ABSTRACT
The end of the Cold War in the early 1990s led some scholars and partisans of progressive social change in the Third World to believe that new opportunities had emerged to advance agendas of social justice, national liberation and democratisation locally and in the global system. This optimism was based on the view that with the collapse of the Soviet bloc, the Third World would no longer be a staging ground for East–West rivalries. Specifically, the United States, as the dominant world power, had supported dictatorships and authoritarian regimes, and the exploitative socio-economic orders these regimes defended, as part of its competition with the Soviet Union. Some scholars and revolutionary groups assumed that the core capitalist powers would no longer have any reason to block aspirations for authentic democratisation, for structural change in Third World countries in favour of popular majorities, and for the liberation of oppressed groups and nationalities. Particularly, since East–West rivalry would no longer dictate US action, it was expected that the United States could become an ally of human rights and social justice in Africa and around the world. ‘The end of the Cold War’, stated Randall Robinson, 1 the head of the pro-Africa US lobby ‘Transafrica’ in expressing this view, ‘has stripped America of the fundamental cornerstone that motivated U.S. policy toward Africa since the end of World War II.’
