TOP DOG AMERICA SHOULD ENJOY ITS LAST, PRECIOUS YEARS

 
Gideon Rachman
Thursday, June 14, 2007
 
 
America's position as the world's sole superpower remains unchallenged. Despite the Iraq war – despite everything – we are still in the “unipolar moment”. The US may as well enjoy it. By 2020 that moment is likely to be over.

Global power has many dimensions to it: economic, military, cultural, technological, intellectual and institutional. Today the US can still claim full-spectrum dominance. It is the world's largest economy. It spends more on the military than the next 14 countries combined. Its popular culture – from films to music to fast food – has a global reach that is unrivalled. Its universities are the best in the world. US companies have led the information technology revolution. After victory in the cold war, there is still no coherent alternative to the political and economic ideas (capitalism and democracy) associated with the US. Most of the world's most important institutions are either based in America (the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank), or dominated by Americans (Nato).

Yet every one of these forms of dominance is under challenge. The most obvious challenge is economic. The rise of China is now so rapid that Goldman Sachs recently revised its projection for the moment at which the Chinese economy will be larger than that of the US. The bank now thinks that China will overtake the US by 2027 (in real dollar terms), rather than by 2035 as previously predicted. China already has the fourth largest economy in the world and by 2020 its economy will be bigger than that of every member of the G8, except the US.

India is also catching up fast. Goldman Sachs estimates that by 2025 its economy will be bigger than six of the G8 members and by 2050 the Indian economy will also be larger than that of the US.

Sheer economic size will inevitably translate into political power. It is already anachronistic that the Chinese and Indians are taking part in the G8 only as part of an “outreach” meeting with developing economies. If the G8 is serious about reaching an agreement on climate change, the Indians and Chinese should be there as equal partners. And what is true of climate change will be true across a whole range of other issues, as economic power shifts east.

When China is the world's largest market and source of savings, international businessmen and bankers will have to pay attention to Chinese regulators – in the same way that they now worry about America's Securities and Exchange Commission or Federal Reserve. The threat of exclusion from Chinese markets – already fairly dire – will make politicians around the world jump.

A huge economy will have more money to spend on the most basic form of “hard power”: the military. Chinese military spending is already large enough for some analysts to think that it could challenge US primacy in Asia, particularly if there were a clash over Taiwan.

It will be a long time before any other country can aspire to the global military reach of the US. But the Iraq war has shown that all that dazzling firepower is not as useful as many Americans assumed. How can it be, if the US is unable to control a third-world country of 27m people?

Iraq has also damaged America's ability to lead the world in other ways. US prestige has plummeted – a fact reflected in opinion polls around the world. The election of a new president and the closure of the Guantánamo prison camp may help recover some ground. But America's own willingness to lead has also taken a knock. Blithe faith that democracy, free markets and the US army will sweep all before them is giving way to a warier and more cynical approach to the world.

Even American technological and intellectual leadership has been affected by Mr Bush's foreign policy failures. The security backlash after the attacks of September 11, 2001 has damaged the ability of US universities to attract the world's best minds. This shift comes at a particularly bad time for the US – just as the Chinese and Indians have begun to invest seriously in research and development.

The erosion of America's power to lead is well under way. But it would be a mistake to assume that US leadership will simply end on the day – 20 years from now – when China's economy overtakes that of the US.

Size is not everything. Even when the Chinese economy is larger than that of the US, the average American will still be far richer than the average Chinese. Combine riches with political freedom and it is likely that the “American dream” will remain much more attractive than Chinese reality for many years to come – sustaining the cultural and intellectual power that is a vital part of America's ability to lead.

As the reality of an increasingly powerful China sinks in, bashing the US may also become a less popular pastime. Critics of the US who regard its foreign policy as amoral and nationalistic should meet the Chinese.

Sheer inertia will also help the Americans. Institutions and patterns of thought built during the American century may persist long after its economic supremacy has passed. ?S leadership is well entrenched in many of the world's most important institutions. The fact that the Chinese seem ambivalent about assuming the responsibilities of global leadership could also help. One reason the meeting is not the G9 is that the Chinese government is reluctant to join – fearing, perhaps, that the “developed” nations will gang up on China.

So the G8 remains largely a white, western club. But no future US leader will ever preside there with quite the swagger of Mr Bush

中印将取代美国？

 
作者：英国《金融时报》专栏作家吉迪恩•拉赫曼(Gideon Rachman)
2007年6月14日 星期四
 
 
美国作为世界唯一超级大国的地位仍未动摇。尽管有伊拉克战争——以及其它所有对美国不利的因素——我们仍然处于“单极时刻”(unipolar moment)。美国最好能享受这一时刻。到2020年时这一切可能就将结束。

全球力量包含多个层面：经济、军事、文化、科技、知识和制度。目前，美国仍可以宣称在所有领域占据着主导地位。它是全球第一大经济体，军费开支比排名其后的14个国家的总合还高。它的流行文化——从电影到音乐到快餐——拥有无可匹敌的全球影响力。美国的大学是全世界最好的，美国企业则领导了信息技术革命。在冷战胜利后，美国的政治及经济理念（资本主义和民主）仍没有成体系的替代品。多数全世界最重要的机构，要么总部位于美国[联合国(UN)、国际货币基金组织(IMF)、世界银行(World Bank)]，要么受美国的支配[北约(NATO)]。

不过，美国在所有这些方面的支配地位都面临挑战。最明显的挑战来自经济方面。目前，中国的崛起速度如此之快，以至于高盛(Goldman Sachs)最近调整了其预测中国经济规模超越美国的时间。目前，高盛认为中国经济规模将在2027年超过美国（以实际美元计），而非此前预测的2035年。中国已成为全球第四大经济体，到2020年，其经济规模将超过八国集团(G8)中除美国以外的所有国家。

印度也在迅速追赶。高盛估计，到2025年，印度经济规模将超过八国集团中的六个国家，并将在2050年也超过美国。

单纯的经济规模将不可避免地转化为政治力量。中国和印度参与八国集团峰会，但仅作为与发展中经济体“范围外”会议中的一部分，这已是一个时代性的错误。如果八国集团在达成有关气候变化协议的问题上是严肃的，印度和中国应作为平等的合作方出现在会场上。同样，使用于气候变化问题的道理，也适用于其它所有问题，因为经济力量正在东移。

当中国成为世界上最大的市场和储蓄国时，全球商人和银行家将必须关注中国的监管机构，如同他们现在对美国证券交易委员会(Securities and Exchange Commission)或美联储(Fed)的担心一样。被排除出中国市场的威胁——现在已经相当可怕了——将使全世界的政客们跳起来。

一个规模巨大的经济体将会有更多的钱投入“硬实力”最基本的形式：军事。中国的军费开支之大，已足以使一些分析人士认为，中国可能在亚洲挑战美国的首要地位，特别是在发生台海冲突的时候。

任何其它国家追求获得美国在全球的军事影响力都需要很长的时间。但伊拉克战争已经表明，所有那些令人目眩的武器，并非美国人所想象的那么有用。如果美国无力控制一个2700万人口的第三世界国家，这是怎么回事呢？

伊拉克还损坏了美国在其它方面对世界的领导力。美国的声望一落千丈——全球范围的民意调查都反映出这一事实。选出一位新总统并关闭关塔那摩监狱，或许有助于在一定程度上挽回局面。但是，美国自身的领导意愿也已遭受了打击。认为民主、自由市场和美国军队可以扫清一切障碍的轻率想法，正转向对世界采取一种更谨慎、更质疑的方式。

甚至连美国在科技和知识方面的领先地位，也受到布什外交政策失误的影响。2001年9•11袭击之后，美国在安全问题上的强烈反应影响了美国大学吸引全球优秀人才的能力。而这一转变发生在美国尤为艰难的时刻——中国和印度正开始认真进行研发方面的投资。

美国的领导能力已面临严重侵蚀。但如果以为20年后中国经济超越美国时，美国就会丧失其领先地位，这种想法是错误的。

规模并不代表一切。即使当中国经济规模超越美国时，美国老百姓也仍然比中国老百姓富裕得多。生活的富裕加上政治方面的自由，许多年后，“美国梦”可能仍将比中国的现实更富吸引力——保持文化和知识力量是美国领先能力的关键因素。

随着中国日益强大这一现实逐渐为人们所接受，抨击美国可能也会成为一种越来越不受欢迎的消遣。认为美国外交政策不道德和具有民粹主义特点的批评人士应该见一见中国人。

仅是惯性也将有利于美国人。在美国失去其经济霸主地位之后，美国时代树立的制度和思维模式可能还会持续很长时间。在全球许多最为重要的机构中，美国的领先地位根深蒂固。中国似乎对承担全球领先地位带来的责任颇为矛盾，这一事实可能也有所帮助。八国集团会议之所以不是九国集团会议，原因之一在于中国政府不愿加入——或许是担心那些“发达”国家将对自己群起挞伐。

因此，在很大程度上，八国集团仍是西方白种人的俱乐部。但如果美国未来的领导人还像布什这么狂妄自大，那么他们将不再有机会主持这一会议。