Introduction

Many nations were devastated by the Great Depression (1929-1939) and the Second World War. Leaders looked for solutions to global conflict, poverty, injustice and instability. Intergovernmental groups like the League of Nations (1920-1946) had failed to promote peace and economic security. So, world leaders tried a new approach.

Several new institutions were created. An institution is an organized social structure. It tends to be complex and long-lasting. Institutions affect how communities are organized by influencing behavior, customs, and laws. In this case, leaders wanted to create institutions that would help communities or networks of people. These institutions would pursue particular social, political, or economic goals.

As we discuss these world institutions, we’ll consider how effective they were at influencing people’s lives. How did the world change as a result of these new institutions?

A world government? The development of political institutions

The League of Nations, formed in 1918, had been intended to prevent another world war. But in 1943, World War II peaked, and it had obviously failed. Global leaders knew they needed a new institution that could carry out similar goals. So, in 1945, they formed the United Nations (UN).

With the United Nations, all member nations had a duty to come together as an international community. They had to resist aggressive behavior to ensure collective security. One of the UN’s tools to prevent conflict is its judicial arm: the International Court of Justice (ICJ), headquartered in the Netherlands. The Court’s role is to resolve disputes between member states¹ and to advise the United Nations’ various agencies.

The United Nations has also created measures for protecting global health and human rights. The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is one example. It set standards for human rights, the treatment of women and children, and labor. Another example was the World Health Organization (WHO). This agency ensures public health globally.

So, the UN clearly serves many different functions. All are aimed at a better, healthier, fairer, and more peaceful world. This has led some to describe the UN as a “world government.” But it’s quite different from a government. The United Nations is not like an independent nation. It cannot punish its citizens. Instead, it must influence its member states through treaties, monitoring, special procedures, and commissions.

Has the United Nations met these goals? The language of rights that it sponsored has certainly shifted how people think about individuals, citizens, and states. The United Nations isn’t always able to enforce humanitarian standards. Still, these standards seem to have affected people’s beliefs and behaviors.

Has the United Nations ended conflict? Absolutely not. There is still violence and corruption today. But does evidence show that violence has lowered overall? How about human rights abuses? And for whom have these measures been most effective? To answer these questions, we can consider human rights reports, changes in population, and death rates. We know the shifts are occurring. Still, it’s trickier to figure out what’s causing them.

Globalizing trade: the economic institutions

After the end of World War II, many leaders were also worried about economic instability and poverty. After the Great Depression, most world economies were still struggling. Even before the war ended in 1944, some leaders met in the United States. Their goal was to regulate the global economy.

Out of these discussions, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) was formed. So was the World Bank.

Originally the IMF and the World Bank aimed at protecting employment and standards of living. They also wanted to make sure trade was balanced. Both institutions wanted to help member countries develop their resources and productive powers. Their initial goals were largely focused on regulation—creating new international trade policies. The World Bank had a slightly different focus: reconstruction and development.

Working together, the idea was that they would help member states share risk, resources, and information. This was meant to be non-political. Each state’s voting power lined up to how much money it would put into the project. This non-political style was important because member states wanted to avoid nationalist policies, where countries only look out for their own interests. Such “me-first” focus had made the Great Depression worse. Instead, these institutions worked by creating more cooperation. The IMF, for example, gave loans to poorer, developing countries to cover trade deficits (shortages). The World Bank made massive investments in the form of debt relief and reconstruction projects, particularly in Europe.

Over time, the original goals changed. It became about opening up markets around the world. This concept is called economic liberalization. The idea is that markets would be less held back by rules on trade, allowing networks of exchange to operate more freely. The international institution that most pushed for economic liberalization is the World Trade Organization (WTO), founded in 1995.

How did these institutions change the world? Over several decades, the global markets did in fact become increasingly connected to broad networks. This allowed money and investment to move much more easily. These institutions also helped manage financial meltdowns and economic transitions. For example, they encouraged countries like the former Soviet Union to move toward open markets. It otherwise may have used a nationalistic economy.

Non-Governmental Institutions

International non-governmental organizations (INGOs) also create global change. From the nineteenth century, such organizations have worked to tackle global health problems and poverty. The International Committee of the Red Cross and Oxfam International are examples. More recently, human rights advocacy organizations, like Amnesty International, have allowed many more people to see themselves as global citizens participating in an international community. Environmental activist organizations like Greenpeace have had a similar effect, putting campaigns on TV and in newspapers.

This belief in the importance of common action highlights the ways these institutions shape people’s communities. This can be a powerful—and effective—belief. INGOs² like Amnesty International have effectively called attention to abuses. They’ve pushed for violent acts like rape to be defined as war crimes. The groups also helped build world opinion against nuclear testing and the racist system of Apartheid in South Africa.

Changing world opinion is no small thing. It creates a powerful feeling of connectedness and shared responsibility.

Some conclusions

The world is now connected in a never-before-seen way. International political and economic institutions and global NGOs influenced that.

But these connections have not always been even. The effects have been partial, inconsistent, or short-lived. Some have been hurtful, even. They haven’t always managed to prevent problems. Also, in pushing economic liberalization, these institutions have resulted in fewer social protections. In many cases, in order to receive debt relief, loans, or other investment, countries have been forced to reduce social protections like healthcare. Altogether, these changes have created more uniformity on a global scale—for better or for worse.

1 A state is any region with its own government. A nation, meanwhile, has that and a population who unified in many ways, i.e. culturally, socially, economically, ancestrally, etc.
2 When a non-governmental institution does not deal with international issues, it’s just called NGO. But it’s worth noting that people very often say NGO when they are actually talking about INGO’s like the Red Cross and Amnesty International.