Università Roma Tre

"As the 21st century progresses it is clear that the world as a whole faces a number of major challenges ahead of it. Attempts to try to deal with these challenges, and the degree of success that comes with these attempts, will almost certainly shape the future of humankind for a long time to come, and perhaps will even determine the most basic, fundamental question of all – do we actually have a future? For most of us, the way we see and interpret these challenges, as well as the solutions that will be put forward, will be determined by the major political powers and socio-economic forces of the developed world, along with the global institutions that they control – the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the World Trade Organisation etc. But will the solutions be the right ones – not just for us but even more particularly for the less developed countries of the world located principally in the southern hemisphere, which are
actually going to be the ones most affected by the coming challenges? Will the powerful states and institutions of the ‘North’ take on board the situation in the ‘South’? Will the southern hemisphere countries and their peoples be given a real voice to express themselves? How in fact do these challenges and problems look from their perspective? Do they look different? What if they have alternative solutions to put forward, what might these be? How and from where might these alternative solutions be formulated? Might any alternative solutions also have potential positive consequences for us, if they are allowed to be put forward and adopted? It is these kinds of issues (and others) that will be at the heart of
this short course."