Monday, August 15, 2011

I. Wallerstein: The World Consequences of U.S. Decline

Immanuel Wallerstein, Commentary No. 311, Aug. 15, 2011

A decade ago, when I and some others spoke of U.S. decline in the world-system, we were met at best with condescending smiles at our naivety. Was not the United States the lone superpower, involved in every remote corner of the earth, and getting its way most of the time? This was a view shared all along the political spectrum.

Today, the view that the United States has declined, has seriously declined, is a banality. Everyone is saying it, except for a few U.S. politicians who fear they will be blamed for the bad news of the decline if they discuss it. The fact is that just about everyone believes today in the reality of the decline.

What is however far less discussed is what have been, what will be the consequences worldwide of this decline. The decline has economic roots of course. But the loss of a quasi-monopoly of geopolitical power, which the United States once exercised, has major political consequences everywhere.

Continues >>

1 comment:

Nasir Khan said...

Professor Wallerstein shows the negative consequneces of the decline of the United States. I have much sympathy for his views but not without many reservations.

Such a decline about which he says nothing will also mean that the militarist yoke of America will weaken throughout the world. The victim nations of American imperialism, its criminal wars and the genocides, and political puppet regimes it has and will continue to impose as and when it chooses to do so will weaken. That means freedom from American imposed tyranny, freedom from the tyrannical regimes imposed and supported by America and freedom from American wars of aggression.

Isn’t that what the victims of American imperialism want and wish for?