The Non-Aligned movement had its origins in 1955, 70 years ago, at the conference in Bandung, Indonesia, where some 30 Asian and African leaders met to encourage cooperation and trade among the newly independent countries to put an end to the colonialism of which they had been victims. They also expressed their decision to support the liberation movements seeking independence and to distance themselves from the two main powers of the time: the United States and the Soviet Union, which had begun a struggle for hegemony through the Cold War.

The Bandung Declaration stated in one of its points that the signatories should “refrain from participating in collective defense agreements”, i.e., military pacts, which favored either of the two countries. A few years later, in 1961, in Belgrade, then capital of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) was officially born with 28 member states, where issues such as the self-determination of peoples, independence, a new international economic order, the end of the South African apartheid doctrine, and the non-participation in military pacts were discussed, or disarmament, among others, gave strength and growth to the movement which, from its beginnings, made its voice heard through the Group of 77 (G-77), created in 1964 and which today groups 134 countries, supporting the call and fulfillment of “we the peoples”, i.e. the United Nations Charter. From Latin America, only Cuba participated in this first meeting.

Twentieth century

It was in the second half of the 20th century, during the Cold War, when the so-called Third World massively joined the NAM, achieving a strong presence in the United Nations and multilateral bodies. From 28 participating countries in Belgrade in 1961, it grew to 47 at the Cairo meeting in 1964, to 54 in Lusaka in 1970, to 75 in Algiers in 1973, to 86 countries in Colombo in 1976, and to 96 in Havana in 1979. Prior to this Summit, Fidel Castro wanted to raise the thesis that the socialist countries were the “natural allies” of the non-aligned countries, which was strongly refuted by one of the founders of the movement, Yugoslav President Josip Broz Tito, who remained firm in the founding principles such as not belonging to any bloc and far from any form of political or economic hegemony.

The Yugoslavia of the 1970s had one of the strongest armies in Europe and had demonstrated the political will to confront Soviet ambitions to bring it under its orbit, which gave it the legitimacy to become one of the leading countries of the movement. From the 1980s onwards, the NAM began to decline, as demonstrated at the New Delhi and Harare meetings in 1982 and 1989, respectively.

The ANPM grew during wars such as Vietnam, the Middle East between Israel and the Arab countries, the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan, the struggles in Africa, the devastating war between Iran and Iraq, and many other conflicts. He had decisive participation in the United Nations on economic and political issues, in the fight against underdevelopment in the Third World, and in support of the right to self-determination of countries. Among his achievements, we can highlight, among others, the majority vote in the United Nations assembly of the resolution that cataloged Zionism as a form of racism equivalent to apartheid, or several others referring to the illegal occupation of Israel in Palestine.

The 1990s saw the fall of the Berlin Wall, the disappearance of the Soviet Union, the European socialist bloc and the end of the Cold War. The change in the global scenario and, fundamentally, the disappearance of the Warsaw Pact as a military alliance, caused the NAM to lose strength and international presence, even though NATO continued to add countries and fed an aggressive policy to confront Moscow's expansionist power that resulted, in fact, in a Russian war against Ukraine-NATO that is still going on.

From the third world to the global south

The end of bipolarism in the 1990s and the undisputed dominance of the United States, together with the uninterrupted process of globalization, the strengthening of new political and economic referents such as the European Union, the strength and presence of the People's Republic of China, the awakening of India and the recent expansion of the BRICS, (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa), created in 2010, seek to move the world in another direction.

Formally, today the NAM has around 120 countries. Summit meetings have been held in Tehran in 2012, in Isla Margarita in Venezuela (2016), in Baku in 2019, and the last summit in 2024 in Kampala, Uganda. The NAM has become irrelevant on the international scene, being relegated as a political expression that was valid in the 20th century. Third World or Developing countries are now called “Global South”, and the term “Asia Pacific” is also being changed to “Indo-Pacific” for geopolitical reasons. There are political and economic forces seeking to align regions rich in natural resources and isolate them from competition from the Western world, as is the case with China.

The intellectual effort to revive the policy of non-alignment falls into a void because the 21st century is facing a transformed world that is rapidly encountering realities such as climate change, artificial intelligence, the fight for data, or even more serious, the loss of legitimacy of the natural scenario for action of developing countries, such as the United Nations, where resolutions have become a dead letter or fall into the void and continue to be ignored by the five great controllers of real power centered in the Security Council. Increasingly sophisticated technological development requiring greater financial and human resources, dependence on the global market, money flows, and economic aid to face crises, among many other factors, make most of the countries of the so-called “Global South” dependent, where differences in politics, interests, and economic development are clear.

The 21st century

In contrast to the second half of the 20th century, when two military blocs faced each other, in the 21st century few countries can claim to be truly non-aligned and practice an autonomous and independent policy vis-à-vis giants such as the United States or China. Even among states with nuclear power, there are major differences in economic development, such as Pakistan or India. The latter country, which has a growing scientific and technological development together with a rising economy, can aspire to a role of real non-alignment, always conditioned by the support of its allies or that of its rivals.

Other regional powers, such as Iran, Turkey, South Africa, Brazil, or Indonesia, have strong defense apparatuses and military industries but remain dependent on the defense technology market, chips concentrated in a handful of countries, and financial flows.

In most states of today's so-called “Global South”, there are deep political divisions, diverging interests and asymmetries in economic development, and technological and military dependence, which means that they lack the strength to stand on the international stage independently and autonomously. When they do so -except in exceptional situations- they are ignored or may be punished when it comes to credits or cooperation. This is the harsh reality that cannot be hidden with academic exercises, since countries continue to revolve around power, which is legitimized mainly by military and economic force.

It is no coincidence that the greatest power on the planet, the United States, maintains more than 600 military bases around the world and concentrates the largest arms industry and arms sales with figures that surpass imagination. In short, there is no room in today's world for non-alignment except as a legitimate aspiration of the peoples of the world who continue to rely on the main instrument created to prevent wars, such as the United Nations Charter.