As we step into a new year and a new world order unfolds, Africa must learn urgent lessons from the UK and US who, last year, both experienced the most paradigm-shifting political earthquakes witnessed in recent political history.
The United Kingdom’s vote to leave the European Union and Donald Trump’s unexpected victory in the recent U.S. presidential elections have shown, in the starkest terms, how political and economic exclusion can stoke social divisions and spark tensions that can lead to major political upheavals.
As both countries writhe from the political whiplash of the ‘blue-collar revolution’ and struggle to come to terms with its implications, the political ripples are already spreading across the world. The geo-political power balance has shifted and global politics, as we knew it, has been turned on its head. The future of global governance is now on a precarious path.