True, freewheeling American-style capitalism has not acquitted itself proudly of late. And America's military superiority has not proved all that useful in accomplishing American ends. But who may pick up the slack in providing global leadership?

The uncomfortable answer that Obama is likely to confront is this: nobody. America may be damaged, but no replacement is on offer. Europe is self-absorbed, focused on creating whatever kind of entity it ends up deciding to be. China's standard response to any suggestion that it exercise global leadership is to hide beneath its vast internal agenda and plead poverty. No other country comes close to having either the capacity or the ambition.

In the face of the familiar litany of desperate global problems, not just financial instability, but also climate change, energy insecurity, potential pandemics, terrorism, and the spread of weapons of mass destruction, the prospect of a rudderless world is more than alarming. What is to be done? And by whom?

Given that the United States has not been playing much of a leadership role on many of these issues recently, it is worth taking a look at what happens when no one country exercises effective leadership.

Consider climate change. It is now clear that avoiding catastrophic climate change requires dramatic and rapid reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions, cuts that would lower annual emissions to 80 per cent below 1990 levels by 2050. Yet emissions are not just rising, but accelerating. The coming recession may stem their growth temporarily, but only slightly. The necessary reductions imply a rapid and radical transformation of industrial, energy, and land-use systems around the world.

Supposedly, by December 2009 in Copenhagen governments will agree on a new treaty to set limits on emissions. But the prospects are close to nil. The new Obama administration will have only a few months to develop meaningful proposals that can win domestic support, and will be preoccupied with the aftermath of the current financial debacle and the Iraq war.

Europe is pushing for ambitious targets but is having trouble with its own vested interests. The large emerging countries, although they will suffer disproportionately from wilder weather and rising sea levels, show little interest in picking up the slack. Negotiation watchers term the current American-Chinese dance of mutual blame a suicide pact. In short, the process is a mess.

This is hardly surprising. An inter-governmental system that falls apart under the challenges of trade negotiations and proliferation threats is unlikely to master the deep complexity and multitudinous vested interests that the issue of climate change entails. Traditional diplomacy will at best devise a face-saving but meaningless accord next year.

There are many ways to put matters on the global agenda, as shown by Bono's campaigns on African development and Al Gore's on climate change. While enforcement in the coercive sense remains the domain of states, coercive enforcement is rare even when it comes to inter-governmental agreements. Whether countries abide by agreements has far more to do with international processes of persuasion, socialization, and capacity-building, and those can be done by anyone with a good argument.

The big question today is whether all these alternative approaches can add up to more than a bit of desperate tinkering around the edges. Standard international-relations thinking does not even entertain the question, and those conventional ways of seeing the world have blinded us to looking at this crucial question.

As a result, we do not yet know the answer. Data remain scarce. There are hundreds of global public-private partnerships working on various global ills but few have been examined to see what good they do. The mishmash of initiatives, actors, campaigns, and appeals creates opportunities for major progress and mass confusion.

If there is to be real progress toward more effective and efficient global governance that can address the unprecedented challenges posed by climate change and the rest of the global agenda, we must do much more than look for an easy replacement for American hegemony. We must figure out how to make sense of this enormous diversity of ways of saving the world.

Project Syndicate

Ann Florini is Director of the Centre on Asia and Globalisation at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore.

Chhimi Urkyen Gurung, president of the Nepal Cycling Association (NCA), puts it best: "Mountain biking and Nepal were made for each other."

With its endless rocky trails, tough climbs and steep descents, Nepal is the perfect place for mountain biking. And you only need to ride a few minutes outside Kathmandu's Ring Road to get there with the added bonus of a splendid mountain backdrop.

After two years of lobbying by the NCA, Nepal finally signed a contract this summer to host the XIV Asian Mountain Bike Championships, the first such event the country has hosted. If it goes well, this should open the door for Nepal to host other sporting events, including the 2010 World Mountain Biking Championships.

Dhanjit Rai, one of Nepal's top riders, is keen for the country to put on a good show: "We all hope that this will heighten the interest in mountain biking as a sport for both tourists and Nepalis here."

Shailee Basnet and Shradha Basnyat

KIRAN PANDAY AIR-BORNE: Padam Sabenhang (Limbu), 23, flies with his bike during practice in Chobar before the championship.

ALL OTHER PICS: SUNDAR SHRESTHA PEDAL AWAY: Nepali participants practicing for the cross-country category in Chobar on Monday.

TEAM NEPAL: (l-r): Dipendra Bajracharya, Surendra Rai, Padam Sabenhang (Limbu), Suresh Kumar Dulal and Dhanjit Rai are participating in the upcoming XIVAsian Championship.

About the race

From 6-10 November, more than 60 competitors from Nepal and 12 from other Asian countries will take part in the XIV Asian championships. The winning team will qualify for the 2012 London Olympics. In the cross-country race, 30 men and 11 women will compete in their respective elite categories over the steep, rocky five-km track at Chobar. There will also be a downhill race, with 22 men and three women competing.

About the competitors

DOWNHILL: Sajja Rajhanshi, one of the promising contenders from Nepal, races downhill in Chobar on Monday.

Sajjan Rajbanshi and Padam Sabenhang (Limbu) are two of the toughest riders in the squad. Rajbanshi, nicknamed the 'Himalayan Hurricane' in the US, spent six years in cross-country races before switching to downhill two years ago. He has participated in two Asian Championships, and finished 12th in 2001 in the championships held in Thailand.

Sabenhang, though one of the youngest contenders, is considered one of the strongest. He started racing for fun five years ago but began to take it more seriously after he kept finding himself on the winners' podium. As reigning national champion and the best cross-country racer in the team, his medal chances look bright.

Among the international competitors, China, Japan and Korea are all fielding very strong teams.

Subina posed as a Buddhist from Nepal delivering food aid and was the first journalist to reach the area. She spoke to shocked survivors in villages along the river as the victims lay unattended on the riverbanks. The survivors had no food, water or government help and a week after Cyclone Nargis, were becoming desperate. Subina produced, filmed, edited and voiced the report herself.

Subina's report is among three finalists in the news category that also includes an ITN documentary on Somalia and another Al Jazeera report on a Kenyan slum. One of the judges praised Subina's 'enterprising news gathering', adding: 'This is a powerful piece with some extraordinary shots. But at the same time the restraint of the reporting matches the quiet dignity with which the villagers share their stories with an outsider.'

Subina is based in Nepal and was trained in journalism in the US and India. She has been working with documentary films since 2001. To bypass Burmese controls, Subina had to sneak in on a tourist visa and sidetrack officials, who were on the look out for foreign journalists, on her way to the parts worst affected by the cyclone.

Says Subina: "The sun was relentless and it was difficult to ignore the smell of the decaying bodies. And yet, the dark cloud made everything look so beautiful. After talking to the villagers, I came back feeling helpless, angry and sad. Sometimes the journey down the river still haunts me."

The Rory Peck Awards recognises the work of freelance cameramen and camerawomen in TV news gathering and current affairs worldwide. The Awards ceremony on Thursday evening in London was attended by senior broadcasters, freelancers, bureau chiefs, commissioning editors, diplomats and journalists.

Besides the news category, there is also a prize for freelance news footage on humanitarian issues and another one for in-depth features.