfully blocking: Chapter 7 of the UN Charter allows the Security Council to undertake economic, diplomatic and other sanctions in the event of threats to the peace, and if such are be enough, to proceed to armed action. The adoption of such a resolution would be very favorable to the U.S. and its allies in Europe and would finally decide the fate of Syria. However, even the lack of the resolution is not a constraint for the United States: it is enough for us to recall the war in Yugoslavia.

The world has entered a long period of global instability, where the basic form of existence of the international relations system is a controlled chaos, and the old ways of implementing foreign policy are losing their effectiveness. In this new reality, Russia is at the intersection of the interests of the leading world powers seeking to dominate the world, such as USA, China, the Islamic world (both Sunni and Shia), etc. Although, the peace policy of Russia does not make anybody happy. Our country has an extremely important geopolitical position in Eurasia, by the very fact of its existence, making it difficult to implement aggressive and strategic plans that create new world aggressors.

This is why today Russia is under huge external pressure from the West (U.S., NATO) in the issues with Syria and Iran, and from the East (Saudi Arabia, Japan, etc.), for whom it is vitally important that Russia does not implement its own independent foreign policy, and obediently allows to embed themselves into the wake of the western or eastern policy. In the West, we hear more and more often the opinions that ‘the new democratic Russia is a non-viable state’, that ‘it will always stand in opposition to world politics and to a truly democratic progress’, that ‘for the whole of Western civilization it would have been incomparably better and more useful if Russia was divided into two dozen fiefdoms, in which democratic values would win’. Siberia with its vast resources, which Russia owns alone and does not share, in general, should be made available to the entire world (i.e. Western) civilization. These are not mere words: creation of a belt of political instability around Russia, and surrounding its borders with the global missile defense system clearly indicates that the U.S. and NATO are ready to move from words to action as soon as the right moment and the reason for the intervention come.

Under these conditions, Russia will need not only a modernized foreign policy, calibrated for the specific conditions of global development, but also a complete modernization of the existing foreign policy concepts and doctrines, principles, research and the formation of new alliances and alliances; flexible use of resources, actual and potential allies reassessment of priorities and targets and development of new methods to influence Russia’s opposing alliances. This is particularly necessary, since Russia, in its position of defending peace in the Middle East, has remained essentially alone: its only ally in resisting the West’s position regarding Syria is China, but it is a rather arbitrary and changeable ally. In addition, China pursues its own strategic interests in the Syrian conflict (and not only in Syrian).

We concur with those local researchers and patriots who believe that major efforts to modernize Russia’s foreign policy should be aimed at supporting the process of development and foreign policy decisions by the Russian leadership and those members of the international relationships that share the position and views of the Russian Federation on the events in the world. In addition to this problem, Russia’s modernized foreign policy should include mechanisms for the formation and translation of the positive image of Russia to foreign audiences, information and analytical support for the foreign policy of the country and the ongoing Russian foreign policy actions, including the state system of promotion in the Russian civil and Information Society. Only in this case, the foreign policy of Russia will unite all the progressive forces interested in the future of Russia as a great power, and will become the platform to generate innovative ideas of harmonization of international relations and global development processes, giving a new impetus to the development of the theory of international relations and domestic political science in general.

In the future, on the basis of Russian foreign policy, national culture, and ideology, an authoritative community of experts in the field of international relations and global development should be formed; such community should be represented by different actors in international relations, such as states and international organizations, as well as entities of public diplomacy. This will allow the international community to get the full unbiased coverage of world events of international significance, as well as their comprehensive scientific, analytical, and peer review; identify and explore trends of global development, and the formation of a new world order, new platform and architecture of international relations.

CHAPTER I

Global Problems of Development of the World Civilization: The New Political Reality, Challenges, and Threats

T he development of modern human civilization on the path of scientific and technological progress leads to a continuous complication of modern society, its structure, and the entire system of social relations, which needs constant management and control. Humanity is rapidly pushing beyond social formations where it has been growing like in a cradle for hundreds of years. This is especially clearly manifested in the sphere of international relations: the nation-states formed under the Treaty of Westphalia that, for centuries to come, have shaped the international system, are gradually descending from the political scene, giving way to non-state actors in international relations, the actors outside the sovereignty, and subjects of Public Diplomacy.

The framework of national states is becoming too small for modern public organizations and businesses that often have their own interests in many parts of the world, and by virtue of these features are transnational and cross-border in nature. These new structures of global society are pushing the traditional actors out of the sphere of international relations, and demonstrating with all their activity that nation-states are not really needed. As a result, not only the nature of socio-political relations, but also the political reality where these relationships exist are maintained and develop, change. These changes have global character, and generate global problems whose solution is impossible without consolidation of efforts of the whole mankind.

1. Global Problems of World Civilization as a New Political Reality

It is believed that globalization is a showcase of contemporary global processes, which is understood as an objective process of combining a number of different social formations and systems that compete in the same economic and political spheres, into a single global system that belongs to no particular nation or people, but the human civilization as a whole. In this case, the right of individual nations to exist in a global world is not denied, but it is rather strictly linked to their usefulness to the international community. The term usefulness is understood as a nation’s ability to perform a certain set of functions in the global system that its other components do not or cannot fulfill, but the ones that the system needs. In fact, globalization is the melting pot that should eventually melt down national identities and cultures of different nations, giving way to values and ideology of global civilization.

Meanwhile, globalization continues to generate polar processes that are opposite to the pole of global development as it propagates across the globe: these are, of course, the processes of regionalization. As a result, globalization and regionalization become the two poles of the global dipole between which the existing and the emerging world order oscillates. All in all, much in the global political process begin to depend on the way the pendulum of the global order will swing: towards globalization and regionalization.

Changes in political reality occur unevenly in different directions, at different rates: where a break occurs, the political system changes its appearance, making a sort of revolution, breaking, and destruction of old foundations of its functioning; at the same time, more archaic forms of social and political engagement and political regulation remain around for quite some time; these forms not only control but prevent from immediate slide into chaos those parts of the system where the wave of modernization has not yet reached. In areas or centers of modernization, where a qualitative change in the political reality actually occurred, rivalry of tradition and innovation of the old and the new is escalating. As a result, there is a conflict in which traditional society through its institutions fiercely resists its violent suppression, thus opening new, hidden resources of society; while modernization, as it seems, tends to lose unnecessary convention, only slowing down the pace of socio-political development of the society.

This conflict can have a pretty sharp character and pose a threat to society as a whole: the uneven pace of socio-political development of society can easily lead to overheating and subsequent explosion that will destroy its foundations. Thus, even the development of society on the way to the undoubted progress that carries the benefit of the whole of human civilization, may give rise to new challenges and threats to human security on a global scale, which form a new political reality today.

Undoubtedly, with the development of civilization, the humankind has repeatedly faced complex problems, sometimes even planetary in nature. Still, it was all a distant prehistory, a kind of incubation period of contemporary global problems. These problems became fully apparent in the second half and especially in the last quarter of the 20th century, i.e. at the turn of the century, and perhaps even the millennium. They were brought to life by a number of reasons that are clearly evident in this period.

The twentieth century is a watershed not only in the world of social history, but also in the fate of mankind. The principal difference between the past century and the entire previous history is the fact that humanity has lost faith in its immortality. Humanity realized that its dominion over nature is not unlimited and that it could bring destruction upon itself. Indeed, never before has humanity grown quantitatively by 2.5 times in one generation, thus increasing the demographic press force. Never before, humanity has entered the period of Scientific-Technical Revolution, reached the postindustrial stage of development, and opened the road into space. Such globalization of the world economy and such a united world information system has never occurred before. Finally, never before did the Cold War allow all of humanity to come so close to the line of self-destruction. Even it is possible to avoid a nuclear world war, a threat to human existence on Earth still exists, since the planet cannot sustain excessive load that formed as a result of human activity. It becomes increasingly clear that the historical form of human existence, which allowed it to create a modern civilization with all its seemingly unprecedented opportunities and facilities, has generated a lot of problems that require radical solutions, and, moreover, immediately and without delay.

Yet current global challenges of the development of civilization cannot be considered solely in a negative way. In many cases, global problems are typical problems of growth caused by the high rate of development of human civilization and the inertia of the existing international systems and institutions that are not always able to respond quickly to the changes in the social environment. The industrial revolution always leads to the fact that the resources necessary for its implementation are removed or forcibly taken away from some segments of the population on Earth and passed on to others that let them into production and give them a new quality. Thus, one part of the population gets richer, and the second (whose resources cause a breakthrough in industrial production, science, and technology) remains impoverished; there is a critically important gap between the rich and the poor, generating tension in society, which often results in opposition, and sometimes in armed opposition. However, in this case compensatory mechanisms developed by human civilization for thousands of years of evolution come into play; states are beginning to implement a social policy that soothes and compensates for the costs of various revolutionary breakthroughs. So, mankind has experience in dealing with global challenges, whose threat cannot be underestimated, but should not in any way be exaggerated.

Global problems, as well as and conflicts of development and growth of world civilization generated by them, perform globally defined functions, without which the development of human civilization is basically impossible. Moreover, these functions do not necessarily have a negative connotation. Global problems by their very origin and existence not only contribute to the heightened fear and panic in the community, but also warn of the emergence of the contradictions in its development related to the changing political reality external conditions of functioning of global governance systems and international institutions and imperfections of the new institutions of global society. They also warn of miscalculations and mistakes made in the practical implementation of the new concepts of the world order. Thus, the global challenges bring attention to the need to combine their efforts and concentrate on solving their specific problems.

In this regard, we would like to object to such a renowned scientist in the field of global studies, as Professor I.V. Ilyin, Dean of the Faculty of Global Processes of the M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University, who considers the global problems phenomenon as purely negative and destructive to modern civilization. In our view, the development and progress of modern civilization is not possible without the associated risks, threats, and challenges; the ability to detect them in time, recognize and eliminate their causes significantly accelerates the progress, making the system of social and political relations of modern society more stable and impervious to many external and internal threats that are reducible by the system to the level of institutional conflicts, taking on and modernizing the signaling function.

In this regard, the approach of A.I. Kostin, Professor of the M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University is more appealing to us. He notes that the introduction of tension around certain groups of global threats is often unjustified and speculative; it is frequently by incompleteness of the process of understanding and perceiving the nature of global problems.

Globalistics that studies global problems and their solutions is a relatively young science that is already in the stage of development. Members of scientific and expert community are just starting to agree between each other as to what are global processes and global issues, and what is their nature. This process in its initial stages always generates a lot of polar opinions that later usually start to reduce to a common denominator (or more so) in a slow and complex manner.

We hope that this study will make a positive contribution to the systematization and integration of existing knowledge on global issues and promote the formation and development of globalistics.

1.2. Concept, Nature, and Content of the Global Problems of World Civilization

In the process of historical development of human activity, the outdated technological methods, as well as the legacy of social mechanisms of interaction between man and nature, are breaking apart. At the beginning of human history, mostly adaptive mechanisms of interaction were operating. The man obeyed the forces of nature, adapted to its changes, thus changing his own nature. Then, in the course of development of the productive forces, the utilitarian attitude of a man to nature or to another person prevailed.

The present era raises the question of the transition to a new way of social mechanisms, which should be called co-evolutionary, or harmonic. The global situation facing humanity reflects and expresses the general crisis of consumer attitude of a man to the natural and social resources. Reason pushes mankind to realize the vital importance of the harmonization of connections and relationships in the global system man-technology-nature. As a result, the understanding of global problems, their causes, relationships, and solutions gains special importance.

One of the characteristics of the present stage of human history is that a growing number of major issues of social development that took place earlier and were local in character become globalized. Global problems do not occur somewhere near the pre-existing problems, but grow from them. Now, it is not enough to solve them only in a particular country or region, as it is closely related to how these problems are solved in other countries and regions, as well as in the entire world.

Global problems are problems that first, concern all of mankind, affecting the interests and destinies of all countries, peoples, and social groups; secondly, lead to significant economic and social losses, and in the case of aggravation may threaten the existence of the human civilization; and thirdly, demand planetary-scale cooperation and joint action by all countries and peoples for their solution.

The study and understanding of global development of human civilization is an important component of the special branch of political science—globalistics. This is primarily due to the fact that it was during the second half of the 20th century that mankind has reached a new stage of development when political and economic processes become global in nature and in some way affect the life of all the peoples of the globe. By definition of Ulrich Beck, global problems are the result of these non-linear (cross-border) processes of global¹development. They are characterized by dynamism, complexity, interdependence, high acuity, and historical hierarchical pattern.

The study of global problems raises many questions. What is the nature of global problems? How are they different from other problems facing humanity? What is the relationship between global issues, globalization, and other global processes? All these are highly relevant questions to be answered in the near future.

Contemporary globalistics is based on the assumption that global problems are an objective factor in world development, and for this reason they cannot be ignored by any of the actors of international relations, including the nation-states and international organizations. Often, global issues are considered as a natural result of the process of²globalization.

The cause of global challenges is the socio-political, industrial, and technological development of modern society. In the most general terms, global problems are the problems arising from the contradictions of the social system and the conditions of its existence in the same space-time continuum with the natural world.³ Intensification of contradictions leads to disruption of the social system and the inevitable under these conditions conflicts that affect the development of human civilization.

The global problems take source from political, economic, environmental, and socio-cultural contradictions on a global scale, imposing various restrictions on the nature and forms of competition between nations, as well as socio-political, cultural, and civilizational systems.

In the modern world, global problems are no longer considered to be a result of miscalculations, mistakes, and blunders of modern strategies of social and political development of society or the mistakes made in the process of their implementation. It is more pointless to bind the global problems of human civilization with natural or man-made phenomena, anomalies or disasters. Apparently, the current global problems are the result of a long evolution of socio-political system of the global society, which cannot take place without distortions or random solutions that increase the level of political risk. It is this evolution, its long-period trends and patterns that generated the technocratic society crisis that today covers the full range of interactions, changes the principle of mutual relations in the man-man, man-society, man-nature, society-nature, and affects the interests of the world community as a whole. Global problems are complex; they represent an international and socio-natural phenomenon and are in a relationship with each other.

A category modern global problems in the sense of totality of vital importance for humanity, the solution of which depends on the further social progress has become widespread in 1970s in both foreign and domestic literature.⁴

The Club of Rome, an international non-governmental organization established in Rome in 1968, was one of the first to study the global problems of the development of modern civilization on a system level. It is the Club of Rome that popularized topics of global issues, emphasizing their danger, and, in fact, made sure that these issues were the focus of public attention and research. The club members have spent quite a lot of effort to develop strategies to address global problems of human civilization at the global, regional and local levels.

Considerable research advance in this direction was made by scientists of the USSR, such as I.T. Frolov, V.V. Zagladin, D.I. Gvishiani, and N. Moses. With their efforts, research centers have been set up: Scientific Council for the Social and Philosophical Problems of Science and Technology under the President of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, and the Council for Global Issues of the 21st century.

At the theoretical and conceptual level, the term global problems has gained a rather clear definition shared by the majority of the scientific community, and has become a part of scientific and political lexicon, entrenched in the public mind. ⁵ Today, global problems are considered to be the problems that are common to all mankind (civilizations) and affect the interests of humanity as a whole and each person individually.

In the 1990s, the global problems of civilization came to be seen mainly in the context of processes of globalization, which became interpreted as one of the causes and sources of contemporary global problems. At the same time, there was a different approach where the processes of globalization were not seen as the cause, but as a consequence of global issues that occurred at a certain stage of development of civilization and which the globalization was called to resolve or at least mitigate. However, the excessive dominant attention given to globalization as a main source of current global issues, in our view, is not justified, since globalization does not explain all the diversity of global issues and is often attracted to these problems in an artificial manner.

In this regard, it is impossible not to agree with I.V. Ilyin, who is very careful about globalization, doubting its ability to explain everything in the world; in his definition of the global problems, the scientist has rolled back to more general and universal position and considers global issues as the negative effects of global processes on the biosphere and sociosphere and positive trends as global factors of progressive development of society.⁶ In this case, global processes and their consequences are the most important part of the subject field of globalistics, which in this context serves as a field of study of global processes in their holistic effect on the genesis and development of all areas (meninges) of the planet, and their mutual interaction.

However, it should be noted that global problems are not always strictly negative in character, as in the interpretation of I.V. Ilyin: human evolution occurs by overcoming these challenges. Problems only mark those tasks that the modern society has yet to solve.

Although the definition of the term global problems is more or less clear, objective difficulties constantly occur with the listing of the global problems of mankind. It comes to the fact that the very problem of compiling such a list can be rightfully attributed to one of the global problems of modern development, since so many scholars of different nationalities helped its development. However, they have achieved only one goal in the matter—the general confusion. The reason for this situation is not due to the quality of researchers, but to the virtual absence of criteria to clearly and unequivocally identify the global challenges out of the number of issues affecting the community as a whole or substantial part of it that are momentary or situational in nature. The fact is that not all the problems that accompany development of the world community can be defined as global problems. Quite often, a number of global problems include almost any contradictions of the modern era associated with human activities.

Criteria of globality is a system of quantitative and qualitative parameters and characteristics of modern challenges and threats that enable us to refer them to the competence of international (supranational) institutions. One of these criteria is undoubtedly the scale of the problem dispersal in the world. Another criterion of globality is frequently considered as the rise in the level of threat to international security and to basis of the entire human civilization. A typical example of such a problem that fully meets both criteria is international terrorism. The formulation of these criteria can highlight global issues in a separate group, define them, and develop their classification.

Global problems are common for global processes (they are generated by them.) Therefore, with a certain degree of confidence, we can say that the criteria that determine which processes are global will also work well with regard to global problems. In the most general terms, global processes are understood as processes occurring on the planet, spreading over its entire territory, and exhibiting a certain global and planetary integrity. Thus, the processes become global when they cover the entire planet, affect the basis of global socio-political system, and lead to a change of planetary paradigms of society, gaining a planetary significance.

In political (and not only political) science, the notion of a global is used in its two main meanings: 1) planetary, related to the globe, and 2) all-encompassing, universal. Accordingly, the global processes can be defined in these two bases: 1) all-planetary processes, 2) processes related to the entire universe. The first approach in defining global processes is attributed to global studies, the second to the theory of evolution (evolutionism.)

Recently, in global studies the word global is used in terms of reach of a certain amount of space and acquisition of the planetary system integrity predetermined by the globe. ⁷ Some scientists call the quality of global processes spatial globality. ⁸

However, a somewhat different interpretation of the term global received significant distribution: it is a process that has a feature or group of features for the entire set of real processes. This is the qualitative and meaningful definition of the term global. It is also the most all-encompassing: it is a sign of planetary integrity.

In connection with this, it makes sense to refer to global processes as the processes that apply to the entire territory of the planet and exhibit a global planetary integrity. In this sense, the global processes are not just the processes taking place on Earth, but the processes that have planetary and evolutionary significance. ⁹

In the end we can state that there is a certain variety in the interpretation and understanding of the term globality. In the studies of globalization and global issues, the term is used in this, as well as another sense, with approximately the same frequency. The development of globalization involves the spread of certain trends and patterns of social and political development of the entire human society, irrespective of national and state borders, which should lead to the human attainment of planetary unity and integrity in politics, economics, international relations, and cultural sphere.

The mentioned integrity is formed as a result of the inherent social movement patterns, as well as due to natural features and limitations of the globe. Moreover, we note that the term globalization has gotten its name from the above-mentioned natural and spatial integrity and our planet constraints that are clearly visible from space.

The MSU professor A.I. Kostin correctly notes that global problems of humanity in general terms are problems arising from the contradictions of the social movement form and conditions, existing in the same space-time continuum.¹⁰ Global problems have a character that is common and essential to all mankind, since they affect not only the global community as a whole, but also the vast majority of real people. These problems come into play as a result of development of the inherent social processes and social and natural interaction patterns, but in the end they clash with planetary and natural limitations of spatial constraints and integrity of the Earth. Global problems meet the criteria of globality, which has a spatial and geographical content, i.e. they extend to the territory, where these or other significant problems exist. However, one cannot but agree with A.N. Chumakov, who indicates that a geographically-spatial (quantitative) criterion needs a substantial-good quality. ¹¹

Global problems are an acute socio-natural complex of contradictions that affect the world as a whole, as well as all its regions and different countries;in contrast to the regional, local and private problems, they have a universal human significance, carry the risks and threats to the development of human civilization in planetary scale, and in the case of aggravation place human civilization to the brink of survival.

In this sense, problems can be identified only as global problems when they meet the planetary concept, i.e. covering the entire biosphere of the Earth, up to the space on the top boundary and the mantle at the bottom. This approach is used by natural scientists (geologists, geographers, biologists, and physicists) that came into the political global studies: they all seek to determine globality through spatial coordinates and geographical characteristics. This approach has advantages: geographic criteria have their quantitative indicators, such as the area of the planet’s surface, the depth of the cultural layer, the height of the top of the atmosphere (physicists are well aware of what it is), and others that contribute to the specifics to the general philosophical arguments about the global nature of certain phenomena and establish a clear framework, limiting the scope of the review and separating it from the rest of the universe. Geographical approach to the definition of globality is often called quantitative or three-dimensional.

The geographical approach can probably be considered the most practically oriented, as it allows defining global problems at the stage where they have received their actualization on a global scale. However, it is difficult to talk about the ability of this approach to identify global problems at the early stages of their occurrence and origin, since he describes the events that have already taken place.

Moreover, there are problems that can cover the entire globe in a short period of time, but still are not considered global. Here we are talking about a spontaneous hysteria sweeping the world due SARS or the bird flu. Obviously, these problems are completely consistent with the notion of globality in terms of geographical approach, but in fact they are not. ¹²

Many researchers add their own criteria to the geographical approach of defining global problems of human civilization. Thus, quite often there is a belief that the problem can only be global, when it is super-regional, i.e. relevant with respect to any region of the planet. Otherwise, it will be about the problems of one or more regions or areas on a smaller scale. All global problems are also regional at the same time, but not all regional problems are global.

There is an equally frequent assertion that global problems are only those that affect the interests and destiny of all mankind and not just the interests of individuals and their national and state associations (the modern nation-states, their alliances and coalitions, regional and global civil society organizations.) These arguments are not generally devoid of logic, although they are naively descriptive in nature: how to determine whether these or other problems affect the fate of all mankind or whether they are just temporary difficulties involved in the inevitable costs of intensive development? Only humanity itself can provide an answer to this question, which today is still not a monolith, but largely fragmented and experiences noticeable difficulty in formulating a common point of view regarding even regional-scale problems such as revolutions of the Arab spring or war in Syria.

To overcome these problems in the definition of the globality of the existing problems of world civilization, researchers often make a kind of workaround and try to determine the global problems on the basis of the total labor required for their peaceful resolution. From this point of view, problems that may be considered global are those that require the combined efforts of the entire international community in order to overcome them.

Some of the researchers do not limit the defiition of the global problems to the present, but strive to look into the future and assess the possible damage that these problems can cause to the development of world civilization if they not promptly resolved. In this regard, they note as a criterion of globality the consequences for the whole of humanity and its environment, resulting from the pendency of these problems, but only from those that are able to become serious and irreversible problems. As a matter of fact, the mortgage crisis of 2007-2010 in the United States easily fits in this definition, along with truly objective problems of human development (poverty, exhaustible resources, disease, etc.).

In 2009, I.V. Ilyin tried to bring all these features to a common denominator, forming its own set of criteria for determining the global nature of the existing development challenges. In his view, "global problems:

- Express the fundamental contradictions of holistic and interconnected modern world;

- Are an objective factor in the development of modern civilization;

- Are characterized by the geospatial indicators;

- Have the property of universality, as they affect the vital interests of all mankind, every nation and every individual; and pose a real threat to the positive development of human civilization and the biosphere, and the survival of the planet in the future;

- Have the quality of generality, as they clearly require a concerted action by all subjects in world politics, regardless of their political systems, as well as economic, social, and cultural differences;

- Identify the need for a public mechanism of resolving conflicts in the international system;

- Contribute to the internationalization of the social processes and participation in international public life of the general public."¹³

In general, it can be noted that this attempt of I.V. Ilyin was a success. As a result, different points of view were systematically and structurally integrated into a single, internally consistent scheme. However, in this approach, as in many others, there is descriptiveness and eclecticity; the main motive is the idea that global problems are problems for any and every individual. But this is evidently not sufficient to clearly define the concept of globality as applied to modern problems of development, since the universality is a rather subjective notion, and global challenges must be objective in nature, which I.V. Ilyin emphasizes in his second thesis above.

Contemporary global problems are characterized by a further feature: very often they are inseparable from each other; they are generated by the same global processes, and they exist together and flow into one another. In other words, today’s global challenges are interconnected and intertwined; their evolution is closely linked to similar processes of escalation or attenuation of other problems of this group; sometimes between different problems of world civilization, noted by the researchers, it is difficult to draw a clear dividing line that would indicate where one problem ends and another begins. Thus, the problem of poverty is closely linked to uneven distribution of resources and lack of resources, problem of diseases and epidemics, poverty and misery, etc. All this requires an integrated approach to the analysis of contemporary global issues, and the search of comprehensive solutions adapted to the development strategy of a global society and the entire human civilization as a whole.

After defining the criteria of globality, the next step in the study of global issues should obviously be the classification of the selected criteria. The very process of classification reflects the ability of the criteria to be a universal systematizing beginning, and their applicability to the issue of dividing this category of problems into individual fractions. However, the current practice of classification and typology of global problems of human civilization development shows that this problem is quite complex and ambiguous, even if the system of criteria elected for the classification is clearly and objectively defined, and thus eliminates the ambiguity in the evaluation of certain consideration problems.

The first attempts to organize global problems occurred in the early 1970s as part of the Club of Rome and the research work of an entire galaxy of scientists such as F. Feriks, V. Bazyuk, Yu. Skolnikova, G. Brown, S. Chase, A. Gabyu, E. Fontela et al. ¹⁴

In the Yearbook of world problems and human potential published in 1976, there were more than two and a half thousand human problems. In 1979, the U.S. Congress forecasting center called 286 problems common to all mankind, highlighting 32 of them as the most important.

In Russia, the point of view of I.T. Frolov and V.V. Zagladin became rather widespread. According to them, all global problems, depending on the degree of severity and solution priority, as well as the type of cause-and-effect relationship existing between them in real life, are divided into three groups. ¹⁵

According to the above authors, the international problems characterized by the greatest generality and relevance are part of the first group. They arise out of the relationship between different actors of international relations, especially between nation-states and their military-political alliances and coalitions, as well as between the largest social associations and organizations (both governmental and non-governmental).

I.T. Frolov and V.V. Zagladin attribute to this group the two major global issues that are important to the world as a whole:

- Elimination of war from the life of society, and building of a just world;

- Establishing the new world economic order.

To the second group of problems, I.T. Frolov and V.V. Zagladin attribute the problems associated with the system man-society and, basically, with the quality and level of human life on the planet. These are demographic problem, problems of health, education, social welfare, and cultural diversity of humanity, etc.

The third group, according to the above-mentioned scholars, includes global problems arising from the interaction between society and nature. These include the problems of uneven distribution and the termination of natural resources, which are associated with such an important task for all of humanity as providing people with energy, fuel, fresh water, and raw materials, etc. This includes all kinds of ecological problems, as well as problems related to the consequences of the exploration of the Ocean World, the lithosphere, and the outer space. ¹⁶

At the end of the 20th century, the most influential researchers in determining the current state of post-industrial theory—P. Drucker, Galbraith, Francis Fukuyama, M. Castells; prominent experts on governance and the theory of modern corporation—L. Edvinsson, T. Stewart, Charles Handy, T. Sakayya; as well as the most well-known experts in the field of environmental security and relations with the Third World—A. Gore, D. Meadows, R. Reich, P. Pilzer, E. von Weizsaecker, and others, have identified the most pressing global issues of our time. Their conceptual articles entered the collection published in Russia under the title New post-industrial wave in the West. Anthology. ¹⁷ In this regard, it is particular to note the report of E. Weizsaecker, E. Lovins, and L. Lovins Factor Four. Costs—half, returns—double. ¹⁸

Views of the above scholars have largely determined the most relevant areas of the research in contemporary global studies, as well as challenges to be addressed by efforts scientific community. Some of these tasks included the following:

- The formation of a healthy environment, the development of policies to protect the environment from chemical, toxic, and radioactive pollution of the planet. A.A. Krushanov believes that modern civilization while in the process of historical development has entered into a kind of border zone of its interaction with the planet, which can result in two types of challenges: environmental and resource. In this case, the worsening of the ecological situation is expected to continue because of the growing tendency of overloading the environment. From the researcher’s point of view, in some ways civilization has already gone beyond the natural permissible boundaries; for the return of civilization to the allowable natural boundaries, the developed countries that create a burden on nature have to reduce their needs by 20%; ¹⁹

- Global warming (the greenhouse effect), control of emissions, and carbon dioxide content in the atmosphere;

- The struggle with the reduction of environmentally productive land per capita. The well-known specialist V.I. Morozov believes that within the system of current environmental priorities, the pollution of the local and regional nature associated with intense economic activity in dense population areas causes the most painful reaction. Ecological trouble of natural human environment, significant quantities of hazardous emissions and discharges of toxic substances, and transport-intensive industrial activities lead to the destruction and degradation of key natural biological and geological systems necessary for the survival of human species. Thus, by the beginning of the 20th century, more than 30 thousand sites of various sizes, critical in terms of their chemical hazard, have been revealed in the United States only. The total amount of the expected costs of decontamination of the most contaminated areas is estimated by U.S. experts to be at least $ 30 billion; ²⁰

- The allocation of resources on the planet (especially non-renewable), and protection of renewable ecosystems;

- The fight against the disappearance of species and destruction of biological diversity;

- The problem of processing and decontamination of toxic and non-toxic waste. The reason for extreme concern of the international community in this area is caused by the growing influence that the modern techno sphere exerts on the biosphere and natural processes of the human environment. The powerful impact of human activity is such that it now runs the risk of not only upsetting the balance of global biogeochemical relations, but also turning them back. By becoming a geological force, (in the words of V.I. Vernadsky) a man is now close to self-destruction as a result of the incredible concentration of radioactive materials for military purposes, chemical pollution of the atmosphere and hydrosphere, soil degradation, and deforestation. All this taken together fundamentally changes the course of biogeochemical processes, noted E.V. Krasnov and A.Yu. Romanchuk, in their report at the Congress, Global Studies—2009: Ways Out of the Global Crisis and the Model of the New World Order; ²¹

- The depletion of soils, water logging and desertification, and acidification,

- Destruction of fisheries and marine life;

- Problem of the arms race and military conflicts;

- Conversion; reduction of nuclear arsenals and stockpiles of chemical weapons;

- Coping with the economic gap between the North and the South, between the global center and the global periphery;

- Solving the food supply problem; eliminating food shortages;

- Balancing the demographic situation in the world;

- The regulation and restriction of consumption growth;

- Increasing the controllability of global, political and socio-economic processes;

- The stabilization of the international system to prevent it from rolling into unmanaged or controlled chaos;

- The struggle with the devaluation of the basic values of human civilization—the values of peace, human life, etc.

The classification of global problems helps to identify the various connections and relationships between them. In their content, global problems are divided into political, economic and social problems²², depending on the area of the world development (politics, economics, and social) where these problems arise. According to I.V. Ilyin, such structuring is rather arbitrary, since in reality, the global problems are closely related not only within a particular group, but also between different groups.²³ Actually, a multi-level integrated system of global issues functions. It characterizes the relationship between the various international actors, as well as the relationship of society-man and the interaction of society-nature. ²⁴

Being a negative consequence of the impact of non-linear processes in the development of global sociosphere, global issues are central points of its evolution. Each of the global problems is related to many underlying objective and subjective factors, but their effect in the specific historical conditions and in different geographic regions is not constant and depends on the nature of the flow of global processes.²⁵

Modern scholars tend to study global issues in the context of the general laws of historical development without departing from the world historical process and formed multifactorial reality, given the global political and economic dynamics, global, cultural