The idea of "globalization" is not just an economic or technological concept, but a real paradigm shift that redefines the boundaries of politics, society and identity. After the bipolar order dissolved in 1989, the speed at which goods, information, and ideas traverse the globe made our lives simultaneously more interdependent and more vulnerable. In the contemporary world, therefore, we are not faced with a simple continuation of the past: we are immersed in a time that we could define as one of "rupture" and "transformation".
The notion of the "end of history" – made famous by Francis Fukuyama – held that with the fall of the Soviet bloc, liberal democracy would become the inevitable horizon of mankind. But this premise has proved to be very fragile: the last few decades have shown us that democracy, the market and peace do not unfold automatically just because they are proclaimed: conflicts on a global scale, financial crises, the resurgence of authoritarian power, and the new so-called "hybrid" wars are all signs that history is not over, and that the claim was perhaps naïve.
With the birth of the magazine Global Age. Journal of Political Studies and International Thought, promoted by ASERI - and published by EDUCatt - we intend to give voice to that complexity, not as a simple accounting of events, but as a space in which political thought analyzes, questions and contextualizes transformations. The "global age" is not a simple label: it implies that no issue today can be confined to the local, that the distinction between national and international has been diluted, and that political thought must leave the traditional disciplinary fence to range over the globe.
This change questions new generations of scholars and professionals: those who look not only at the systemic dimension of the world, but also at the often neglected aspects, i.e. those micro-dynamics that cross cultures, identities, languages and technologies. Training skills capable of interpreting the contemporary world has been ASERI's mission in its thirty years of life, and today with this magazine it is renewed: not only to preserve a legacy, but to project it into a future in which the global interpretation of politics is no longer a privilege, but a necessity.
The choice is therefore not between "resuming" the age of the past or "giving" it a new course: it is recognizing that globalization today is a structural fact, which requires up-to-date critical tools. With Global Age magazine we want to participate in this collective effort of reflection and discussion, because our era deserves to be understood.