Global apartheid is the system of minority rule in global governance, under which a few nation states dominate the world and its most powerful international institutions, as described by political scientist Titus Alexander in Unravelling Global Apartheid (1996 Polity Press). This analysis is based on the close parallels between systematic global inequality and apartheid in South Africa. Alexander argues that Western nations exercise minority rule through their control of the Bank of International Settlements; their majority shareholding in the World Bank and IMF; the veto power of the US, France and UK in the UN Security Council; and their dominance in the World Trade Organization and other global institutions. Global apartheid is based on systematic discrimination between people on the basis of nationality rather than race, as in South African apartheid, although there is a racial element in nationality.

Global apartheid has its defenders. In The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, Samuel Huntington presents a ‘framework, a paradigm, for viewing global politics’ to protect “Western civilization”. He argues that other civilizations threaten the West through immigration, cultural differences, growing economic strength and potential military power. ‘If North America and Europe renew their moral life, build on their cultural commonality, and develop close forms of economic and political integration to supplement their security collaboration in NATO, they could generate a third Euroamerican phase of Western affluence and political influence. Meaningful political integration would in some measure counter the relative decline in the West’s share of the world’s people, economic product, and military capabilities and revive the power of the West in the eyes of the leaders of other civilizations.’ However, this ‘depends overwhelmingly on whether the United States reaffirms its identity as a Western nation and defines its global role as the leader of Western civilization.’ (p308)

Huntington describes how ‘the United States together with Britain and France make the crucial decisions on political and security issues; the United States together with Germany and Japan make the crucial decisions on economic issues.’ (p81) He quotes Jeffrey R Bennett to show that Western nations:

• own and operate the international banking system
• control all hard currencies
• are the world’s principle customer
• provide the majority of the world’s finished goods
• dominate international capital markets
• exert considerable moral leadership within many societies
• are capable of massive military intervention
• control the sea lanes

(‘Exclusion as National Security Policy’, Parameters, 24, Spring 1994, 54)

In many respects, minority rule in global governance is worse than apartheid in South Africa. Inequality in income and influence between people in the Majority World of Africa, Asia and Latin America and the Western minority is much greater than between black and white in South Africa under apartheid. Although the West condemns racism, and includes people of African descent at the highest levels of governance, the structures of global decision-making systematically prevent nations of Africa, Asia and Latin America from having an effective say in the economic and political rules which govern their affairs. As a result, Majority world states are often treated like Bantustans in South Africa.

Alexander argues that global inequality needs to be challenged with the same moral and political determination as apartheid in South Africa in order to create a just and sustainable world.

Titus Alexander, Unravelling Global Apartheid (1996 Polity Press)

Jeffrey R Bennett, Exclusion as National Security Policy, Parameters, 24, Spring 1994, 54

Richard Falk, ReFraming the International: Law, Culture, Politics (p133)

Samuel Huntington, In The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order

Ian Linden, A New Map of the World, Darton, Longman & Todd, 2003