World Politics: Trend And Transformation

The essays collected here relate the writings of Antonio Gramsci and others to the contemporary reconstruction of historical materialist theories of international relations. The contributors analyze the contradiction between globalizing and territorially based social and political forces in the context of past, present, and future world orders, and view the emerging world order as undergoing a structural transformation, a "triple crisis" involving economic, political and "socio-cultural" change.

The Democratic Republic of Congo has the third largest urban population in sub–Saharan Africa (estimated at 43% in 2016) after South Africa and Nigeria. It is expected to grow at a rate of 4.1% per year, which corresponds to an additional 1 million residents moving to cities every year. If this trend continues, the urban population could double in just 15 years. Thus, with a population of 12 million and a growth rate of 5.1% per year, Kinshasa is poised to become the most populous city in Africa by 2030.