ABSTRACT
Liberal international thought has heralded the rising forces of economic globalization that have made the world a much smaller place, particularly since the end of the Cold War. While there is an increased emphasis by intellectuals on diversity and multiculturalism, the fact is that a cosmopolitan world culture has arisen in which differences are greatly outweighed by similarities. Despite the benefits of exchanging economic competition for the military rivalries of the Cold War, questions about this change remain. As the immediate post-1989 optimism has faded, and in light of growing evidence that globalization brings with it significant negative externalities, those questions are, if anything, becoming more numerous. Certainly the lives of hundreds of millions of people have improved during this time; however, for others, globalization has not been the positive force many had hoped it would be. Many liberals aspire to create an ameliorative win-win world order in which everyone can benefit from the changes taking place, i.e. in which everyone can pursue his or her interests. Many would also argue that doing so is a moral duty for those populations, and the states they inhabit, fortunate enough to have the resources, to help bring about such a world. A philosophical chasm exists, however, between these aspirations and the interest-orientation at the heart of contemporary liberal theory. This was not always the case. Liberalism arose from an intellectual milieu – the horizons of covenantal theory – that secured both interests and ethics.
