NAM Tails behind Brandt

NAM Tails behind Brandt I S G TOWARDS the close of 1979 when the world in general and industrial countries in particular already faced prospects of prolonged, severe recession, the Independent Commission on International Development Issues under the chairmanship of Willy Brandt (commonly known as the Brandt Commission), had come out with what was called 'A Programme for Survival'. Many people, said .Willy Brandt, "may consider this to be the worst possible moment for advocating radical changes" but he believed that it was "precisely in this time of crisis that basic world issues must be faced and bold initiatives taken" to reshape worldwide relations. The existing system of international institutions which was established at the end of World War II, the Commission felt, faced numerous disadvantages which called for fundamental correction. Hence the demand for a new international economic order, "What is new on the agenda is a re-arrangement of international relations, the building of a new order and a new kind of comprehensive approach to the problems of development." In the establishment of the new order, the Brandt Commission called for co-operation between the industrialised, affluent North and the developing, poor South, pointing out, at practically every step in its exposition, to the mutuality of gains and benefits to all countries, rich and poor, from a strengthened, more just global economy.