That large American shadow all over
Debnath Sajit Chandra finds a lot of sense in a work on the superpower
Fareed Zakaria's work is a masterpiece with great insights into the ever-changing 21st century world. This book is particularly significant when the US is suffering from multiple problems from anti-Americanism to unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, from disappearing dollars to the most-recent hit of subprime disaster and when the rest of the world is emerging with much more economic capability than the military capability which America enjoyed throughout the 20th century. Economic challenges have never been felt so harshly in world history as they are being felt in this 21st century. Zakaria's brilliance is that he did not simply prescribe the fall or decline of the United States. He has rather pointed out the phenomenon of the 'rise of the rest' and how this phenomenon is reshaping the 21st century world. He has argued how China and India can potentially become game changers in the economic gravity of the world. After World War II, Germany and Japan had shown even faster economic growth. However, like the US, both countries later suffered the bubble burst of price boom which halted the horrors of 20th century economic totalitarianism, centered into specific geographical location. But this time, as he argues, the scenario is different because of the size of the economies of India and China, with a market of more than 2 billion people enjoying more than 7% GDP growth on an average since the 1990s. American output would still be about one-quarter of the world total as it has been for the past 125 years. Militarily the United States will remain one of the top players in the world as it has one of the most modern and highly equipped armed forces with a spending of almost as much as the rest of the world combined, with powerful allies in almost every corner of the world. So, Zakaria argues on the human capital development, indicating the fact that China and India produce 600,000 and 350,000 engineers a year to only 70,000 in the United States. However, if we subtract the 'auto mechanics and industrial repairmen' from the China-India total, the US still tops in training the most engineers per capita in the world. On top of that, many brilliant engineers produced in China and India find their fortunes in America. The most important point may be the quality of higher education in the US, a capacity that absolutely dominates higher education in the world with more than 50 percent of the world's top universities making the US the first choice for the most brilliant brains in the world. America's brilliant multi-cultural society prioritizes skills, openness, innovation, opportunity and competition that basically give every individual the chance to flourish at his/her best. The best example may be Barack Obama's emergence as the first African American president. The same goes for Zakaria himself, a Bombay-born immigrant who got training in Yale and Harvard. It indicates the unique and enduring strengths of a faltering America. So, immigrants, the ultimate secret American weapon, will keep the US ever young, giving the country an edge with youth energy compared to aging societies like Japan, China and Europe --- unless, of course, China or India becomes home to hungry masses yearning to be free to make their fortunes. That seems unimaginable at least in the 21st century. The US will remain the superpower in the coming years as it has shown superior capability to manage the 'rise of the rest' economically than it did against terrorism, which intensified anti-American sentiment. If the US can rebuild its good image throughout the world under an Obama presidency, it can potentially become a super-popular country while being the superpower both economically and militarily. Zakaria suggests what the US must do to retain its significance from choosing priorities for regaining confidence in the very things it has long celebrated --- free market, world-wide trade, immigration, and technological change --- to working closely with allies and agreeing on international rules of interaction to increase its legitimacy to the levels it enjoyed during the Clinton era. The US has to change its last eight years' behaviour to become more of a 'global broker' than 'global police', as he argues, for involving itself in more consultation, cooperation, and even compromise. In this sense, the book can serve as a note to the incoming Obama administration. One can argue that the New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman made a similar argument much earlier in his book, The World is Flat. However, Zakaria's use of a wide range of areas such as economics, politics, foreign policy and culture provides a simple but complete portrait of a globalizing world rather than dealing with only technology change, as did Friedman. Naming the book The Post-American World may initially look sensible as we have experienced scholarly conflict naming this era the inter-war period, wartime, the post-cold war world. However, in his book, Zakaria argues not about the decline of the US but rather of the rise of others. The book is notable for its clear and simple logical analysis of many complex issues involved in a globalizing world where America will still play the role of a major superpower in the coming decades.
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