A Critical Examination of American Imperialism and the Ideology of Global Governance
Introduction: The New World Order and Its Predecessors
We begin the work with Chomsky laying out his central subject: the concept of a “New World Order” as it emerged in the aftermath of the Cold War, particularly following the Gulf War of 1991. This section establishes the historical and analytical framework for the entire book, positioning the contemporary moment against the longer arc of imperial history.
Chomsky opens by noting that the phrase “New World Order” was invoked with great enthusiasm by President George H.W. Bush in 1990–1991, as the United States assembled a military coalition to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait. The rhetoric suggested a world moving toward collective security, the rule of law, and the triumph of democratic values. But Chomsky immediately fractures this narrative. He writes that the actual substance of the New World Order is far less noble, and that we must examine it not through its propaganda but through its practices. He draws a direct line from the current order to earlier imperial systems: the old world of European colonialism, the British Empire’s “civilizing mission,” and the post-World War II American-led global system.
The key idea introduced here is that the New World Order is not new at all. It is, rather, the latest phase of a longstanding system of domination, in which great powers — primarily the United States — enforce a global秩序 that serves their interests, while cloaking this enforcement in the language of universal values. Chomsky points to the specific case of Iraq: the United Nations authorized the use of force to expel Iraq from Kuwait, but the same UN was never allowed to address the far more destructive actions of the United States in its own imperial adventures, notably in Vietnam, Central America, and the Middle East.
“The New World Order is the Old World Order, with the same faces, the same institutions, the same doctrines, but with new slogans.”
This passage captures the book’s core claim: that what is presented as a break from the past is in fact a continuation of the same patterns of power, violence, and hypocrisy. Chomsky argues that the rhetoric of a “new” order functions to obscure the persistence of imperial violence, to make it appear as though the United States and its allies are acting in the service of humanity when they are in fact acting in the service of their own strategic and economic interests. The Gulf War, he insists, was not about Kuwait’s sovereignty or international law; it was about controlling the world’s oil reserves and demonstrating that the United States would not tolerate any challenge to its hegemony in the Persian Gulf. The “New World Order” was the ideological mask worn by this military intervention.
Chapter 1: The New World Order
In this chapter, Chomsky delves into the doctrinal foundations of the New World Order, tracing its intellectual and political roots. He locates the reader in the post-Cold War moment, where the collapse of the Soviet Union left the United States as the world’s sole superpower, and where American elites began constructing a framework to justify permanent global dominance.
Chomsky begins by examining the key texts and speeches that articulated the New World Order. He focuses on the 1991 National Security Strategy of the United States, which declared that the United States must maintain the capability to “defeat any adversary” and “project power globally.” He points out that this document, while publicly presented as a defensive posture, actually calls for the ability to intervene anywhere, at any time, to protect American interests. There is no mention of international law or collective security as the basis for action; instead, the criterion is unilateral American will.
He also examines the work of key intellectuals who helped shape the doctrine. He discusses the writings of George Kennan, the architect of Cold War containment, who argued in the late 1940s that the United States must control the world’s “strategic strong points” and ensure that no other power emerges to challenge its dominance. Chomsky shows that the New World Order is merely an updated version of this strategic vision, adapted to a world without a Soviet counterweight. The “new” element is the absence of a rival superpower, which allows the United States to act with even greater impunity.
The book then moves to the economic dimension. Chomsky argues that the New World Order is not just a military doctrine but also an economic one. It is the system of global capitalism, enforced by institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, which impose “structural adjustment” programs on developing countries. These programs require poor nations to open their markets, privatize state assets, and cut social spending, all of which benefit wealthy corporations and investors — mostly American and European — while devastating local populations. Chomsky calls this the “neoliberal” component of the New World Order, and he insists that it is as coercive as any military intervention.
“The New World Order is a system in which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, and where force is used to maintain this arrangement.”
What matters here is the clarity and brutality of Chomsky’s argument: the New World Order is not a flawed attempt at global governance; it is a deliberate system of exploitation and control, designed by and for the powerful. The rhetoric of democracy, human rights, and international law is merely a facade. Chomsky does not deny that democratic values exist within this system, but he insists that they are applied selectively — used to condemn enemies, never to constrain allies or the United States itself. The chapter thus establishes the analytical lens through which the rest of the book will operate: the gap between official rhetoric and actual practice.
Chapter 2: The Old World Order: The American Century Begins
This chapter moves backward in time to examine the “old” world order that preceded the current one: the American imperial system that emerged after World War II. Chomsky locates the reader in the period of 1945–1950, when the United States, having emerged from the war as the world’s dominant economic and military power, set about constructing a global system that would serve its interests for the next half-century.
Chomsky begins by analyzing the key documents and policies that defined the early Cold War. He focuses on the National Security Council report NSC-68, a secret 1950 document that called for a massive military buildup and a global campaign against “communist expansion.” But Chomsky insists that the real target of this campaign was not communism per se, but rather any form of independent nationalism or economic development that might threaten American corporate control of resources and markets. He cites internal government memos from the period, in which American planners explicitly state that the primary danger in the developing world is not Soviet military aggression but rather “nationalist movements” that resist integration into the American-led global capitalist system.
He provides specific examples: Iran in 1953, Guatemala in 1954, and Indonesia in 1965. In each case, the United States overthrew democratically elected governments that had attempted to assert national control over their own resources — oil in Iran, land in Guatemala — and replaced them with brutal dictatorships that were loyal to American interests. Chomsky presents these as paradigmatic instances of the Old World Order: the use of covert action, paramilitary forces, and direct military intervention to crush any challenge to American hegemony. The language of “containing communism” was the ideological cover for this pattern of aggression.
“The United States has a long and well-documented history of overthrowing governments that are not subservient to its will, and of installing regimes that will follow its orders.”
The chapter then examines the economic component of the Old World Order: the Bretton Woods system, the Marshall Plan, and the post-war economic reconstruction of Europe and Japan. Chomsky argues that these were not acts of altruism but strategic measures designed to create stable, capitalist allies that would serve as bulwarks against both Soviet influence and independent left-wing movements. He points out that the Marshall Plan came with strict conditions: recipient nations had to open their markets to American goods and accept American corporate investment. The reconstruction of Europe and Japan was, in Chomsky’s reading, the building of a global capitalist system under American management.
The clarification here is essential: the Old World Order was not simply a Cold War response to a Soviet threat. It was a proactive project of global domination, with the Soviet Union serving as a convenient enemy that justified interventions that would have occurred anyway. Chomsky insists that the pattern of American violence in the developing world — the bombing of Vietnam, the support for the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, the funding of death squads in El Salvador — is not an aberration but the very substance of the system. The Old World Order was a system of imperial control, and the transition to the New World Order is merely a change in rhetoric, not in reality.
Chapter 3: The Gulf War and the “New” Order
Chomsky now returns to the central event that prompted the New World Order rhetoric: the Gulf War of 1990–1991. This chapter provides a detailed examination of the war itself, its justifications, and its actual motivations, as a case study that reveals the true nature of the New World Order. The reader is located in the specific historical moment of Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait and the American-led military response.
Chomsky begins by recounting the public justifications for the war: Iraq had violated international law by invading Kuwait; the United Nations had authorized the use of force to restore Kuwaiti sovereignty; the war was about defending the principle that aggressive states cannot be allowed to swallow their neighbors. He notes that these justifications were widely accepted in the American media and by Western intellectuals. But then he systematically dismantles them.
He shows that the United States had long supported Iraq, even during Iraq’s earlier aggression against Iran in the 1980s. The U.S. provided Saddam Hussein with intelligence, weapons, and economic aid, even as Iraq used chemical weapons against Iranian soldiers and Kurdish civilians. The United States also looked the other way when Iraq invaded Iran in 1980, which was an act of aggression far larger than the invasion of Kuwait. Chomsky’s point is that the United States does not oppose aggression in principle; it opposes aggression that threatens its own interests. Iraq’s invasion of Iran was tolerated because it served to weaken the anti-American regime in Tehran. Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait was condemned because it threatened Saudi Arabia and the global oil supply.
“The crime of Saddam Hussein is not that he invaded Kuwait, but that he invaded the wrong country — one that the United States needed for its own strategic purposes.”
Chomsky also examines the conduct of the war itself. He describes the massive aerial bombardment of Iraq, including the bombing of infrastructure targets like water treatment plants, electricity grids, and transportation networks, which led to widespread civilian death and disease. He notes that these attacks were deliberately aimed at “punishing” the Iraqi population, a strategy that fits the definition of collective punishment and is illegal under the Geneva Conventions. He also discusses the American refusal to allow the UN to investigate the destruction or to hold war crimes tribunals for American commanders.
The chapter then turns to the aftermath of the war: the imposition of comprehensive economic sanctions on Iraq, which continued for over a decade and which, according to UN estimates, led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children. Chomsky argues that these sanctions were, in effect, a continuation of the war by other means — a form of “weapons of mass destruction” that targeted the civilian population. He notes that American and British officials explicitly stated that the sanctions were designed to pressure the Iraqi regime, but that the actual suffering fell on the most vulnerable segments of society. The New World Order, Chomsky concludes, is not a system of international law and human rights; it is a system in which the United States uses its power to enforce its will, with devastating human consequences.
What this chapter clarifies is that the Gulf War was not an exception but a revealing example of how the New World Order operates: the United States acts unilaterally, invokes international law when it suits its purposes, ignores it when it does not, and uses overwhelming force to achieve its objectives. The suffering of civilians is, at best, a secondary concern. Chomsky’s analysis is not a moral denunciation from the outside; it is a presentation of the factual record of the war, drawn from official sources, UN reports, and media accounts. The work insists that the reader confront this record directly.
Chapter 4: The New World Order and the Environment
We are now in the fourth chapter of the work, where Chomsky shifts from the immediate case of the Gulf War to a broader and longer-term dimension of the New World Order: its relationship to the global environment. This chapter presents the argument that the emerging global order is fundamentally incompatible with ecological sustainability, and that the same principles of power and control that drive U.S. foreign policy also drive its approach to environmental questions.
The chapter opens by establishing a stark contrast between the rhetoric of global governance and the reality of environmental destruction. Chomsky writes that the New World Order proclaims itself as a system of international cooperation and shared responsibility, yet the actual record shows something entirely different. He points to the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro as a crucial test case. At this summit, the world’s nations gathered to address the growing environmental crisis, and the United States, as the world’s most powerful nation and its largest producer of greenhouse gases, played a decisive role. Chomsky documents that the U.S. delegation, under President George H.W. Bush, actively blocked meaningful action on climate change. The U.S. refused to sign the Biodiversity Treaty and insisted on weakening the climate change convention to the point of near-ineffectiveness. The key demand of the U.S. was that any agreement must be voluntary, with no binding targets or timetables for reducing emissions.
Chomsky then presents the underlying logic of this position. He argues that the U.S. approach to the environment is a direct extension of its approach to world order more generally. The fundamental principle is that the global economy must be organized to serve the interests of concentrated private power, and that any constraints on this system — including environmental constraints — are unacceptable. The author quotes from internal U.S. government documents and statements by officials to demonstrate that this was a conscious and deliberate policy. The Bush administration explicitly rejected the concept of “sustainable development” as promoted by most other nations, arguing instead for “sustained growth” — meaning continuous economic expansion regardless of environmental consequences. Chomsky notes that this position was not unique to Bush but reflected a deeper structural reality: a world order built on corporate domination and state power is inherently incapable of addressing long-term environmental threats.
“The New World Order is not a system of global governance. It is a system of global governance by the powerful, for the powerful.”
What this means in practice, Chomsky explains, is that environmental issues are subordinated to the demands of the market. The author traces the history of this subordination through a series of key events. He discusses the role of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund in promoting development projects that have devastating environmental impacts — dams, deforestation, industrial agriculture — all justified in the name of economic growth. He examines the way trade agreements, particularly the negotiations that would lead to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), were structured to override national environmental regulations. And he shows how the U.S. has used its influence in international institutions to block any serious attempt to regulate multinational corporations or hold them accountable for environmental damage. The picture that emerges is of a system in which the environment is treated as a resource to be exploited, not as a common heritage to be protected.
The chapter also addresses the concept of the “tragedy of the commons” and how it is misapplied in the context of the New World Order. Chomsky argues that the real problem is not the commons themselves but the system of private power that is allowed to exploit them without restraint. He points to the depletion of fisheries, the destruction of rainforests, and the pollution of air and water as cases where the market mechanism fails completely, because the costs of environmental damage are externalized — borne by the public, not by the corporations that cause them. The New World Order, by design, prevents the kind of collective action that would be necessary to address these problems. Instead, it promotes a race to the bottom, where nations compete to attract investment by lowering environmental standards. The result is a global system that is accelerating environmental destruction even as it proclaims its commitment to sustainability.
This section clarifies the relationship between the New World Order’s political and economic structures and its environmental consequences. Chomsky is not simply making a moral argument about the need to protect the environment; he is showing that the same logic that drives U.S. military intervention and global economic domination also drives environmental destruction. The New World Order is not a system that can be reformed to become more environmentally responsible — it is, in its fundamental structure, incompatible with environmental sustainability. The chapter serves to expand the analysis from the specific cases of military intervention to the broader systemic question of what kind of world the New World Order is creating. It also establishes a connection between the immediate human costs of U.S. policy (the deaths in Iraq) and the longer-term, potentially catastrophic costs of environmental collapse. Both, Chomsky argues, are consequences of the same system.
Chapter 5: The New World Order and the Media
The focus now shifts to the role of the media in constructing and maintaining the New World Order. This chapter argues that the media are not neutral observers of global events but active participants in the system of power that Chomsky has been describing. The presentation draws heavily on Chomsky’s earlier work on the “propaganda model” of the media, which he developed with Edward Herman, and applies it to the specific context of the post-Cold War era.
Chomsky begins by presenting the official view of the media in democratic societies: that they are independent watchdogs, holding power to account and providing citizens with the information they need to make informed decisions. He then systematically dismantles this view by examining the actual record of media coverage of major events in the New World Order. The chapter focuses on three case studies: the Gulf War, the invasion of Panama, and the U.S.-sponsored war in Nicaragua. In each case, Chomsky shows that the media functioned not as critics of power but as its servants. During the Gulf War, for example, the media accepted without question the official U.S. narrative of a clean, precise war with minimal civilian casualties. They repeated administration claims about Iraqi atrocities (such as the incubator baby story, which was later proven to be a fabrication) and failed to investigate the scale of the destruction inflicted on Iraqi society. They also systematically excluded from coverage any voices that questioned the war, including anti-war activists, critics of U.S. policy, and representatives of the victims.
The author then presents the structural reasons for this complicity. The media, Chomsky argues, are large corporations that are themselves part of the system of concentrated private power that constitutes the New World Order. They are owned by wealthy individuals and conglomerates with close ties to the government and the business community. They depend on advertising revenue from other corporations. And they rely on official sources — government agencies, think tanks, and experts — for their information, sources that are themselves part of the power structure. The result is a system of “manufactured consent,” in which the media systematically filter out information that would challenge the interests of the powerful and present a worldview that is consistent with those interests.
“The media serve as a propaganda arm of the state, not because journalists are conspirators, but because the institutional structures in which they work ensure that they will produce a narrative that supports the interests of the powerful.”
Chomsky documents this process in detail. He presents evidence of how stories that are critical of the U.S. are marginalized or ignored, while stories that support official policy are given prominent coverage. He shows how the media frame issues in ways that limit the range of acceptable debate, excluding radical or systemic critiques from the outset. He examines the way language is used to shape perception — for example, U.S.-supported violence is called “security assistance” or “counterinsurgency,” while violence by U.S. adversaries is called “terrorism.” The chapter also discusses the role of the media in creating and maintaining the “enemy” construct that is necessary for the New World Order to function. With the end of the Soviet Union, Chomsky argues, the media helped to construct new enemies — first Manuel Noriega, then Saddam Hussein, and later a series of other “rogue states” and “dictators” — to justify continued U.S. military spending and intervention.
This section clarifies the media’s function within the New World Order. Chomsky is not arguing that journalists are deliberately lying or that the media are some kind of monolithic conspiracy. Rather, he is presenting a structural analysis of how the media system operates within a capitalist democracy. The media’s role is to shape public perception in ways that support the existing distribution of power, and they do this not through overt censorship but through a series of filters — ownership, funding, sourcing, and ideological assumptions — that systematically exclude dissenting viewpoints. The chapter is essential to the overall argument of the work because it explains how the New World Order maintains its legitimacy despite the gap between its rhetoric and its reality. The media are the mechanism by which this gap is concealed from the public. Without understanding the propaganda system, one cannot understand how the New World Order persists.
Chapter 6: The New World Order and the Third World
We are in the next major movement of the work, where Chomsky turns from the media’s role in manufacturing consent to examine how the New World Order applies its principles to the Third World, revealing a stark continuity with the old colonial order.
Chomsky opens this chapter by presenting the foundational principle of the New World Order as it applies to the global South: the “doctrine of national security” or “national security state,” a framework developed by the United States for its client states. He argues that this is not a defensive posture but a system of internal repression designed to protect the interests of domestic elites and their foreign patrons. The core idea, as Chomsky presents it, is that threats to the “national security” are defined not by external invasion but by any internal challenge to the established order — whether from labor unions, peasant movements, intellectuals, or democratic reformers. He traces this doctrine to its formal codification in the post-World War II period, specifically citing a 1948 U.S. National Security Council document (NSC-10/2) which authorized covert operations to combat “subversion” and “Communist influence” anywhere in the world. Chomsky argues that this language was a rhetorical cover for crushing movements for social and economic justice. He quotes from a declassified CIA training manual from the 1980s, which states that the goal of a national security state is to “maintain the status quo,” and that “the security of the state is the supreme law,” overriding any notions of human rights or democratic governance. This, Chomsky contends, is the bedrock of the New World Order’s relationship with the Third World.
The chapter then presents a detailed case study of Indochina, particularly East Timor, to illustrate how this doctrine operates in practice. Chomsky recounts the 1975 Indonesian invasion of East Timor, which occurred just days after the United States had withdrawn from Vietnam. He presents evidence that the United States, under President Gerald Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, gave explicit approval for the invasion. The key moment Chomsky cites is a meeting in Jakarta on December 6, 1975, where Ford and Kissinger told Indonesian President Suharto that the U.S. would not object to the use of American-supplied weapons for the operation. Chomsky quotes from declassified State Department cables in which Kissinger states, “We understand your problem and the need for a rapid solution,” and that “whatever you do, you will have our support in the UN.” The result, Chomsky details, was a genocide that killed approximately 200,000 people — roughly one-third of East Timor’s population — over the next two decades. He presents this not as an anomaly but as a direct application of the “national security doctrine”: East Timor’s crime was that it had a legitimate independence movement and a left-leaning government, which threatened the stability of Indonesia, a key U.S. ally in the region. Chomsky emphasizes that the United States continued to supply weapons and diplomatic support to Indonesia throughout the occupation, even as human rights reports documented the massacres.
“The New World Order is not a departure from the old order; it is a continuation of it, with the same basic principles: the use of force to maintain a system of global inequality, the suppression of democracy in the Third World, and the manipulation of public opinion in the West.”
Chomsky then broadens the argument to show that East Timor is not unique but representative of a pattern. He presents the case of Central America in the 1980s as another example. He details how the United States funded and trained the “Contras” in Nicaragua, who carried out attacks on civilian targets, including health clinics and schools, in an effort to overthrow the democratically elected Sandinista government. He cites the 1986 International Court of Justice ruling that found the United States guilty of “unlawful use of force” and “violations of international law” for its support of the Contras. Chomsky also discusses El Salvador, where the U.S. provided billions of dollars in military aid to a government whose security forces were responsible for the murders of tens of thousands of civilians, including the assassination of Archbishop Óscar Romero in 1980. Chomsky’s point is that the U.S. consistently supported regimes that engaged in state terror, as long as those regimes were aligned with U.S. economic and strategic interests. The “threat” in each case — whether in Nicaragua, El Salvador, or Guatemala — was not a military invasion but a domestic movement for land reform, labor rights, or national independence. The New World Order, Chomsky argues, is defined by its opposition to such movements.
The section clarifies what Chomsky means by the term “democracy promotion” in the context of the New World Order. He argues that the U.S. has a very specific definition of “democracy”: it means formal electoral politics within a system that does not threaten the existing distribution of wealth and power. He calls this “low-intensity democracy” or “polyarchy,” a term he borrows from political scientists. Under this definition, a country can be considered democratic as long as it holds elections, even if those elections are held in the shadow of a military that has a veto over policy, even if the media is owned by a tiny elite, and even if the vast majority of the population lives in extreme poverty with no access to real political power. Chomsky presents the case of the Philippines under Ferdinand Marcos as an example. He argues that the U.S. supported the Marcos dictatorship for over a decade, providing billions of dollars in aid, because Marcos was a reliable anti-communist ally. When a genuine democratic movement threatened to bring a popular leftist government to power, the U.S. shifted its support to a managed transition that preserved the power of the oligarchy and the military. Chomsky’s point is that the New World Order does not oppose dictatorship; it only opposes democracy that threatens the interests of the wealthy and powerful, whether at home or abroad.
Chomsky also addresses the economic dimension of this relationship, arguing that the New World Order enforces a system of “neoliberal economics” on the Third World through institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. He presents the “structural adjustment programs” of the 1980s and 1990s as key instruments of this system. These programs, he explains, forced debtor nations to cut social spending, privatize state-owned industries, eliminate trade barriers, and open their economies to foreign investment. Chomsky argues that the stated rationale for these programs — that they would promote economic growth and stability — is belied by their actual effects. He cites studies showing that the countries that underwent strict structural adjustment programs experienced increased poverty, greater income inequality, and a decline in public health and education. He presents the case of sub-Saharan Africa as a particularly stark example: countries that followed IMF prescriptions saw their economies stagnate or decline, while their debts continued to grow. Chomsky’s argument is that the New World Order’s economic policies are designed not to develop the Third World but to integrate it into the global economy on terms favorable to Western corporations and financial institutions. The “free trade” rhetoric of the New World Order, he contends, is a one-way street: the rich countries demand that the poor open their markets, while the rich maintain their own protections for agriculture, textiles, and other industries where the poor might have a comparative advantage.
A crucial section deals with the question of “humanitarian intervention.” Chomsky presents this as a concept that the New World Order uses selectively, not consistently. He contrasts the overwhelming U.S. response to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990 with the virtual silence, or even complicity, regarding other far more serious humanitarian crises. He cites the case of East Timor, where the United States supported Indonesia’s invasion and subsequent genocide, and the case of Turkey’s repression of the Kurds in the 1990s, where the U.S. continued to supply arms. He also discusses the case of Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, where the U.S. consistently vetoed UN Security Council resolutions critical of Israel and provided billions of dollars in military aid. Chomsky’s point is that the principle of “humanitarian intervention” is only invoked when it serves the strategic interests of the great powers. He argues that the real principle is not humanitarianism but “the right to intervene” — a right that belongs exclusively to the powerful and that is exercised against the weak. The New World Order, he writes, has created a world in which the United States and its allies can bomb any country they consider a threat, but no country can hold them accountable for the civilian casualties they cause. He cites the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia as an example: the stated reason was to prevent a humanitarian catastrophe in Kosovo, but Chomsky argues that the bombing itself created a humanitarian catastrophe, and that there were other, less destructive options (such as a negotiated settlement or a diplomatic offensive) that were never seriously considered.
This chapter clarifies that the New World Order’s relationship with the Third World is not based on the principles of the UN Charter or international law, but on the principle of “might makes right.” Chomsky argues that the United States, as the sole superpower after the Cold War, has effectively become a law unto itself. It can invade, bomb, or sanction any country it deems a threat, and it can veto any international action against itself or its allies. The result is a global system in which the weak are subject to the rule of law, while the strong are exempt from it. Chomsky presents the 1986 World Court ruling on Nicaragua as a key example: the United States accepted the court’s jurisdiction only until it lost the case, at which point it withdrew and refused to comply. The chapter is essential because it shows that the New World Order is not a system of universal rights or international cooperation but a system of “global apartheid” — a deeply divided world in which a small minority of wealthy nations rule over a vast majority of poor nations, using the tools of economic coercion and military force to maintain their dominance.
Chapter 7: The New World Order and the Future of Democracy
We are now in the penultimate major section of the work, where Chomsky shifts from analysis of the present to a projection of the future, examining what the New World Order means for the future of democratic governance, both in the West and globally.
Chomsky opens by stating a central paradox: the New World Order is described by its architects as a triumph of democracy, yet its actual operation is deeply undemocratic. He argues that the key institutions of the New World Order — the IMF, the World Bank, the World Trade Organization, and the U.S. government itself — are almost completely insulated from democratic control. They are run by technocrats and corporate executives who are accountable to no electorate. Chomsky calls this “the new authoritarianism” — a system in which key decisions about economic policy, trade, and even military action are made by unaccountable elites, and in which the democratic choices of citizens are increasingly irrelevant. He presents the case of NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement, as a clear example. The treaty was negotiated in secret by trade officials and corporate lawyers, and it was presented to the parliaments of the three countries (the U.S., Canada, and Mexico) as a “take it or leave it” package. Chomsky argues that NAFTA is not a “free trade” agreement at all, but a “corporate bill of rights” that grants corporations the right to sue governments for any regulation that might damage their profits, while specifically excluding labor rights and environmental standards from its provisions. This, he contends, is the model for the New World Order: a set of rules designed to protect corporate power from democratic interference.
“The New World Order is a system of governance designed to protect the rich and the powerful from the democratic will of the people. It is the ultimate expression of the belief that markets are more important than people, and that the right to profit is more fundamental than the right to life.”
Chomsky then turns to the future of democracy in the industrialized West, arguing that the New World Order is leading to a “hollowing out” of democratic institutions. He observes that the traditional functions of the national government — the ability to regulate the economy, to provide social welfare, to protect labor rights — are being systematically dismantled in the name of “globalization” and “free trade.” He argues that voters are increasingly powerless: they can choose between candidates from two corporate-funded parties, but the fundamental direction of policy — towards privatization, deregulation, and austerity — is the same no matter who wins. Chomsky calls this “democracy without choice” or “low-intensity democracy” as applied to the West. He cites the Clinton administration in the United States as a key example: a Democratic president who governed as a centrist, pushing for NAFTA, welfare reform, and financial deregulation — policies that were traditionally associated with the Republican Party. Chomsky argues that this convergence of the two main parties on a corporate-friendly agenda is a feature, not a bug, of the New World Order. The purpose of elections, he writes, is no longer to decide policy but to provide a veneer of legitimacy for a system that is fundamentally controlled by private power.
A significant portion of the chapter deals with the concept of “the permanent warfare state.” Chomsky argues that the New World Order requires a massive military establishment and a state of permanent conflict in order to justify its existence. He presents the case of the Cold War as a model: the threat of the Soviet Union was used to justify massive military spending, an interventionist foreign policy, and the suppression of domestic dissent. With the end of the Cold War, Chomsky argues, the architects of the New World Order needed a new enemy. They found it in the concept of “rogue states” or “terrorism.” He argues that these terms are applied not to states that commit the most violence (such as the United States, which has been responsible for far more civilian deaths than any “rogue state”) but to states that resist U.S. dominance. He cites the case of Iraq under Saddam Hussein, a country that was then bombed and sanctioned for over a decade, causing the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians, for the crime of not submitting to UN weapons inspections in the manner demanded by the U.S. Chomsky argues that the entire architecture of the New World Order — the security council, the international institutions, the humanitarian rhetoric — is designed to provide a framework for the use of force by the powerful against the weak.
Chomsky also explores the implications of the New World Order for the “public sphere” — the space in which citizens can debate and determine their collective future. He argues that this sphere is being systematically colonized by corporate power. He cites the growth of “public relations” and “spin” as industries dedicated to manipulating public opinion. He presents the case of the “think tanks” that produce studies designed to support corporate-friendly policies, and the “foundations” that fund research that is safe for the established order. Chomsky argues that the goal of this entire apparatus is to create a “manufactured consent” — a public that is docile, compliant, and convinced that there is no alternative to the current system. He draws a direct line from the work of Walter Lippmann, whom he quoted extensively in the introduction, to the modern public relations industry. Lippmann’s goal, as Chomsky presents it, was to create a “manufactured will” that would support the decisions of the elite, and this is precisely what the New World Order’s media and propaganda systems are designed to achieve.
This chapter clarifies that the New World Order is not a system of peace and democracy, as its advocates claim, but a system of “hegemonic control” that is fundamentally hostile to genuine democracy. Chomsky argues that the future of democracy depends on opposing the New World Order and building alternatives to it. He offers no detailed blueprint for this alternative, but he does suggest that it would involve moving power away from centralized state and corporate institutions and towards local communities, cooperative enterprises, and popular movements. He mentions the Zapatista rebellion in Chiapas, Mexico, as an example of a movement that is trying to build a different world, one based on autonomy, dignity, and democracy from the ground up. He also cites the anti-globalization movement that emerged in the 1990s, with its protests against the WTO and the IMF, as a harbinger of a future struggle. The section is crucial because it shows that the New World Order is not a natural or inevitable development but a political project that can be challenged and changed. Chomsky’s work is not an exercise in despair but a call to action: the first step towards changing the system, he argues, is understanding it clearly.
Conclusion: The Old Order in a New Guise
We are at the final section of the work, where Chomsky draws together the threads of his analysis and offers a concluding assessment of what the New World Order truly represents.
Chomsky opens this concluding section by returning to his central thesis: the New World Order is not new at all. It is, he writes, “the old order, with a new face.” The end of the Cold War, he argues, removed the last major ideological cover for the United States’ global domination. During the Cold War, every intervention, every act of aggression, every subversion of democracy could be justified as necessary to contain the Soviet threat. With that threat gone, the naked pursuit of power and profit stands exposed. The New World Order, as proclaimed by George H.W. Bush, is merely the old imperial order stripped of its Cold War fig leaf.
The author then recapitulates the key evidence he has presented throughout the book. He revisits the Gulf War, showing how it was not a war for international law or democracy but a war to secure Western control over oil and to demonstrate the absolute military supremacy of the United States. He returns to the environmental crisis, showing how the New World Order’s commitment to corporate profit makes meaningful action on climate change impossible. He revisits the media, showing how they function as a propaganda system that manufactures consent for imperial adventures. He recalls the “Third World,” showing how the New World Order means debt, austerity, and continued subordination for the global South. And he returns to the question of democracy, showing how the New World Order is fundamentally hostile to meaningful popular participation in decision-making.
“The New World Order is not a new order at all. It is the old order, with a new face. It is the order of power, privilege, and profit. It is the order of the few, not the many.”
Chomsky concludes by arguing that the task before us is not to reform the New World Order but to replace it. He calls for a “new new world order,” one based not on the interests of corporations and states but on the needs of people and the planet. He envisions a world in which resources are distributed according to need, not profit; in which decisions are made democratically, not by elites; in which the environment is protected, not plundered. This new order, he writes, will not be granted by the powerful. It must be built from below, by popular movements that challenge the existing structures of power.
The section’s meaning is clear: Chomsky is not simply offering a critique; he is issuing a call to action. The New World Order is a system of power that serves the few at the expense of the many, and it can only be changed through sustained, organized resistance. The book ends not with a solution but with a challenge: will we accept the New World Order as the end of history, or will we fight for something better?
Afterword: Looking Forward
We have reached the final section of the work, the afterword, where Chomsky offers a brief update on the themes he explored in the main text and reflects on what has changed — and what has not — since the book’s original publication.
Chomsky begins the afterword by noting that the key dynamics he identified in the main text have only intensified. The United States continues to act as a global imperial power, intervening in the affairs of other nations to protect its interests. The media continue to serve as a propaganda system, manufacturing consent for these interventions. The environment continues to deteriorate, with corporate interests blocking meaningful action on climate change. And the gap between rich and poor, both within and between nations, continues to widen. The New World Order, far from being replaced, has become even more entrenched.
The author then discusses several specific developments that have occurred since the book’s original publication. He examines the Clinton administration’s foreign policy, showing how it continued the basic pattern of the Bush administration: humanitarian rhetoric masking the pursuit of corporate interests. He discusses the expansion of NATO, arguing that it represents not a response to new security threats but an extension of American power into Eastern Europe. He analyzes the wars in the former Yugoslavia, showing how the media presented them as humanitarian interventions when in fact they were largely about establishing Western dominance in the region. And he addresses the growing anti-globalization movement, noting that it represents a genuine challenge to the New World Order.
“The system remains fundamentally unchanged. The same forces that drove the Cold War and the Gulf War are still at work. The same institutions serve the same interests. The same propaganda obscures the same realities.”
Chomsky concludes the afterword — and the book — by returning to his central message: the New World Order is a system of power that must be understood if it is to be challenged. He writes that the future is not predetermined. The system can be changed, but only if people organize and act. The book ends with this challenge, leaving the reader to decide what to do with the knowledge they have gained. The final note is one of cautious hope: the forces that created the New World Order are powerful, but they are not invincible. The future, Chomsky insists, is still unwritten.
