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After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the assumption was that the United States would play a leading role in the world and become an irreplaceable hegemon. However, this “unipolar” moment for the United States was short-lived. That is, with the rise of China, Russia’s recovery from the collapse of the Soviet Union, and India’s rapid development, the United States’ geopolitical dominance ended. A new multipolar era is coming.
The United States is still fighting for world dominance, but this is wishful thinking and doomed to fail. The United States is incapable of leading the world, even if the rest of the world wants it to, but it does not want to. The United States’ share of world production (at international prices) is 16% and declining, down about 27% from 1950 and 21% from 1980. China’s share, on the other hand, is 19%. China’s manufacturing industry is about twice that of the United States, and China can rival the United States in cutting-edge technology.
The United States is also militarily overextended, with some 750 overseas military bases in 80 countries. The United States is embroiled in protracted wars in Yemen, Israel-Palestine, Ukraine, Syria, Libya, and elsewhere. America’s wars and desire to be a hegemon are financed by borrowing, including from rivals like China.
Moreover, fiscal policy in the United States is paralyzed. The rich finance political campaigns and want lower taxes, while the poor want more social spending. As a result of this situation, we have reached an impasse characterized by persistent budget deficits (currently exceeding 5% of GDP). Today, public debt has risen to 100% of GDP, compared to about 35% of GDP in 2000.
While the United States has successfully maintained its technological momentum in areas such as artificial intelligence and microchip design, China is rapidly catching up with the United States in innovation by spreading knowledge and advances initiated in China. Much of the world’s green and digital hardware (including advanced solar panels, wind turbines, nuclear power plants, batteries, chips, electric vehicles, 5G systems, and long-distance power transmission) is produced in Asia, with a large portion coming from China, or more precisely, with supply chains dominated by China.
Given its budget deficit, the United States has avoided the financial burdens associated with global leadership: Specifically, it requires NATO allies to pay for their own military defense, while its contributions to the United Nations system on climate and development finance have become increasingly stingy.
In short, while the United States deludes itself into thinking it is still the world’s dominant power, we already live in a multipolar world, which raises the question of what such a new multipolarity should mean. Here are three possibilities.
The first, and our current trajectory, is a continued struggle for dominance among the great powers, with the United States competing with China, Russia, and others. Professor John Mearsheimer, a prominent American foreign policy scholar, has proposed the theory of “offensive realism,” which holds that great powers will inevitably compete for dominance, but the consequences may be the tragedy of devastating war. It goes without saying that our task is to avoid such tragic outcomes, rather than accepting them as our fate.
The second possibility is to maintain an uneasy peace through a balance of power among the great powers, sometimes called “defensive realism.” Since the United States cannot defeat China or Russia, and vice versa, the great powers should avoid direct conflict to maintain peace. The United States should not try to push NATO into Ukraine given Russia’s strong opposition, nor should it arm Taiwan due to China’s strong opposition.
In general, the great powers should proceed with caution and avoid crossing each other’s red lines. This is good advice, of course, but it is not enough. The balance of power becomes an imbalance and threatens peace. The Concert of Europe, the balance of power that existed between the European powers in the 19th century, eventually succumbed to the changes in the balance of power that occurred at the end of the 19th century, leading to the First World War.
The third possibility is a true peace among the great powers, which has been scorned by American leaders for the past 30 years but represents our best hope. This peace would be based on the shared understanding that there is no hegemony and that common interests require active cooperation among the great powers. This approach has several foundations, including idealism (a world based on morality) and institutionalism (a world based on international law and multilateral institutions).
Sustainable peace is possible. We can learn a lot from the lasting peace in East Asia before the arrival of Western powers in the 19th century. Chinese cosmopolitanismPhilosopher Xiang Shuchen cites historian Kang Dawei, who notes that “from the founding of the Ming dynasty to the Opium Wars, that is, from 1368 to 1841, there were only two wars between China, Korea, Vietnam, and Japan. These were the stories of China’s attack on Vietnam (1407-1428) and Japan’s attack on Korea (1592-1598). The British attack on China in the First Opium War of 1839-1842 and the subsequent East-West conflict (and later the Sino-Japanese conflict) broke the lasting peace in East Asia.
This peace, which lasted for nearly half a millennium in East Asia, is attributed by Professor Xiang to the Confucian norms of harmony that underpinned East Asian nation-states, in stark contrast to the hegemonic struggles organized by European nations. Dr. Dong Qiong, an expert on Chinese foreign policy making, has noted similar differences between Chinese and European nation-states in his book China’s statehood in a changing world: Demystifying enduring traditions and dynamic constraints.
I recently suggested 10 principles for achieving lasting peace in the 21st centurywhich builds on China’s Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, with an additional five practical steps that allow us to blend Confucian ethics and institutionalism. My idea is to draw on the ethics of cooperation as well as the practical benefits of international law and the UN Charter.
Taking into account the upcoming United Nations Future Summitwe send the following key message: We do not want hegemony, nor do we need hegemony. We do not need a balance of power that can easily degenerate into an imbalance of power. We need a lasting peace based on morality, common interests, and international laws and institutions.
Jeffrey D. Saxophone
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