Thoughts.

In the end, the Rise of the Rest is still about the Rise of the Rest. Glenn Beck can shake (is there someone under his desk tazing him whenever he tries to make a point?) and ramble all he wants, politicians can rabble rabble rabble all they want and a Chinese farmer can sit in their Yangtze delta rice paddy as long as he or she likes, but the tides of change are a'swirlin' and nothing short of a nuclear holocaust can stop it.

There's a quote from a film (2008's Curious Case of Benjamin Button) that I've always liked but never really felt, i guess, until rather recently. "You can be as mad as a mad dog at the way things went. You could swear, curse the fates, but when it comes to the end, you just have to let things go." America doesn't seem to want to let American hegemony go and it's understandable...No person (who happens to be a control freak) feels comfortable with giving up control. We're faced with two options that will shape how the final transition turns out. We can deny that there's 'a problem,' say that everyone else is the problem and try to redirect the tides of change (even for just a little while), or we can accept that we're living in a changing world and that, for the sake of stability and survival, we can make the best of it and do what we can to usher in this change smoothly.
For the last little while, we've been on what I feel is the wrong path...we've been trying to "stay the course" and maintain American hegemony (A good and lengthy example would be: launching a military adventure into an underdeveloped yet resource rich country in order to pull them from OPEC and then flood the market with their oil (cheaply), hopefully leading to a destabalization of OPEC and, under the pressures of Saudi debt, reduction of OPEC influence and control as a means of increasing American hegemony in the region for years to come...all the while, cracking open the country to the 'beauty' of the free-market for the purpose of maintaining hegemony and increasing the sphere of American influence...yup, that's what it was all about. I just blew your mind!)

This book is about taking a different path. It is about accepting what's going to come and trying to come up with solutions about what sort of positive things we can do about it. Going further, it's about preparedness and in order to be prepared we must understand and in order to do that, we must first discuss.

I found that Fareed laid the subject matter of this book out very clearly and in a very eloquent manor, discussed from a point of view that is truly worldly and relatively free of a Western bias. I do believe that this book will (and has) succeeded in the goal of bringing the topic of Post-Americanism out from the backrooms of policy advisors and into the homes of average Western citizens.

In regards to the class project itself, I have picked up two other books (The End of Oil by Paul Roberts and The Omnivores Dilemma by Michael Polan) that were also on the class list of reading material for this project and have been reading through them while working on this blog project for The Post-American World. I'm actually quite happy to find something within the Engineering cirriculum here at the ol' UofC that engages me on a level other than well, Engineering (Fluid Mech, Thermodynamics or other nerd stuff.) I found that writing the blog was far more time consuming than I expected it to be (and much more so than a book report would have been) and at times, I found it somewhat challenging to do. It is this challenge combined with the ability to express my own thoughts as they are that made this project so enjoyable to do.

I was speaking with a friend of mine about 'the Engg481 project' a while back and she shared a kernel of wisdom that a professor of hers had once shared with her: "A blog should be like a woman's skirt. Long enough to cover the goods, but short enough to keep you interested." It'd be pretty easy to say that, considering i've written a solid 6 pages of 10point font per chapter that I may have failed in that respect; however I don't think this is really the case. I feel that the content of this book is so important that if the ideas are not analyzed at length or discussed thoroughly, then you run the risk of losing out on the true message of the book. Over the last few years i've taken a heavy interest in economic theory as well as human psychology (specifically behaviour) and I have enjoyed analyzing the content of this book, both within this blog and unspoken, through an engineering lens as well as through the lens of my own interests. It's been a neat project, one that i've very much enjoyed doing (I already said that, but oh well.)

I don't think there's much more to it to say other than that...I thank you for bearing with me and reading through the length of my ramblings and all that. I'd also like to thank Marjan Eggermont for teaching this class and putting her own spin on things, I really enjoyed it.

-Darren.

Chapter 7: American Purpose (And the story goes full circle)

Well Team...give yourselves a round of applause...we made it. This is the seventh and final chapter in the P-AW and the story has come full circle. Through this book, Fareed has examined the fundamental driving forces behind Post-Americanism and the historical background which has laid the foundation for the Post-American World. We have also examined the effects that this global movement has had on two countries that are symbolic of the rest of the world, India and China. No body has said that the Rise of the Rest will be an easy transition for any single country or the world as a whole, but one could believe that in a uni-polar world experiencing a shift away from uni-polarity, the country that defines this order could experience the most turbulent, tumultuous transformation. The previous outlined and analyzed America's position in the Rise of the Rest movement up until now and both strengths and weaknesses that are present within the country that may or may not help its transition. The current chapter, American Purpose, deals with strategies for America to move forward and to help make the Rise of the Rest a true global success. The image to the right is all that Google would hook me up with when I searched for "Purpose" (American Purpose didn't really turn up anything good.) So here we go...that's what it's all about. Purpose.

As a side note, I apologize. This chapter's write up is largely going to be a giant wall of neverending text with few images to break it up. Bust out that Venti 'Pike Place' roast and lets get a'readin'!

Fareed begins the chapter with a brief example to illustrate the current uni-polarity of our world and how that is changing. In 2002, Morocco sent twelve soldiers to the Island of Leila (pictured), a tiny mound of rock a few hundred metres off the Moroccan coast, inhabited by goats, parsley and perhaps a bird or two. These soldiers planted the Moroccan flag in the soil and everybody cheered. Except Spain...who felt that the island was their sovereign territory. Spain airlifted seventy-five soldiers to the island, planted two flags and continually buzzed the lonely rock with attack helicopters and docked several naval vessels off coast. Reacting like two bald men fighting over a comb, Morocco quickly denounced the Spanish "Act of War" and the nation got all whipped up into a nationalist frenzy. Thankfully, unlike the Falkland Islands incident which occurred a while earlier, Morocco and Spain agreed to at least talk things out before starting to shoot each other. Of course, someone would have to mediate between the two countries to make sure the talks went smoothly...and that responsibility, of course, fell to the United States [1].

Wait...what? The United States? Reflecting on the situation, Colin Powel (who was charged with de-ruffling everyone's feathers) later mused to himself about the task. The United States had no interests in the region (no oil to be found there) had no special leverage or relations with either country, nor could it represent a broad, world view on the situation like the EU or the UN could [1]. So in what rational mind could it make sense to have the United States be the mediator here? It really comes down to the fact that the United States was at the top of the world order, still the sole superpower and it was able to call the shots world wide. Fareed uses this example to mark a specific point in time to compare and contrast the current world with the state of global affairs during this time. 2002 marks the apex of global uni-polarity and as Fareed puts it: "America's Roman moment." America was the new kid on the block and the coolest kid in school, dazzling the world with its roaring economy, soaring growth rates, sky-high surpluses, super strong dollar and ultra-rad Air Max I's and Breakfast Clubs.

As I've mentioned previously in this blog, America does remain the global super power but in the last 8 years has slid down a rather slippery slope, but since this book is about the Rise of the Rest, it makes sense that the most important change isn't dealing with America but with the rest of the world at large and as time goes on (regardless of the current difficulties of the global economic recession) the rise will only gain strength. Things are going America's way, but the observable slide of America (in almost every respect: economic strength, political influence, social control, world image, etc) from that high water mark in 2002 raises a big question: How did America blow it? Did they really squander the opportunities associated with being the world's sole superpower?

According to Fareed, the answer is more or less a resounding "Yup" and paradoxically, the reasoning can be traced back to America's own strength. Since the Soviet Union folded, America has more or less strutted the globe unrivalled and unchecked and while its true that this position has the potential for some amazing benefits, it's made America arrogant and lazy, rather ignorant of the 'goings-on' of the rest of the world. We can draw a parallel to the Detroit Automotive sector's business plan in the 60's and 70's. The Big Three openly scoffed and laughed at the idea that a Japanese maker could actually penetrate the American market, let alone actually offer competition with the American brands...and, well, that attitude didn't work out so well for them, did it? (My father had the "BUY AMERICAN!!" attitude when it came to cars and actually purchased a Toyota SUV recently due in part to the fact that the American equivalents were just so terrible in so many respects.) This political attitude (also mentioned in previous chapters) wasn't always the case and soon after the collapse of the Soviet Union, many big shots in world political circles figured uni-polarity was going to be a brief phase that would very quickly yield to a multi-polar world. However, in the years since, despite efforts of Presidents to tread lightly and to focus (LIKE A LASER BEAM, said Bill Clinton) on other issues (economy) world foreign policy just kept on ending up in the hands of America and soon became much more assertive on the way of doing things. The real enabling factor in the slide of America came along on an easy going Tuesday morning in September, 2001. Before that day, Fareed points out that there was considerable difficulty and several domestic constraints that made the pursuit of a unilateral and for lack of a better term, empirical policy possible [2]. I'm not going to get into opinions, thoughts, feelings and all that craziness regarding America and 9/11, but I will simply leave a quote from my good friend Hermann Goering, Commander of the Luftwaffe and successor to ol' Adolf. "Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the Leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country" [3]. Anywho, after this attack America was scared, angry, and united and this fateful day has allowed the country to live in a cocoon and, as mentioned previously in chapter 6, allowed for the development of a political structure that is lazy, ignorant and taking a lax view on competition. I know the point of this was covered in chapter 6 and I'm more or less reiterating myself, but this point is one that is incredibly important to establish.

As America moves into the future and deeper into the Post-American world, I feel that it is quite critical to look to the past in order to ensure a smooth transition. Previously, America took a much more diplomatic, cooperative and friendly approach to the rest of the world. It was the single most powerful nation in the world when it proposed the creation of the League of Nations, and was still the dominant force on the globe when it later spearheaded the creation of the United Nations [4]. Many people, then and today, are worried to live in a world in which a single nation holds so much power and influence over the rest of the globe and the purpose of America then was to foster a never ending cycle of diplomacy and friendliness. This was done with incredible care and expertise and created not only a pro-American world that served America's own interests for expansion and control, but laid the foundations for the global economy and order and was a crucial, 'unseen' force in continuing the dominance of America. These diplomatic efforts also served to calm the waters and to assure the world that "America's mammoth power was not to be feared [5]." Unfortunately, copying the past will not work as we move forward to the future (international relations are a complex bunch) but recognizing the difference between the attitudes of then and now is important.

The rules are different this time around. I've mentioned before that Washington's central challenge is in transitioning itself from sole global superpower into a new role more fitting with the Rise of the Rest. Fareed identifies this role as that of an honest, constructive global broker. By using the current standing at the top of the world order and by utilizing competitiveness with other countries and by utilizing all of the strengths of the American society (including economic, cultural, diversity...hopefully not military), America can forge unique relationships with each specific country that are stronger than those that each of these countries have with each other. The other element that I mentioned to Washington's central challenge is the need to actually accept a world order in which America will not dominate, one that allows other countries to participate in full. The ability to transform from a sole superpower into this global trust broker goes hand in hand with allowing other countries to participate in full, to rise to the zenith of their own potential. America can do this by shifting from unilateralism back to the methods of old, those used in Roosevelt's day, and by initiating and then fostering cooperation, consultation and even compromise [6].

Fareed has identified 6 guidelines that he believes will help define America's role in a post-American world and enable Washington to successfully navigate the tricky waters of its central challenge. I'll try to summarize each in brief and provide discussions where applicable. Buckle your seatbelt...here we go!

1. Choose: Choose what? Priorities. In short, America needs to rightly choose its goals and what it intends to accomplish. The age of American dominance and power has resulted in a political power that feels that they do not have to set priorities...that nothing is out of their reach. In the post-American world, when America walks into a Dairy Queen store, it's going to have to choose if it wants a Blizzard or a Sundae, but it cannot simply have both (who could eat all that icecream, anyways?) In the current world order, America wants it all and orders it all, but doesn't think twice about the possibility of getting a tummy ache or spoiling appetite for dinner (i think i'm getting a little off the tracks with this analogy...sorry.) Using several current examples, Fareed makes the point that, with respect to a specific country, by insisting on all of several choices, whether it be nuclear proliferation, regime change, policy change, globalization or whatever, we have achieved nothing all the while, worsening and weakening diplomatic relations. America needs to re-evaluate its foreign policy as well as specific policies toward specific nations and, if it hopes to make any progress at all in becoming a global broker, it must pick and choose specific policies to enforce rather than trying to achieve everything. We only need to look toward Imperial Britain at the height and downfall of their own empire to see the importance in decision making and choosing specific policies. Additionally, America needs to move away from the role of "World Police" and focus more on the issues of true importance. "By focusing on the seemingly urgent, [America] will forget the truly important" [7]

2. Build broad rules, not narrow interests: This one deals quite heavily with the central challenge to Washington. In fostering a world in which other countries are allowed to be players, America must stop trying to export its own interests abroad and instead, help to create a set of rules, practices and standards that are equal and fair to the world (as in...not pushing a western-only view on the world, either.) That also means, then that the United States must adhere to these same rules in all cases. If the United States wants to act unilaterally whenever the cause suits it (Invading Iraq despite the UN security council's disapproval is a good example) why shouldn't any other nation do what ever it wants when that course of action serves some sort of benefit? (Taiwan should be smiling right now because China is looking at them!) It's a lot easier to state something like this than to actually do something like this. Washington must realize that it has to drop the exceptions of its own special interests if it expects other countries to do the same and that it must truly take the time to understand the issues in which it is trying to preach about from a global sense and not just an American view (see the section on Nationalism in the chapter 2 write ups.) To do anything else is nothing short of hypocrisy and serves only to foster further global resentment and a further drop in American moral standing, a "do as I say, not as I do" issue.


3. Be Bismarck not Britain: As in...Otto Von...Bismarck? Yup, that's the one. Let us generalize here for a moment. There are really two main directions that the United States can go in regards to its transition within the Rise of the Rest and they are represented by Bismarck and Imperial Britain. Britain kept a pretty low profile on the European continent (more or less, anyways) and tried to compete and balance itself against the rising and great powers of the time. Bismarck, on the other hand, directly engaged everyone around him and sought to build better, stronger, deeper relations with each governing state than the relationships that those states had with each other. Bismarck was in the 19th century what America should be in the 21st century, the honest broker, the central pivot [8]. It's important to distinguish that the British role has worked in the past for America (Imperial Japan, Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia are all examples) but the past cannot be copy-pasted to the future, and such an attitude in a technological age of interdependence and interconnectivity is unwise, as it would be likely to sow the seeds of hostility and disruption as rising powers (China, for example) would seek to balance themselves against Americas original balancing against China. Arms Race 2.0 (or...global economic crazy race 1.0...something like that. I'm sure Jon Stewart would come up with a catchy popculture reference.) Anywho, it's obvious that actively (and more importantly, genuinely) pursuing the role of building real, meaningful, deep relationships with other nations gives America to positively shape the transformation of the world (and of itself in the Rise of the Rest) as a peaceful one. I find it interesting to note one thing: Fareed highlights the wacky world of Realpolitik with the following sentence: "if [Bismarckian approaches] do not work out, it also gives the United States legitimacy and leeway to move into a balancing [British] role" [9]. I find this a little interesting. As long as the United States at least appears genuine in its attempts to foster deep, friendly relations with another country (Let us use modern day Russia as an example) and the bromance doesn't work out (for whatever reason, let's say it has to do with Russia's rather aggressive actions toward its neighbours lately) the United States can then, in the world's eyes, legitimately turn toward a hostile balancing approach which serves to isolate Russia from the world community (for not cooperating with American friendliness) and thus, either forcing it to become a rogue nation (dun dun dun) or to play fair and cooperate. If America didn't attempt all of that friendliness first (and as the sole superpower, the responsibility falls on America to take the initiative here, with everyone) then it would appear to be fostering hostility, further degrading its own legitimacy and adding to the potential for disruption during the transition to the Post-American world. Interesting (and crazy) stuff.


4. Order à la carte: Fareed notes something that I feel, while being perfectly logical, is a little strange given the current shift in the world order. International Peace/stability endures best in a system where there is a single dominant world power to maintain order [10]. Britain and later America have played this role over the last 200 years, "becoming the market and lender of last resort, home to the world financial centre and holder of the reserve currency. (...) secured the sea lanes, balanced against rising threats and intervened when necessary to prevent disorder" [10]. In just about every respect, this hegemony is waning (which makes sense with the Rise of the Rest.) So...is the world going to hell in a hand basket? Of course, potentially yes, but more likely no. If America takes a British approach to things (Point 3) then that could very easily change to "more likely, yes" but as far as things are going now....we're cool, we're good and we've got this. 200 years of Anglo-American hegemony have created a system, a global system, that is much, much stronger and solid than it was in the days of that small gap between waning British hegemony and the acceptance of American hegemony (the 20's and 30's, when Britain was starting to really lose influence and control yet America maintained an isolationist policy.) This international system has been widely accepted and embraced which in turn, supports the stability of the system (obviously.) As I mentioned, copy-pasting the past won't work for the Post-American future and being accommodating, accepting, considerate and flexible when it comes to international issues will be the best path forward. As my good friend Mark Twain has famously said "To a man with a hammer, every problem looks like a nail," sticking to a specific method of solving problems based on an ideology or the mindset of "how we did it in the past" just won't work. In the post-American world, we've got to put down that hammer and instead, utilize our whole tool shed of problem solving gadgets!! As such, we've got to adapt to a more interconnected system which addresses challenges through a variety of different structures and solutions to create a layered stability. To sum things up, stability within the new world order and the continued prosperity of the world as a whole require an adaptable organizer, a leader with a world view. This step goes hand in hand with America taking a Bismarckian (is that even a word?) approach to global relations.


5. Think asymmetrically: The era of my generation is one that is asymmetrical. By this, I mean that asymmetrical responses have become much easier to execute and much harder to defeat. This idea is fed by globalization and the technological revolution (as discussed in chapter 2) and, as it seems, is almost inevitable as we move into the post-American world. Let me lay down an example or two right quick:

Let us consider the brainchild the Bush administration, the invasion and occupation of Iraq. It's hard to get a solid, accurate number of 'boots on the ground' troop levels through out the war, but it can be said that right now there's a solid 600,000 Iraqi security personnel (military and police forces), around 150,000 American military troops and an unknown number of contracted security personnel (Blackwater/Xe and others...let's just say 0 for the sake of simplicity.) So, okay, we've got a 750,000 soldiers on one side. What about the other? Numbers for the insurgency are even harder to estimate. Let us say around 100,000 insurgents (realistically, probably less) from all actors (Militias of various sects, Al-Qaeda, etc.) On one side, we've got a bunch of people with third-world maintained soviet-era weapons (perhaps some better weapons once funding from Iran arrived) in a disorganized network with rudimentary training. On the other, we've got JDAM's, B52-H Superfortresses, Reaper Drones and the full force of the strongest military in the history of the world, backed by trillions of government dollars, making this probably the most one-sided combat operation since David fought Goliath, right? Yeah, it seems that way, and yet that rag-tag hoard of bandits has managed to wreak havoc within the country, sending it spiralling into a hellhole of blood and violence and as of now, there's been little that the far superior American forces can do about it. Another example is the combined strength and authority of world governments versus the cultivators, producers and traffickers of narcotics. It sure seems like Mexico's drug cartels have more control over the situation in that country than government paramilitary forces do. Fareed makes the point very clear and simple, so I'll just go ahead and quote him: "In an age of constant activity across and within borders, small groups of people with ingenuity, passion and determination have important advantages" [11].

A group of three random dudes in Yemen can blow up a bus shelter and release a video claiming affiliation with Al-Qaeda, and the US Military races out to fight them (better on the streets of "insert Middle Eastern town here" than in New York, they say) and the debate soon switches from terrorism to negative foreign policy issues and imperialism. This bait and run strategy has worked very well to, in the current era, degrade the United State's moral authority and world image. The big problem is that the United States does not yet think asymmetrically. Again, the utilization of a Bismarckian (it's a word now!) approach to global affairs and the utilization of the full range of assets that American society offers will enable the country to function better as an asymmetrical entity in the post-American world. This utilization of society and not just government (or military) is critical in the transformation of America in the Post-American world as well as the successful handling of Washington's central challenge.


6. Legitimacy is power: Ice Cube said it best in the 1988 "N.W.A." hit "Straight Outta' Compton". "You are now about to witness the strength of street knowledge." Just like the afterschool musical animated "Schoolhouse Rock!" televised shorts always told us, 'Knowledge is Power!!' and in the rap game, street knowledge represents streed cred(entials) which in turn, relates to strength and power. Even though this reference is profoundly immature, the basic idea behind it (that legitimacy and knowledge are the keys to power) do hold true, whether it be in regards to, as the kids say, 'phat beats' and mainstream culture or international relations. Unfortunately for the United States, legitimacy is the one real power that they're lacking these days. They've got economic, political, military and sociocultural power in unlimited supply, but in today's world (and even more so in the post-American world) that just doesn't cut it. The lack of legitimacy within America on the world stage is a critical deficiency.

Regardless of this lack, the United States still does hold a tremendous capacity to set the agenda in world matters and thus, confer legitimacy on the agenda that it has set (for example, the Bush Jr. administration still did managed to swindle and wheedle a group of nations and NGO's into the 'coalition of the willing,' thus attempting to add legitimacy to its own agenda.) However, even that doesn't cut it. The world has become flat and empowered by the digital revolution (chapter 2) and in a 'Rise of the Rest world' that is gains increasing access to digitial communication, the discussion of ideas and, to the very core, the legitimacy of those ideas, is the most important thing.

I, personally, hold trust pretty dearly. I don't quickly trust many people and if one were to violate my trust, they will almost never get it back...that's just who I am (i believe it has only happened once and even then, it was a very limited amount of trust that this person regained...but I'm getting off topic here.) Y'see, in my mind, trust is a lot like legitimacy and on the world stage...I think many people would agree with my own feelings toward trust. A separate but important element to Washington's central challenge(s) is that it will have to regain this trust and legitimacy and that is something that will be very hard to do...but it is absolutely vital that Washington make efforts to regain legitimacy. The scope of this book and thus, my project, do not deal with the process of how Washington should go about this (it's a complex situation, which many policy makers, think tanks and useless news pundits nation wide could write endlessly about) but the first step in solving your problem is admitting that you have a problem and thankfully, America has in fact taken this first step (executive branch initiatives to make the government more transparent are a good start.)

In the second part of Chapter 2, I spoke a bit about the culture that has taken ahold in America that threatens to destroy the very ability for that country's success. This can largely be summed up as 'fear' and as my good friend Franklin Delano Roosevelt said, "we have nothing to fear but fear itself, (...) Nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror." Right now, America has managed to get itself all in a terror and panic about, well...nothing. We're living in times that are largely peaceful and safe. Now, back in FDR's day, there were things to actually be scared about and they still managed to hold it all together. The blame for this cannot solely be laid on the people and has a lot to do with the political culture of the country (remember this from chapter 2? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2iFhGtKO-Q&feature=channel .) Before America can even begin to implement or work toward the points outlined and discussed above, it needs to pick itself up, get over the rhetoric of fear and regather its confidence and this process must begin with the people.

In the process of transformation to the Post-American world, America does hold a distinct advantage (which I mentioned earlier, in chapter 6) and that is its population demographic. This ability of "The American Dream" to assimilate new immigrants is increasingly at jeopardy as Americans descend further into the hysteria of fear. Insinuations like those above, in the Rudy Giuliani TV ad (THEY'RE ALL OUT TO GET YOU!!!!!) only serve to spread irrational fear and panic and to change (and in this case, degrade) the community's relationship with a select group of people (in this case, American Muslims.) Just a quick protip out to Rudy G (I know he's reading this) In a world that is going to rely on unity and the strength of relationships...uhmmm, your ads and policies probably are not the best way to go, slugger...thanks for coming out though.

In the end, the greatest strength of all that America will have is openness. The vigour of its society and the pure, all out will to succeed have led America to actually succeed. America thrived because America kept itself open to the world and through its own foreign policy and ideas, the rest of the world is now beginning to really truly, globally thrive from those same principles.

References:
F. Zakaria The Post-American World, New York: W.W. Norton & Company Inc., 2008

[1] Pp 215-216
[2] Pp 223
[3] G. Gilbert, Nuremberg Diary, New York: Da Capo Press, 1995 Pp 278-279
[4] Pp 229-230
[5] Pp 230
[6] Pp 229-231
[7] Pp 238
[8] Pp 233, 241-242
[9] Pp 242
[10] Pp 242-243
[11] Pp 245

Chapter 6: American Power (Cue 'Team America' theme song....now!)

Fareed has spent the majority of this book exhaustively analyzing the forces behind the Rise of the Rest and the theories of post-Americanism and globalization in the context of the rest of the world, but it is very necessary to bring things back full circle and discuss America's position in the Rise of the Rest. After all, it is the American transition or better yet, how America chooses to handle its own transition from Global Leader to Global Player that will cause the biggest splash in the pool.
To be honest, the "Team America: World Police" [1] theme song jumped into my head and played on repeat almost constantly as I read through this chapter, but Fareed uses this chapter to draw a less satirical, much more meaningful comparison to the current and future state of the American position in the world order than Trey Parker and Matt Stone did.

Fareed kicks off this chapter with a vivid and stirring description of the 'Diamond Jubilee' a celebration that occurred on June 22nd, 1897. The event marked the sixtieth anniversary of Queen Victoria's ascension to the British throne [2]. An imperial military procession of fifty thousand troops (with units from every corner of the empire) escorted Queen Victoria to the Mansion House in London (pictured) and it truly was an event of Imperial splendour and decadence. The event was not just celebrated in London, but was marked with festivities occurring across the entire expanse of the British Empire [3]. It seemed like the British Empire was never ending and that the fading of the empire was an impossibility, but as we all know, history happened and the British Empire did fade. Imperial Britain at the height of its power and influence is the closest modern historical comparison that can be made to America in the present and from this, we are faced with the question of "Will history happen again?"


I mentioned in previous chapters the central challenges faced by Beijing and New Delhi as a result of the rise of the Rest and Washington, too, does have a central challenge that will define its own transition within the rise of the Rest. "If history does happen again, as many expect it to, how will Washington handle the change?" One important distinction that Fareed makes about this question and his analogy to the British Empire is that the central challenges facing Britain during her decline were economic rather than political, however the reverse is true for America [4].


http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/26/The_British_Empire.png
I referenced the above link in Chapter 3 and i'd like to draw upon it again. All the lands in pink were at one point under the administration of the British Empire...around a quarter of the Earth's land surface and about a quarter of its population. Much like America today, the Empire was linked with a network of territories, bases and ports spread across the entire globe and protected by one of the strongest military forces the world had ever seen. Through all of this, Britain created the world's first truly global market and as we know, facilitated the spread of its institutions, ideals, language and practices. We can compare this with America's current establishment of soft-power and the spread of globalization and Americanism that we see today. Despite its massiveness and the spread of its control, the cracks had already begun to form.

Much like the invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 spelled the out the beginning of the end for the Soviet Union as a world power, the end of the British Empire began with war on the horizons. In 1899, Britain launched a military adventure into South Africa. Interestingly enough, the Boers adopted a successful campaign of guerrilla tactics against the British however, in 1902, their insurgency was in its last throes and the Boers surrendered. While the war was, technically speaking, a military victory for the British in that their armed forces defeated the armed forces of another, the war had high costs for Britain and to call it a victory for Britain in any other sense is absurd. Britain had lost 45,000 soldiers, spent 500,000,000 Pounds, stretched their army to the breaking point and most importantly, sacrificed their moral standing in the world order due to their severe military tactics [5]. It's obvious to see the direct comparisons that can be made with America today and from this, we can see that history is indeed being repeated and in the grand scheme of the world order, 'Imperial' America is in "decline." HOLD UP! I know what you're going to say!! Right at the beginning of Chapter 1, it was said that this book is not about the decline of America...and that's true! Decline is surrounded by quotations because it is a topic that does require further discussion. Save your thoughts...i'll return to the idea and topic shortly.


Before diving deeper into what this comparison means for America today, Fareed wants to understand exactly how the British became the dominant force of the west and more importantly, how the British Empire handled their own decline. Understanding the history of the decline of the British Empire could prove very valuable if one hopes to understand and successfully weather the "decline" of America today...so let us have a look at exactly how the Brits came to be.


Take a minute and scroll up toward the top of this post. Take a look at that picture of the 1897 Diamond Jubilee. It's okay, I'll wait...I don't mind...I'll hum out a song that's stuck in my head (Jigsaw falling into place by Radiohead...i'm really on a radiohead kick right now...)
...
Did you have a good look at that picture?
The scale of this celebration is pretty massive...it's pretty grandiose and quite the spectacle...Now just keep in mind that it's in EIGHTEEN NINETY-SEVEN, over 120 years ago. It's hard to even think of a current event that would match the scale of the Diamond Jubilee (Dick Clarke's Rockin' New Years Eve?...or maybe the Inauguration of my good friend Barack...but even he didn't get a flotilla of 165 modern warships standing by...) The point is, as grand and marvellous as this all was, the best years of the British Empire were already long passed, the real zenith of the empire being 1845-1870, when Britain accounted for 30% of world GDP with only 2% of world population [6]. That being said, Britain's time as an economic superpower was rather short considering the timeline of its empire and thus, the central feature outlining the decline of the British Empire is economic decline.



In 'Ye Olde Days,' manufacturing was still considered the bulk driving force behind a national economy and while Initially, Britain dominated...but was soon surpassed and Fareed identifies an almost poetic trend that really describes the end of the empire quite well. "...the goods Britain was producing represented the past rather than the future. In 1907, it manufactured four times as many bicycles as the United States, but the United States manufactured twelve times as many cars" [7]. From this statement, we can extrapolate that Britain began to lose its economic focus as its empire aged. Britain remained focused on small, 'cottage' scale industries while other nations shifted their focus to mass-production and heavy industrialization and


at the same time, British capitalism remained very conservative and while investment was high, the financial

industry plateaued and 'modernization' stopped. "Having spearheaded the first industrial revolution, Britain had been less adept at moving to the second" [7], (Recall from Chapter 2: "...the United States succeeded in its great historic mission - it globalized the world. But along the way (...) it forgot to globalize itself.) Basically, from this quote we take that Britain failed to continue its innovation and stay on the leading edge of modernity, and allowed other countries of much larger size to catch up and overtake the empire, and Gordon Brown does not approve (as we can see.)


A unique and very important point was that through all of this, Britain managed to remain a politically powerful nation. Consider during World War II, America paid most of the economic costs of the war and Russia, the majority of the human casualties and yet, in the end, Britain still had a large role in the Yalta conference. This feat of political manoeuvring owes a large amount of its success to ONE key decision made many years ago (well, there's more to it than that, but this decision is a very important part.)


In the early 1900s, Britain was able to SEE that the tides of change were flowing from London and to Washington. The critical decision of accommodating the rise of America rather than opposing it was likely a difficult one for London to make...an Imperial power allowing a former colony to gain such control was probably a big hit to the ol' British pride, yet the Britons of the time understood that if they opposed the rise of America, they would be bled dry. By positioning themselves to accommodate the rise in American influence, Britain freed large amounts of resources which it could then use to continue to exert its influence and control elsewhere (such as the maintained dominance in shipping and naval strength.)

In the end, Britain maintained great global influence even though it was economically, very weak and it realized this and played this declining hand with great skill. The lessons that can be learned here can very much apply to the situation that America is facing and again, in order to weather these changes successfully and remain competitive and even competent at functioning in such a market, we must learn what we can from history. So how does this all apply to America?
Mmmmm...look at that piece of American glory right there? I should not be writing this when I'm hungry...


Moving on, it's essential to note that the central feature of English decline (economic weakness) doesn't really apply to America (with burgers like that...you better believe the economy is good!) America has been the world's go-to-economy&GDP-guy for the last 130 years, and for the most part, it is positioned to continue to hold this spot for many years to come (China still has a long way to go, as we covered back in Chapter 4. Their burgers suck, too.) Fareed highlights an additional significant difference between America and the British Empire that we must observe to get a better understanding of the situation. Military Budgets. I've mentioned several times that the Royal Navy ruled the Sea like it "ain't no thang" but it really actually was a "thang" and the cost of maintaining such a fleet placed a tremendous burden on the royal coffers. Without being in the water, the Brits really weren't much of a threat. Compare that today with America, who dominates at every level of military industry and possesses tremendous research capacity to further that gap in dominance, and yet, even though the United States makes up almost half of global defence spending [8], it's not really breaking the bank all that much. Yeah, we can argue about deficits and Chinese loans until we're blue in the face but the fact of the matter is, America drops a pretty hefty chunk of change on its military development and endeavours but the fact of the matter is that it can afford it...more or less, anyways. More so than Britain could afford that navy. This serves to isolate the fact that the economic base that America is built upon (the military being built upon the same base) is incredibly strong...much more so than Britain's ever was or could be.


Jumping to my first point of reference ("decline" of America), yeah, you're right, that's not what this book is about. However, as the pie gets bigger and the Rest rise and begin to catch up and modernize, America is bound to lose some of its share of that global pie...there's nothing that can be done about it. So America will decline, but the country is also faced with the potential opportunity to change the definition of decline so that it's no longer decline in a negative, traditional sense, but something else entirely. Let us dig a bit deeper...There's an example that Fareed utilizes that i'd like to briefly steal, and it deals with the American education system. A 2005 'National Academy of Sciences' report stated that in 2004, China unleashed about 200,000 engineers upon the world from its educational institutes and India also trained about 120,000 engineers. During this same time period, the United States released about 70,000 engineers from its universities [9]. The report then went on to say that America is at a potential to lose its leading edge in science and technology as a result (recall losing its edge is what contributed to sinking the British Empire.) However, what we need to consider is that higher education is one of the things that America does best, having 42 out of the 50 top ranked educational institutes in the world (or 68%, depending on which study you decide to read. Regardless of which one you take, America dominates the education game.) Going even further, the American educational system (including grade school) is one that teaches the student to THINK, to imagine, to wonder, to question, to try and fail. This system differs from that in many other countries, which teaches students to memorize information, regurgitate information and then forget that information. It is this form of 'ingenuity' teaching, combined with the extreme quality of the American post-secondary education system that keeps America dominating. However, as the Rest have begun to rise, they have observed from America, the values of the American education system and implemented similar systems back home and as a result of this, the rest are getting better. Apply this to many other elements of the world system and we start to acquire a bigger picture of what is happening. Yes, as the world economic pie grows larger, America will be eating a smaller slice, hence..."decline." But when we consider that what's causing this "decline" isn't that America is slipping behind, but that the rest of the world is starting to catch up and to prosper...it's no longer really a "decline" any more, is it? The improving fortunes of the globe as a whole don't spell doom for America, but rather the entrance to a new and improved quality of life for everyone.

Asia is still full of developing countries that are lightyears behind America in terms of economics and technical capability, but the countries of the European Union are much more advanced and the Union as a whole represents much stronger competition in the economic field. However, America also has an ace up its sleeve and as this ace is played (it's been in the process of being played since America's birth) it will shape how Washington responds to the rise of the Rest and handles the American transition, yet it gives America a significant advantage over Europe and most of the developing world. So what is this magical ace in the hole that will help keep America at the top for years to come? The United States is demographically vibrant and more importantly, population continues to swell and the young continue to outnumber the old. When compared to Europe, their population is predicted to remain stagnant and aging, with the ratio of working-age people to senior citizens expected to fall to 2.4:1 in 2030 (compared with 3.8:1 today. For the USA, we have values of 5.4:1 today and 3.1:1 for 2030) [10]. Basically, Europe is moving toward a position where it is taking in less people when it needs to be taking in many more, where as America continues to grow and to absorb people, creating a more or less universal culture that continues to work together in harmony.

In most of the world, developing or not, West or Rest, the demographic situations are similar. Birth rates in many Asian countries are in decline and the effects of an aging population are rather strong and considerable in the context of economic development. We've got a larger pension and medical care burden, and Fareed points out that economist Benjamin Jones states that as a population ages and begins to work less, innovation drops. The effect of a large number of people transferring from net savers to net spenders can also cause havoc on the national scale for savings and interest rates. The solution for the growing demographic problem is at this point unclear (Shipping all the old people out to sea remains a distant plan B) [11]. What really works to keep America ahead is its immigration. America feeds off of this immigration and even as the country grows wealthier (and in most cases, lazier and less driven to succeed), America has been able to revitalize itself, assimilate its immigrants and drive the population as a whole to work together to constantly 'stay ahead' on the global development game...however it's not all 'peachy-keen' and there are troubles brewing in America that can cause the country as a whole to lose this edge.

Recall in Chapter 2, the reluctance of America to globalize itself and the policies taken by much of the population toward globalization, immigration and so on. On top of this, the declines in the savings rate of both the American population and of the government are putting massive strain upon the country. For all of its strengths outlined above, the American economy is facing its toughest challenge and hurdle in history which is a part of the rise of the Rest. It's important to again remember that this challenge is not a conventional decline and the shrinking piece of the economic pie that goes to America should not be feared. As I mentioned above, the handling of this challenge will prove to make the biggest splash in the global economic pool, and its understandable given that America will have the largest 'drop.'

I mentioned throughout this blog several times that America's divine mission was to globalize the world and the results of decades of American foreign and national policy have resulted in the rise of the Rest. To put it easily, everyone is now playing the game (and playing to win) as a result of America's policies. The financial markets of the rest of the world are growing very quickly and this is driven by the simple fact that there are now options on the global market...It's not just all about New York and the American financial market anymore. Capital markets outside of America have grown massively in the last few decades (due in part to mass privatization of state owned assets that has occurred on a global scale over the same time period) and are just as (if not more) liquid and regulated than the American market. Now that countries and companies have global options, they can invest and operate within other markets that perhaps happen to suit them better. In this rise of globalization, America (or the American way or whatever) has been the global standard but it is no longer, as the rest of the world has started to adopt this global standard as their own. Being held as the global standard and on top for so long has created some distinct disadvantages for America, as Fareed points out.

Being so large and being held as the global standard for doing business, the rest of the world took the time to carefully study both the Americans, but also their economic and corporate systems down to the smallest detail. However, the Americans have not bothered to study the rest of the world or to become familiar with the financial markets and economies that now offer the strongest competition to the American system. The Americans are only able to swim in one sea where as competitors in other markets are able to penetrate both the American system and their own, non-English markets and systems. The all important access to American capital is no longer important when you have a world that is swimming in free floating capital. Fareed notes an important aspect where the comparison of progress and competitiveness is no longer a company comparing with its past, but comparing with others at that same moment...Competitiveness has expanded. It's no longer about Capital and Experience, but now about Ideas, Energy and Efficiency. However, this change of competitiveness has brought further obstacles to the American ability to operate in the post-American world.

I mentioned earlier that the biggest obstacle to the British was one of economics and in America, the political system poses the biggest risk to the success of the American system. I mentioned earlier that there has been the development of a sickly irresponsible political culture within America (in Chapter 2) and from this, Americans are constantly believing that they're "number 1" and are refusing to look to the rest of the world for opportunities and options. The laziness and ineffectiveness of the American political system and the lack (at the time of publishing, anyways) of reform to this system serves to further strip away the competitiveness to the American system (1/3rd of the country's school are garbage, bridges are collapsing and the mortgage deduction costs $80billion/year and really has no affect on the levels of home ownerships [12].) Furthermore, the development of an ineffective political system within America, an antiquated system about money, special interests, media bickering and ideological reinforcement of the lack of bi-partisanship is what is hurting America most. The political process now is a theatre and an ineffective mode at getting things done. This all then relates back to Washington's central challenge in the rise of the Rest...Can Washington handle a world in which others have moved up and it's no longer the sole leader? Can Washington tolerate and even embrace a world in which it is no longer calling all the shots? This remains to be seen and as I mentioned, will potentially be the most tumultuous transition of the rise of the Rest.

References:
F. Zakaria The Post-American World, New York: W.W. Norton & Company Inc., 2008
[1] I wasn't sure if I should post this link here (I like to keep this blog family friendly, you see) But here it is. The link contains all sorts of objectionable words and phrases and very explicit language. Open at your own risk and discretion. It was featured as the main theme song in the 2004 film "Team America: World Police" by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators of the "South Park" television series. I got a laugh out of it when I first heard it and its posted with the sole purpose of entertainment. Again, open (if you wish) at your own discretion. Here we go... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZdJRDpLHbw wait...this won't affect my grade will it?
[2] Pp 167
[3] Pp 167-168
[4] Pp 169
[5] Pp 172
[6] Pp 174
[7] Pp 175
[8] Pp 182
[9] Pp 187-188
[10] Pp 196
[11] Pp 197-198
[12] Pp 208

Chapter 5: The Ally (because we like to make global affairs tricky)

Fareed spends chapter 5 in a similar fashion to chapter 4, describing how previously established theories of post-Americanism, globalization, nationalism and modernization applied to the 'other' star of the Rest, India. More importantly, Fareed shows that the rise of the Rest and the forces associated with it are not just a blanket term that can be applied to any random country in the non-Western world. On the whole, this chapter shows us that the Rise of the Rest is a truly global movement and that the same forces that act and shape one country will have drastically different results in another.

Fareed, being of Indian descent, starts this chapter off with a personal touch as he describes his own participation in the mass exodus of Indian youth that was taking place in the 1970's and 80's. A dismal domestic situation was a contributing factor to the exodus (brain drain, as all the cool kids called it) of Indian youth during this era, the prior decades marked by mass protests, riots, secessionist movements and armed insurgencies. Economic growth had basically stalled and it seemed that the country was going no where. Many bright minds, Fareed included, believed that the only real shot at a 'meaningful' future lie outside of India and as a result, over 75% of the 1980's graduates of Indian technical institutes emigrated to America [1].

However, strangely the following decade had been a complete 180 degree turn-around from previous decades, with the country enjoying peace, improved international relations, (relative) stability and prosperity. Since i'm writing a blog about post-Americanism, i'm pretty sure you can guess what the base that underpinned the transformation of the 90's in India was. Well folks, if you guessed 'economic reform and an explosion of stable growth initiated and sustained by the global post-American movement' then "A winner is you!" You win a Gold star and a pat on the back! With growth rates at least 6.9% over the decade (and reaching as high as 8.5%) India achieved what we have since seen many other non-Western countries achieve...a massive reduction in poverty and a sociocultural thrust toward modernization and urbanization. In the 21st century, India has been hailed repeatedly as a global beacon, an example of how economic reform should go down in a democratic society...however, with a population of around 1 billion people, India's rise, much like China's, is going to case quite a shadow over the international stage and will probably be felt world wide...So what do we actually make of this? Where is India actually going and what is going to result of their rise in the global order?

At least with China, we have a bit more of a solid idea where things stand (as outlined in Chapter 4) and the fact that we do not yet know the answers to any of the above questions for India is cause for a good degree of worry in Western experts and economists (especially considering the impact that the country's rise will have.) However, we can take solace in the fact that even the Indians themselves do not yet have the answers to these questions. More importantly, that means that they have not yet been answered and in a sense, to some degree we can still influence what the answers to these questions may look like.

I mentioned it briefly in the first paragraph that "the Rise of the Rest" isn't just a blanket term that can be applied to every country. While the forces that are the source for this change are relatively speaking, pretty similar from country to country, the end results that these forces have produced are vastly different across each individual country. For the last 15 years, India has been the second fastest growing economy in the world (right behind good ol' China) however, the economic, political, social and cultural organization of India and China are very different from each other in almost every respect. Through the in depth analysis of these two countries with respect to their aforementioned differences, we can better understand the results of the rise of the Rest and globalization and more importantly, how it may affect each individual country in the global order. From this, we are able to make more accurate predictions and forecasts and essentially, better prepare ourselves for oncoming change in the world order. Fareed doesn't explicitly state this anywhere in his book, but I feel that this is an unspoken objective of his, and the purpose for focusing so dearly and closely on China and India. I also feel pretty strongly that this is an important point to state and realize before reading or analyzing any further. Now that i've got that out of the way though, let us keep on a-truckin'.

China's rise is concrete. It's happening and short of some sort of apocalyptic 'end of days' disaster within China/the world, is unstoppable. India's rise, however, is not as deeply dug in as China's, with a per capita GDP (at the time of publishing, probably outdated by now) of 1/3rd that of China's (~$960 vs. ~$2500 market value, respectively) [2]. Goldman Sachs has made all sorts of wacky predictions about India's future standing in the world economy and that by 2040, it will be the world's third largest economy and by 2050, have a GDP Per Capita more than twenty times its current value [3]. Predictions like this have to be taken with a grain of salt, however, as there are maaaaany variables that can drastically affect the trends that are producing these forecasts (take, for example, the Global Recession's impact on worldwide growth trends, a variable that probably was not accounted for at the time of publishing.) Regardless of all this jibber-jabber, India is still growing at a rate faster than Goldman Sachs' trends had forecasted and even with the recession and slowdown, it's probably still growing at a rate faster than most. India also has a few other very important factors going for it that will work to ensure that it is on the leading edge of the rise of the Rest: Its promising demographic profile, the strength of its private sector and the country's former standing within the British Empire. All of these points are slightly complex and intertwined and related, so i'll try to discuss them as best as I can as I ramble on.

In the last chapter, I briefly touched upon the belief that part of China's own success may be attributed to the fact that it is a centrally planned economy that doesn't have to really worry about voters or public opinion, or even the will of the people. Fareed builds upon my own statement (it's almost like he and I are on the same wavelength or something) with a number of examples that serve to contrast some of the economic successes of both countries as they pertain to government. The Chinese government can assert its own will upon the people of the country pretty easily and in that sense, especially compared with a socialist-ish democracy like India, the government is pretty strong. The Three Gorges Dam in China flooded an area of around 39 square kilometres and displaced almost 1.25 million people and basically, all the Chinese government had to do was say "Yo, we're building a giant dam here...so you can either move or drown. We'll help you move...but you don't really have a choice here." China also restricts the movement of its citizens so that they cannot migrate to a city until they have proof of a job...preventing the formation of slums [4]. If a non-Authoritarian state like India tried to enact policies like this, there would be revolutions, uprisings of epic proportions and the blood (of civil officials) running in the streets. In contrast to the top-down and planned/dictated growth of China, India's own growth has been initiated from the bottom of society upward, uncontrolled, messy and chaotic and more or less without the help of the 'weak' government.

A tremendous strength of the Indian system is, as Fareed describes it, "[its] Human Capital [5]." Proportionately, a large segment of India's population are 'youth' and this 'surplus' of young workers (as opposed to the declining of the population of Russia, aging population of Japan, and proportonately smaller portion of youth in China) are a valuable asset to the strength of the Indian economy. Additionally, this workforce contains a vast and growing number of business-savvy and friendly individuals; entrepreneurs, managers and technicians. This is due in part to the years of being "the jewel" of the British Empire. As a result of being dominated by (and not just dominated, but the focal point of Imperial ambitions well into the Industrial era) the British Empire, the Indian population is much more familiar to the trends and traditions of the West and of their business practices (much more so than China, Saudi Arabia or South Africa.) It might be an unfair generalization, perhaps even a politically incorrect one...but that does not change the fact that it's true. This highlights a complete shift in mentality of the average Indian citizen...perhaps to the point that the India that Fareed grew up in could be considered a completely different country. This strength has led Indian led firms and businesses to have a distinct advantage in the global market and it is interesting to observe that Indian investment in Western countries is in many cases greater than Western investment in India. In Short, it is the familiarity with English and the choppy waters of Western business practices (without the need for translators or guides) that is the most important and lasting legacy of the rule of the British Empire over India and an important characteristic of India's past that has contributed to their success now. As Fareed puts it, "They speak globalization fluently [5]."

I did briefly mention the strength of the private sector within India and what it has done for the country without the help or support of the government. It's December 26th, 2004. I worked in a clothing store at that point in my life, So I was at work at about 6am and there till a solid 11pm. I distinctly remember over the following few days hearing about the devastating tsunami that had occurred in the Southeast-Asian area of the world and the truey staggering numbers of dead and persons who were missing or unaccounted for. During this time, all that the Indian government (in all of its weakness) would be good for would be asking for and coordinating foreign aid. The response to this event however, was vastly different. Fareed points out that the people and corporations of India opened up and within two weeks, citizens had privately donated over $80 million dollars in relief money. Since that time, Azim Premji, the 'Bill Gates' of India, has announced he will leave the vast majority of his fortune (valued at $14.8 billion in 2006 US Dollars) to a charitable organization (ala the 'Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.) Similar actions are occurring all throughout the Indian subcontinent, with more than 25% of schools and 80% of the health care system funded by the private entity and outside the state sector [6]. Fareed makes a very interesting comparison that perhaps may serve to answer the questions posed at the end of the 3rd paragraph of this post. This system resembles, more than any other in the post-American, non-Western world, that of the United States in that society has completely overpowered and asserted its dominance over the state. The formula has proved pretty successful for America...but can the same be said India?

Just as Beijing has a challenge that is paramount to the success or failure of the state in its transfer to post-Americanism, New Delhi too has a central challenge that it must confront and successfully weather in order to truly move to post-Americanism. Government does matter and India again benefits from the years of British colonial rule in this area as well. When India gained independence in 1947, many of its institutions (such as a central bank) and controlling rhetoric were already established and thoroughly modern. However, it is the very nature of the openness of democracy that creates challenges for the reform of India. As I mentioned earlier, China is very top-down. The state commands and the people do as instructed, and there is little else to say on the matter. When it comes to restructuring a society, especially in the context of economics, there are often those who will be hurt or affected negatively to some degree by the restructuring. The very nature of democracy...equal representation, open discussion and political accountability, the cornerstones of the inherited system that does give India many advantages, are also the biggest obstacles to full on economic success in India. To put it in different terms, the "One step forward and three quarters of a step backward" nature of democracy serves to slow down the pace of reform and in many cases (as mentioned in Chapter 4) cause law makers to act in ways that are detrimental to long term economic success. It's important to state that the booming private sector in India would not be possible without the presence of a heavily regulated and controlled stock market and processes of government intervention (de-regulation and re-regulation, etc.) Much as the controlled loosening of Beijing's grip on China will define the success of that country and more importantly, the relative peacefulness at which China will enter the post-American world, the weathering of the challenges of democracy by a hesitant ruling class and its relations toward a society eager for change will be the central hurdle and definition of post-American success for India.

I find this point one of the most interesting aspects of the post-American global transformation, that countries who have long utilized systems of government that are ideological opposites to the democratic shift of globalization tend to fare better than those who begin with an ideological system closer to that of the end product (capitalism or at the very least, a democratic socialist system.) This has been a trait recognized in the circles of economic scholars longer than it has in the public domain. It's easy to look back on the policies enacted by Boris Yeltsin, Margaret Thatcher or the leaders of Poland's 'Solidarity' movement as their own countries started to face economic restructuring and reform and it's even easier to condemn those leaders for the often brutal methods in which they instituted and enforced their policies, often suspending civil liberties, creating a state of terror, launching proxy wars and more or less operating in a 'democracy-free zone' to get things done. However, when one recognizes that democracy by its very nature faces greater initial obstacles and challenges to success than command directed systems...is it as easy to condemn these leaders? When looking inward, one has to ask themselves what the alternative would have been... Would you act the same in their position? It's obvious that India is taking a far less aggressive approach to conventional economic theory, rejecting the standardized Western/Washington Consensus approach and yet, they're faced with their own troubles and obstacles and while the devastation may not be as...shocking or upfront as it was in Chile under Pinochet, there is still a large amount of suffering and devastation within the country as a result of economic change (Slum development, for example...can draw back in part to economic restructuring, although it's incorrect to state economics as the only cause.) Makes you think.

I'd just like to steal a point that Fareed makes in order to tie back to my own statements in Chapter 3 about the rise of the Rest and what that means for the global world. "India is diverging not only from its own path but also from the paths of other countries in Asia (...) It is a noisy democracy that has finally empowered its people economically [7]." From this, we see that India is again carving out its own path toward modernization and it is infact a path that is very different from that of its neighbours (many of which are far more centrally organized) yet combining some elements of Western ideals (pro-private sector) while still combining elements that are traditionally and wholly Indian. Just something I thought i'd point out. It goes without saying that this method will be further affected and enriched by the Hindu worldview and the geopolitics of India (regional governments, access to nuclear arms, and so on.)

Anywho, let us move on.

In as much a sense as Beijing is viewed in American circles as a source of future opposition toward Washington and its sphere of influence, New Delhi is viewed as a potential friend (hence, the naming of chapters 4 and 5.)

Fareed references a 2005 Pew Global Attitudes study that showed that 71% of Indians polled had a favourable impression of the United States of America (second only to the USA itself, with 83% in favour.) What this means is that Indians are, on the whole, very comfortable with America and elements of Americanism (globalization, etc) [8]. Fareed states that this in part is due to the fact that for years, the post-Independence Indian government had attempted to make anti-American rhetoric a backbone of its national policies. Simply put, America feels more comfortable with India and vice versa largely because as Fareed states, there is a much deeper understanding between the two countries than between America and other non-Western countries. I'm going to quote Fareed at length here because he has very, very eloquently illustrated his point in a method that one cannot top: "[Americans] are puzzled and disturbed by impenetrable decision-making elites like the Chinese Politburo or the Iranian Council of Guardians. But a quarrelsome democracy that keeps moving backward, forward and sideways-that [Americans] understand" [9]. Like with Britain and Israel, America has developed a relationship that goes much deeper than strategy with the Indians and that relationship has evolved into an almost constant partnership and understanding between the two. There may still very well be friction between the two governments on any number of issues, especially as India continues to expand and cast a shadow over world affairs, but for the time being, the warm relationship between New Delhi and Washington (as opposed to a cold relationship between Beijing and Washington) will become increasingly important on the world scale as the rise of the Rest continues and the world shifts from uni-polarity.

References:

F. Zakaria The Post-American World, New York: W.W. Norton & Company Inc,. 2008

[1] Pp 129

[2] Pp 132

[3] Dominic Wilson and Roopa Purushothaman, Dreaming with BRICs: The Path to 2050 (Goldman Sachs, Global Economics Paper no. 99, Oct. 1, 2003).

[4] Pp 134

[5] Pp 135

[6] Pp 139

[7] Pp 138

[8] Pp 150

[9] Pp 151

In an offtopic and unrelated post...

...these are probably two of the most amazing songs i've heard in the last few months.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Z7zThqVBhU

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxYemY8CQaw

anywho, back to blogging. Chapter 5 will be up sometime tomorrow.

Chapter 4: The Challenger (Earth Angel, Earth Angel!)

So I made the mistake of taking a mid-afternoon nap (I'm notorious for that) and now it's 1 in the morning and I can't sleep. The solution? BLOG!!

Since I'm feeling just a tad nostalgic at the moment, please allow me to take you back to a much cherished and awkward time of my younger years... The Jr. High afterschool dance!! (Just so you know, I'm actually going somewhere with this...so just roll with it!)

It's 4pm and the school gymnasium is looking spiffy; all decked out in streamers and balloons. Everyone is all gussied up in their Sunday best and looking mighty snazzy, but are mostly standing around in their own groups of friends (cutting up the dancefloor wasn't as popular in those days) and for the most part, guys and girls are semi-ignoring each other. The 40-something and balding DJ is spinning out all the latest tracks from "MuchDance 1999" when he decides to mix it up by playing (gasp) a slow dance song! With the music playing in the background (I always think of "Earth Angel" by The Penguins...thanks alot, "Back to the Future!") my eyes glanced across to the other side of the gymnasium, where I soon located the girl that I had a crush on, looking very pretty in her red dress with yellow stars. With fellow students and teachers looking onwards, I awkwardly approached this young lady and asked her to dance (my voice probably cracked, too.) Held apart at arms length (haha, cooties was running rampant at this time too, you see) we slowly danced in circles. Ah, what a magical time it was.

Such an awkward description serves to (loosely) describe events across the world stage today, as Fareed beings the chapter by offering up a description of America's fascination with China and how it exemplifies the rise of the Rest. China has captured America's eye (awwwww) and as China begins to rise within the world stage, the two have become stuck in an awkward never-ending waltz, holding each other at arms length but at the same time, dependent on each other for support.

Fareed uses this chapter to really build on many of the ideas that were established earlier in the book and how the relate to China. Chief among these is the prediction that I made toward the end of chapter 3; that as non-Western countries begin to modernize and enter upon the international stage, they will take a path that is a blend of Western principles and that of their own traditions. Before we can begin to pick this apart, we must first apply a bit of context to the prediction. My good friend Napoleon Bonaparte once famously said "Let China sleep, for when China awakes, she will shake the world" [1]. With an economy that has doubled in size every 8 years over the last 30 and with a vast migration towards urbanization and higher education (the government increased post secondary scholarships and aid to $2.7 billion in 2008, up from $240 million the year before [2]) China is indeed awakening, and the shaking of the world stage is tremendous.

Fareed has very eloquently described the rise of China, so I will directly quote him: "China's awakening is reshaping the economic and political landscape, but it is also being shaped by the world into which it is rising" [3]. Beijing is at the forefront of globalization and nationalization, the two forces that are defining the post-American era, and it is the combined push of these forces that will define how China integrates into the world order. The technological revolution and economic interdependence of globalization are pushing China toward a peaceful integration, yet nationalism fuelled by increasing influence within the world order are producing disruption and a change of the social order within the country. As countries tend to open up to free-markets and globalization, they tend to have a shift toward democracy and these forces are exposing the cracks within the foundation of the country's political structure and the vastness of its cultural diversity (example: the growing tensions between Uyghur nationalists and the Chinese state.) We'll get back to this point shortly, I'd first like to talk more about the predictions made in Chapter 3 and how they relate.

China has more or less become the second most important country in the world when it comes to the rise of the Rest (the first is, for the time being, the United States.) Many 'expert' economists and political scientists have long predicted that in the years since Deng Xiaoping's free market reforms, the forces of capitalism combined with the 'evil's of communism' would collude and contribute to regime collapse, however, China is still a centrally planned Communist state. It is true to say that the free market reforms of China have conflicted somewhat with the state and have produced some tensions and troubles (a solid 90% of China's billionaires are involved with the Communist party...nepotism runs deep! [4].) Thing is, China also has something that the rest of the world would kill for, something that makes all other problems seem much more manageable and much less significant and that is robust growth. When it came time to start reforming China, Beijing was very welcoming and frank on its acceptance of capitalist principles, yet it took an approach far different from "the Washington Consensus" that was advocated by scholars of ultra-conservative economic policy (Jeffery Sachs, Milton Friedman, 'Chicago School' etc) and applied elsewhere in the world. China learned from examples of its own past (the Cultural Revolution) and those of countries that had been previously exposed to free market reforms (Pinochet and 'the Brick' in Chile, Yeltsin blowing up (literally) the Russian parliament in the early 90's and (literally) making himself a ruling Monarch for a year [5]) and instead, opted for an option that had "less shock, more therapy." I'm not saying that the Chinese government has been exactly "easy going" but when compared to history, the Chinese reforms have been relatively peaceful. There are a number of reasons for this.

Beijing, instead of instituting a rapid fire assault of massive changes all at once ('the Brick,' issued by the Chicago Boys in Chile), China has chosen a more incremental approach that, as Fareed puts it, "has grown the denominator" of the economy. Instead of a mass-privatization and shut down of inefficient operations, the government has grown the economy around these inefficient enterprises so that over time, the bad areas became a smaller and smaller part of the Chinese economy, additionally giving the entire system stronger legs to stand on. Only now, in the 21st century, after China has strengthened the rest of its economy, is it able to clean up and reform its banking system and financial sector. Looking through the last decade, we can see an interesting problem arise for Beijing. The 'free-marketization' and opening of China has greatly reduced the centralized control that Beijing has on the rest of China, in a sense, Communism has failed and is continuing to gradually deteriorate in a controlled manor. Karl Marx stated that "when a society changes its economic foundation, the political system that rests upon it will inevitably change as well" [6] and a look at the history books confirms this fact, which has become one of the most important generalizations in political science. We see that dozens of countries throughout the world, from South Korea to Argentina to Turkey have shifted their political structures toward a liberalized democracy as they transformed to market-based economies. China has not yet defied this trend, as they have not yet become a true free-market country, nor have they reached middle income status (on the whole, China is still a poor country) but the push is there and China is very much moving in this direction. A younger generation of communist party members have been studying the political structuring of countries such as Japan and Sweden, to better learn how they have maintained control in liberal democratic-socialist climates and it is understood that the prime challenge of China's globalization movement will be how the communist party weathers the tides of change towards a liberalized democracy and whether it will be a violent, tumultuous transition or a peaceful one.

Stepping back a moment, there is another factor in the unique success of China's free market transformation and this one owes credit to the communist party. Basically, China doesn't have to worry about voters, public opinions or even losing power. China has been able to initiate reforms that may be painful in the short-term, but in the long run are most beneficial to the economic success of the country. The transformation processes in other countries (such as India) are slowed by the need to appease voters with policies that are often unfriendly toward market transformation and globalization (farm subsidies, for example.) As the state slowly starts to become decentralized, it becomes more and more difficult to institute policies as a single ruling party with no 'real' accountability or public responsibility. There is no doubt that the method in which change is created in China will play a significant role in determining if the decentralization of the ruling party in China is peaceful or not, and is something to be watched in the future (again, considering the conflict with ethnic Uyghur nationalists, we can speculate that this may be a nerve-wracking time for both China and the world.) From this, we're faced with an unavoidable question: Does this mean that the extraordinary success of China's reforms are due to the fact that the starting point for these reforms was in a centralized, totalitarian government? Maybe yes, maybe no, but regardless of the answer, it is an interesting phenomenon to observe.

One thing we can be sure of, is that China has been very aware of its rise to power and is very conscious and careful as to how the world perceives it. Essentially, during the first decade of growth, China's "foreign policy" (in quotes because it didn't really have one) was to grow and not ruffle anyone's feathers in the process. Chinese politicians often openly avoid discussing foreign policy or the national agenda and often talk about "a renaissance" in China rather than "a rise to power." To be frank, it's probably not a bad Idea, as China is set to cast one heck of a shadow over the world stage (1.338 billion people (the 2008 CIA World Factbook estimate) will do that). We can be sure that if China did show overly aggressive or imperialistic actions (like Russia has been doing as of late), whether it be over Taiwan or interests in the Kashagan oil field in Kazakhstan or opposition of sanctions against North Korea, it would gain nothing but the resentment and fear of the West, which is just bad for business. The official party line has been that a nation's path, wherever or whoever that nation is, "lies in economic prowess and that militarism, empire and aggression lead to a dead end [7]."

This nice, happy, flowery policy is all good, but is it really going to turn out that way? Along with the historical trend of free markets and the movement toward democracy, there is another historical trend that only spells out tension within China. As many countries throughout history have discovered newfound power, they have attempted to expand their political, economic and territorial control. Countries have often had peaceful, benign intentions for doing so, and most importantly, a firm belief in what they were doing was incfact peaceful and benign regardless of world perception. This same trend does apply to China, but due to the country's size is amplified by about a billion percent. China may try and tip-toe around on its rise within the world stage and claim that it is doing so peacefully, but as the nation expands and its interests expand internationally, it creates growing friction on the world stage. Fareed uses the example of Africa to highlight this important point on future international relations.

China is growing, fast. Like any country that experiences growth, the need to secure resources to sustain growth (and in turn, security for the nation itself) usually becomes a pretty high priority. To fulfill this need, China has tried to avoid military conquest and keep in line with its projection of 'a peaceful renaissance' and has actually done a pretty good job, but vitally important world perceptions are changing rapidly as the competition for dwindling resources heats up. Africa has a lot of resources, and a lot of politically unstable and weak governments, many of which are in need of foreign aid. China has recognized this and has invested billions within African governments to cement trade relations and secure stable access to resources, and has gone through great measures to demonstrate to African leaders that its intentions are good for everyone. Fareed mentions a 2006 summit in which 48 African nations attended, where President Hu Jintao cancelled African debt, provide an additional $5 billion in loans and credits, provide training for 15,000 African professionals, increase Aid funding and infrastructure spending to build new hospitals, schools and roads [8]. In general, this seems like it is actually good for everyone, but China is increasingly moving in on spheres of Western influence, which causes tension and friction to develop (This in part, deals with America's role in the post-American world and how crucial it is for Washington to be willing to let other countries become players on the stage...I discussed this point in my second entry for Chapter 2.) China states that it stays out of the domestic affairs of the countries that it is operating in, being a neutral player...but is that really even possible? Oh snap, Rhetorical Question!

On this point, it is very important to acknowledge the foresight of current Chinese leaders. Many of the 'old guard' of the communist party, and even the new generation of Chinese leaders remember well the bitter memories of Mao's mistakes and China's tumultuous past that was the offspring of staunch ideologues. It is the next generation of Chinese leaders that know only a time of peace and stability that has the greatest potential to repeat the mistakes of the past and derail the progress of China's growth.

In its business deals with Zimbabwe, China purchases the raw materials that it needs to sustain itself and in turn, sells weapons and military equipment to Mugabe, which he in turn uses to enforce his will upon domestic opponents and stay in power. The same happens in Sudan, where China is heavily invested and purchases 65% of Sudanese oil exports, and coincidently, Chinese made weapons end up in the hands of militias in Darfur. Their response is that "Business is Business [9]."

Because China is such a main player on the world stage, its dealings with other countries are amplified and in a sense, the dealings that China has with Zimbabwe and Sudan "give them a lifeline, retard progress and in the long run, perpetuate the cycle of bad regimes and social tensions that plague the African continent [9]." Essentially, it is impossible for China to remain a "neutral player" in the affairs of the countries that it is dealing in and this cycle of involvement adds to the increasing tensions on the world stage.

Rather than speak with its wallet as it does in Africa, China has skilfully employed diplomatic tactics to foster a revolution in attitudes over the last two decades within Asia. In 2007, a number of ASEAN (Assoc. of Southeast Asian Nations) members that have traditionally been longstanding regional allies of the United States stated that they trusted China to better wield world power than the United States. This shift in alliances and thinking is crucial to Chinese expansion of influence within the Asian region (especially in regards to its obsession with Taiwan), but is very worrisome to America (again, refer back to Chapter 2.) However, there is a very real danger in the diplomatic relations that Beijing has utilized to improve upon fragile relations in its neighbourhood. "[Beijing's] effort to co-opt nationalism for its own purposes" [10]. As I touched upon earlier, China has moved away from communism, yet Beijing has been reluctant to completely let go of its grip on the country. Acting like a glue to hold everything together, Beijing cultivates the attitude of nationalism when necessary to maintain its grip on the state, an example of which is its relationship toward Japan. Beijing purposefully keeps the relationship tense, recalling wartime behaviour of Japan when needed, refusing to accept Japanese apologies (while still accepting aid money (aka reparations)) and teaching a virulently anti-Japanese version of history in its schooling system [10].

When considering the policy of "a peaceful rise" this simply just does not make sense and only serves to add to the tension that Beijing will face as it moves ever further to a free market system and the looming trend of liberalized democracies (discussed above.) Beijing relies on the heroic image associated with Chairman Mao to help maintain control, as a way to pull the country together but the danger lies in that Beijing has no idea how to actually handle the forces of nationalism that it is fostering...it is unable to reap the seeds of what it has sewn. Beijing has relatively little experience in dealing with NGO's that have a voice and its actions and reactions to these groups are intensely fuelled by fear, paranoia and inexperience. To again fall back on a current example, partly because of the nationalist attitude that Beijing has fostered in the country, Uyghurs groups began to coalesce into one voice and began to exercise the (liberal-democratic) right to speak out. Beijing had no idea how to handle this, freaked out and decided to send in paramilitary groups to "calm things down." Again, this all leads back to the road that Beijing will have to take as globalization and the forces of the rise of the Rest act themselves out within China and the dancefloor of the international stage. Fareed states one very important point that we must take away from all of this. "Economic growth and globalization have made Beijing plan for integration and yet given it the power for military and political confrontation" [11].

We're back on the dancefloor. 'Earth Angel' is still playing and the United States and China are still holding each other at arms length, slowly dancing in endless circles. However, both partners are worried that this is one dance that might not end with a goodnight kiss. The younger and newer generation of Chinese political leaders are seeing that a change in China's political and foreign policy is necessary and China must no longer act to appease Washington, but shift itself so that it may begin to oppose Washington. Thankfully, for the sake of world peace, the forces of integration have won over forces of divergence, but China is taking steps to prove that it is no longer to be considered a secondary player on the world stage and frankly...it means business.

Recall the incident in late 2007 where a Chinese diesel attack submarine surprised a US Naval flotilla in international waters by surfacing (undetected and unannounced) within visual range of the supercarrier USS Kitty Hawk [12]...A tactic reminiscent of Cold War era 'buzzes' of Russian Tupolev bombers on America's northern frontier (Additionally, Russia just recently started this up again by buzzing Canadian airspace with fighter jets while US President Barack Obama was visiting earlier this year.)

In short, it is wise that Beijing and Washington have sought cooperation so far, but it is most probably that China's rise to power will cause some growing pains for Washington and the rest of the Western world and will greatly complicate existing power relations. In keeping with the internal ideals of "the peaceful rise," China is not seeking to become a US style power, armed to the teeth and intolerant of others...a new 'Soviet Union' if you will. Instead, it has sought its own path to modernization and seeks to use its economic strength and a policy of minimal intervention in world affairs in order to subtly manipulate issues so effectively, that the outcome is inevitably in favour of Chinese interests. In avoiding throwing its weight around and instead, acting calmly, asymmetrically and by strengthening economic ties with its neighbours, China is able to slowly grow its influence and push America onto the sidelines of Asia all while more or less staying under America's radar.

Earlier, I mentioned that China was unable to really handle the nationalism it has fostered and is pushing itself into a dangerous new area. By the same token, America is generally unable to handle the quietly positioned economic force that is China, a "new Cold War, but this time with a vibrant market society." China's path to modernization is one that is largely cooperative with world interests, yet one that seeks to undermine Western interests with growing economic and diplomatic prowess. It is a tactic that the West (and specifically America, as it is faced with a shrinking portion of the 'world economic pie') is largely unprepared to deal with and it is this fact that makes America very nervous.

The coming decades are ones that will be shaped by the interactions of and the reactions to these policies and it is, very literally, one that could end very peacefully or very violently.

References:

F. Zakaria The Post-American World, New York: W.W. Norton & Company Inc., 2008

[1] Pp 87-88

[2] Pp 96

[3] Pp 88

[4] N. Klein The Shock Doctrine, London: Penguin Books, 2007. Pp 190 (Billionares calculated in Chinese Yuan).

[5] N. Klein The Shock Doctrine, London: Penguin Books, 2007. Pp 222, Pp 225, Pp 227-228

[6] Pp 102

[7] Pp 107

[8] Pp 117

[9] Pp 118

[10] Pp 121

[11] Pp 123

[12] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-492804/The-uninvited-guest-Chinese-sub-pops-middle-U-S-Navy-exercise-leaving-military-chiefs-red-faced.html