Terrorism As Trigger For New World Order

The prospect that the good old industrial nation state is a shrinking violet might rankle patriotic flag-wavers. But Bobbitt's statistic thrusts home an unsettling question: What does it say about the nation state that it has so often failed to provide, in the words of British statesman Douglas Hurd, "the security, prosperity, and the decent environment which the citizens demand"? Might it be time for something new? In Bobbitt's view, the current wars against terror provide a shrill wake-up call to confront this question. The best way to protect citizens of modern democracies, he claims, is to fundamentally rethink the nation state as the guarantor of the freedoms that terrorists intend to obliterate.