My Talk with Fareed Zakaria: Obama Must Face A Post-American World
If Barack Obama succeeds in his campaign against John McCain and becomes president of the United States, he will have to deal with much deeper issues beyond Iraq, namely the "rise of the rest" as China, India and the developing world aspire to catch up with America and want a seat at the table of global power. In such a world, the strategic vision of US leadership ought to be
to make the world safe for interdependence since we will not always be on top.
I discussed these issues recently with Fareed Zakaria, author of The Post-American World.
Nathan Gardels: Barack Obama has been reading your book The Post-American World. If he becomes president, what is it that you most want him to take away?
Fareed Zakaria: I hope he grasps that the third great powershift of the modern era is taking place. The first was the rise of the West. The second was the rise of America as the leading Western power. Now we are seeing the arrival of a post-American world -- not because the U.S. is declining, but because the rest are rising.
This shift is not about Bush or about Iraq. It is a much deeper and broader phenomenon of the rest of the world catching up. For the U.S. to thrive in a world like this, it must adjust economically, politically and culturally.
At a political level, Obama talks the right language about engaging the world with a political and not a merely military attitude. At an economic level, however, this historic shift is going to be more challenging for him and for Democrats in general. This is a world where the U.S. had the lowest corporate tax rate 20 years ago and now has the second highest -- not because the U.S. rate was raised, but because everyone else lowered theirs! Then, of course, Democrats tend to be quite retrograde on freer trade.
Facing a post-American world means America will have to play better at every level because these days we have lots of competition. It is not just about India and China. In 2006 and 2007, 124 countries grew at a rate of 4 percent or more, including 30 countries in Africa.
The U.S. can thrive in this economic environment because it is not a zero-sum game. The pie is expanding and we can all have our share. In purely political and military terms, of course, there will be some relative U.S. decline because that kind of power is more zero-sum in nature. This shift I'm speaking of will not take place overnight. The U.S. will remain a central player for a long time, but from now on we will have to share power with others who have come to the table.
Gardels: Some, like Singapore's Kishore Mahbubani, say that a post-American world where the rest rise will necessarily be de-Westernized. Do you see it that way?
Zakaria: What does it mean when people say that the Asian countries are reinventing modernity, that the next wave of modernization will be non-Western? In some sense, this is undeniably true. Chinese is a non-Western language, and those who are modernizing China speak it. India has cultural traits America does not have, as does Japan.
But the striking thing is that the West has been dominant for so long, it has put such a distinctive stamp on the modernity it invented that no one really knows how to escape it. What will Indian corporations look like as India becomes more prosperous? Well, InfoSys, Tata and Wipro look about the same as corporations in Silicon Valley or other IT companies.
We all live so completely in a Western world we don't know how to invent a non-Western modernity. Would we do away with double-entry bookkeeping?
China's cities mostly look like those in the West, the same structures only with Chinese architectural flourishes. The highways, road and bridge structures are the same. If you are growing up in China today, you are living in a more Westernized China than at any point in the prior 5,000 years.
Gardels: Can there be modernity that is not secular and democratic, but religious or illiberal?
We see that in China modernization does not include the Western features of human rights and democracy. The example of Russia suggests that the future may belong more to the Putins than the Havels of history. We see in Turkey under the Justice and Development Party (AKP), with its Islamist roots, that modernization does not necessarily mean a secular, but a religious, outlook. The recent ruling to allow women to wear headscarves at university can be seen as a symbol of non-Western modernity.
Zakaria: The GDP per capita in China is about $4,000, and the government still has fairly tight control of the country. Yet, the economy is increasingly open and, in many social aspects, there is great openness. At $4,000 GDP per capita, what Western country had substantially greater political freedom than China? Britain or America, perhaps. France, Austria-Hungary, Germany? Certainly not.
What we regard as Western modernity came at the long end of a train of highly repressive, dictatorial regimes that opened up very slowly against the wishes of the powers at the time. Kaiser's Germany was highly illiberal. That was the 1900s.
China today is according more respect for human rights than at any time in its past, mainly as a consequence of their contact with the West. It would not have happened otherwise.
On a 25-year timescale, Russia has moved forward quite substantially. On a five-year scale, it has moved backward. It is not non-Western culture but the abundance of natural resources that have retarded political modernization there, just as in Saudi Arabia. Russia is a Siberian Saudi Arabia.
Turkey is more interesting. There you had a forced, totalitarian modernization on the Western model imposed by Ataturk. What we are seeing now is an incredibly healthy process where the society is modernizing rather than merely the state. As the society modernizes, it is asking for some space in cultural terms that is not entirely Western.
Here, you are absolutely right. There is a facet of non-Western modernization. At the same time, all the society is asking for is the same right accorded every American of choice in free religious expression. It is just a doff of the cap to the line in the Koran that says women should dress modestly. Only the French and Turkish states had imposed Enlightenment liberalism by dictat. Now, that is what is illiberal, not the right to choose.
Still, what we are witnessing in all these countries is that, because of increasing contact with the West as they open up, they are adopting a form of modernity that is broadly part of the framework created by the West, with some interesting variations, but not vastly different. Bollywood films may not look like Hollywood films, but they all have chase scenes and love stories.
Gardels: The Islamic activists of the AKP in Turkey argue that Ataturk believed only secularism equaled modernity because positive science is what created progress. They think a religious culture can also be scientific and technologically modern.
Zakaria: Let's not create a stereotype of what Western modernity looks like. Britain is not technically a secular country since the head of state is also head of the church. Germany funds Catholic and Protestant churches, something unthinkable in the United States. What is happening in Turkey today is more in accord with those societies in the West, including the U.S., who have always given religion space in the public realm.
Turks are reacting to the complete rejection of any role for religion in society. Ataturk's model was unsustainable in the long run in a society that is 90 percent Muslim in a world undergoing a broad religious revival. Yet, when a synagogue is bombed in Istanbul, there is general sympathetic commiseration for the victims. That pluralist spirit is a core value of modernity.
Gardels: So, on a global scale, you don't see a post-American world becoming less Western and more traditionally, say, Asian. Rather you see a new cosmopolitan, hybrid global culture emerging within the international rules-based system that America largely constructed?
Zakaria: That is precisely right. First of all, there is no such thing as Asia and "Asian values." There is India. There is China. There is Japan. There is Afghanistan. Asia is a Western construct. To find something that unifies the Afghans and Koreans would be an heroic undertaking of generalization.
These societies are moving into a Western-created modernity, and as they rise in power they redefine that modernity in a way that doesn't change its central aspects -- science and technology, commerce and capitalism, shift from countryside to the city -- but colors its character. The model here is the U.S. As immigrants came into the U.S., they changed its complexion, but at the end of the day the basic formula of America, the structure of society, has remained similar.
The core issue is not going to be about culture. The issue is whether the rising powers will get a respected seat at the table. It is not a matter of "letting them in." They have to want to integrate themselves into the existing international order because they believe it will give them a voice commensurate with their accomplishments and status.
If that process goes well, there will be a stable world order. If not, the world order will be unstable. In either case, it is largely an issue of power, not culture. In cultural terms, the British and the Germans in 1914 were very similar. They still managed to destroy the world.
Gardels: Bill Clinton said some years ago that America's strategic vision ought to be "to make the world safe for interdependence" because the U.S. would not always be on top. The rise of the rest really only means they are joining the post -WWII American-framed international order -- the United Nations, Bretton Woods, the World Trade Organization -- with its commitment to universal rules of openness that have spread gains widely. Isn't that essentially what you are saying?
Zakaria: I would put it this way: America's key challenge is to maintain and refurbish the structures of stability for global economics and politics as this huge powershift takes place, as the rest rise. The key challenge is drawing the new great powers such as India and China into this system so they feel they have an investment in maintaining it.
Unfortunately, this supremely important task doesn't stir the soul as much as, say, combating some menacing evil. You won't hear many people issuing trumpet calls on behalf of stable interdependence. Yet, that is precisely the challenge. We have created a system where others feel they can rise to power without going to war, raping, pillaging and plundering.
We should be mindful of how historically unique this situation is and focus on how we can keep it going. We need to be mindful of the morality of this struggle to create a world in which hundreds of millions of people can live better lives than ever before.
To be sure, this sounds like some wonky appeal to shore up international institutions. It may not have the appeal of unfolding a banner to go out and fight the next crusade, but it is by far the more noble cause.
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What may suffer in a world of Post-American modernity, however, is the universal vision (open societies, human rights, democracy, political accountability) that accompanied U.S. ascendance. China, India, and Japan have economic models to export, but little else; there is no “Chinese” world view, no encompassing ideology that can provide the architecture for a rules based, international order. Rather the interests of rising powers like China and Russia are insular and parochial, as exemplified by Chinese currency manipulation and Putin’s attempts to use oil, natural gas, and pipelines as a political weapon.
If the U.S. is powerless to advance more universal principles, the system will suffer accordingly as various regional actors carve out their political and economic fiefdoms rather than promoting broader interests of the global community. Keep in mind that as the hegemonial power after WW II, the U.S. facilitated economic growth and stability throughout Western Europe and much of Asia, and has provided the primary export market for many less developed countries (unlike Europe and Japan).
On the positive side, the scientific/ information/technology revolution ( as well as entrepreneurship in general) – upon which economic growth is based - requires the free flow of information and ideas. Autocracy fails on this count. Zakaria points out that many countries are growing economically – but sustaining economic growth is a whole other kettle of fish. Those states which violate this fundamental rule of “information flow” will end up with an economy like Putin’s Russia or Mubarek’s Egypt.
Modernism isn't really "Western."
True, the modern age started in Europe for well-known historical reasons, but there's nothing Western about the laws of gravity, double-entry bookkeeping or science. These things work anywhere, unlike the religions and other superstitions the world is learning to discard.
People noticed. Much of the world is moving in a modernist direction because it's obvious that scientific and technical progress produce tangible results such as more food, less disease and a chance to lead a secure life.
Of course, this isn't happening overnight. It's the work of decades. There's resistance, especially from the parasites that lead the world's "great religions" who'll need to find other work eventually, as men and especially women find their own voices and take power.
And the US needs to discard its own neocolonialist illusions, especially the dangerous notion that we can deliver democracy via Humvees and B2 bombers. The "White man's Burden" con game didn't work in the 19th century and it won't pass muster in the 21st.
"Fareed Zakaria: I hope he grasps that the third great powershift of the modern era is taking place. The first was the rise of the West. The second was the rise of America as the leading Western power. Now we are seeing the arrival of a post-American world -- not because the U.S. is declining, but because the rest are rising."
"not because the US is declining"???
Maybe not from where he and his nice salary sit. What planet does Fareed Zakaria live on anyway?
Fareed is an intellectual banana-head.
He talks as if all the world needed was some calm, rational
intellectuals to tell everyone what to do.
This is why so few progressives make any real changes in the world.
And China and India??
To even compare the US with these countries is simply inane.
China is going to have to do what China has always done: Pay attention to the needs
of a growing population! They are not going to compete with us as long as the majority
of their people live like rats. Does Fareed think that all of a sudden
India and Pakistan will now be friends, because America doesn't rule the world??
I hope Fareed pays attention to the next wave of violent riots that
are about to rock India real hard. Does Fareed think all these Muslims dedicated to converting the world or slaughtering it are suddenly going to go back in their caves and figure out how to get along in a world where America is no longer a super-power??
Does India still have "Untouchables?"
Does China still have the highest rate of female infanticide in the world?
And we are supposed to worry about THESE countries?
And Fareed, your next stop in your Hope for the World Tour should be several places
in Africa where civilization is just bustin' out all over!
Darfur. Somalia. Congo. Zimbabwe.
Ecce homo!!
It's not necessary for a country to better the standards of living for all its people before embarking upon a round of imperialism or geo-political dominance. To state otherwise is demonstrably idiotic. I call to witness the British Empire in the 19th century, on which the Sun never set, and the millions of children (as young as 8) employed in its factories in England. I call to witness the proud victor of WW2, the US of A, and its subjugation of native Americans and its very own black population until the Civil Rights movement.
Just because there's violence and subjugation of human rights does not in any way dissuade the elites that rule an emerging giant from demonstrating their power. All it requires is a group of people holding the reins of power to decide that the time has come for a new hegemony. It would be foolish and naive to assume that these groups care about human rights or the feeding of their people.
In response to Does India still have untouchables? Or China and the female infanticides, here goes:
Does Texas still have creationism taught in schools? Can Brazilian plumbers with a goatee walk down the streets of London without being afraid that they'll get shot by the Met Police? Can people like Rodney King drive down LA and not get arrested and beaten up for the crime of Driving While Black?
Here's a Cliff Notes version of the entire argument: Everyone has problems. Get over it.
All these comments seem to be coming from a fearful mindset. This is the way things are going. We can either accept them or be in a permanent state of war. I surrender to the noble cause of helping lift the entire world up and accepting my place in the service of it. Can you do that, or do you want to enlist and fight?
Whatever you fight, you strengthen. Whatever you resist, persists.
i think you need to reread the comments - some might think your comments are pretty naive and uninformed.
Helping the "entire world?"
You got lots of work to do Sparky!
And what happens when "helping" depends on killing evil people?
As in Africa. What if the right thing to do is to put a bullet in the brain
of some god-less baby-raping dictator?
What will you do when the gun is in your hand and some evil piece of crap
is begging for his life, after taking the lives of thousands, perhaps millions?
I hope you will do the right thing and PULL THE TRIGGER!
"Whatever you fight, you strengthen." Tell it to Hitler.
DAMN this 250 word limit.
Fareed doesn't know he is talking about. He bases everything on what is good for General Motors is good for the world.
His ideal world would be based upon nothing more than corporate fascism which he seems eager to embrace..
His comment about China "embracing" human rights is laughable at best and delusional at worst. Nothing in China has changed with regards to human rights, it's just hidden better.
His further nonsense that countries feel they can rise to power without "raping, pillaging and plundering is pure delusion"
What does he call what is happening to the people in these third world countries who have NO power beyond what the corporations who are working hand in hand with the government to keep the working force down? What about the raping, pillaging and plundering of environmental and ecological systems in those countries.
Fareed had NEVER paid any attention to those aspects of this so call rising globalization. It is nothing more than rising global corporate fascism.
The U.S. will become a victim of this sort of thinking wherein the middle class is destroyed and he'll think it's perfectly okay to get rid of a middle class in order to have this New World Order he admires so much.
It's easy to speak from an Ivory Tower when talking about the New World Order because you see NONE of the effects it has on the people or the country, only the money and new glass buildings.
Bingo. He's another dangerous elitist who thinks
we should all just 'get along.'
Ain't gonna happen!
i had a problem with Fareed's first show this weekend on cnn-- he was overly effusive about his "star studded" panel-- overly prosthelytizing - which reads elitest. he needs to say what he feels needs to be said, cover what he feels needs to be covered rather than telling americans and the world what is wrong with where they previously fixated. the only way to grow his viewership and readership is if he has a good story with compelling facts, sitting at a table having an erudite conversation with people he thinks are worthwhile - but who are people who can't or don't connect with the audience -- that is just a failure. I wish him good luck but I really think that he needs to work on his stance and his delivery and decide how he wants to come across, it can read as very offensive even to those who hold some similar views.
I think you hit the nail squarely on the head. A unipolar world is inherently unstable, hegemonic, and dangerously out of control, as we've seen all too clearly in the last 8 years. A multi-polar world is also inherently unstable and dangerous, even anarchic. We need something in between, where regional powers--Brazil, the US, Europe, Russia, China, Iran, and India--interdepend to maintain a world system. The major impediment to an interdependent world, however, is a bloated Pentagon; until that beast is tamed or extinguished, we will have neither peace nor prosperity.
Part 2: Globalisation will not bring the third world into the first, it will drag the first into the third and prevent the poorer nations from achieving true freedom, democracy and wealth.
In the future the rich in America or France will be as rich as those in Nigeria or Eritrea. The poor in America or France will be as poor as those in Nigeria or Eritrea.
Eventually we will be living under international government as the powers gradually incline themselves more toward each other. The more centralised the power the greater the power and the lesser the accountability, therefore the appeal to powerhungry politicians.
Either we will all perish as the major superpowers compete for absolute control through nuclear war or they will deal with each other in the name of peace and when the next Hitler comes around there will be no sovereign nations left to defeat him.
Power hungry politicians will destroy each other.
No unity among evil, ambitious men. There is no way
the world will ever be living under an "international"
government.
The gap between the rich and poor will preclude forever
a universal government.
There will come a day when the rich will be on the run.
Because the rest of the world will have nothing left to lose
and will hunt them down and take what they have.
Stay tuned. It happens now, China, India, large chunks of Africa.
The poor of America will never be as poor as those of Africa.
Because American politicians are still smarter than most African
politicians who don't yet understand that you can only starve and oppress
your own people so much before they tear the place the pieces.
Chaos therapy works well in America. Bread and shiny objects.
Part One: Global interdependence is just a term for reduced sovereignty. For example all the power in Europe is being centralised in Brussels, if they manage to bring in the Lisbon Treaty we will be a federalised United States of Europe, only with an unelected President and all our laws will be dictated by an unelected Commission. (and imagine Europe lectures democratic Russia on democracy!) They want to spread this out to Russia, North Africa, the Middle East and Afghanastan. (according to the British foreign minister David Milliband)
You are also seeing people calling for a United States of Africa (the bits that Europe does'nt want presumably).
By centralising the powers on each continent and integrating them into one country, democracy is crushed as the lawmakers are distanced from their own people. This benefits only the wealthy corporations who in an open pool of free labour and trade can push for a race to the bottom in terms of wages and working conditions, creaming off all the profits at the top scale.
United States of Africa? Are you kidding?
Large portions are still mired in tribalism for pity sake. Machetes for everyone!
And the day Europeans figure out how to get along it will be freezing in hell.
And I look forward to the day Europe tries to tell the largest criminal gang
in the world, Russia, what to do.
Vlad will just turn off the tap. No oil. No fun.
I know it is ludicrious, but that is what they are all talking about in certain sections of the European media now - yes a United States of Africa and no it will not work, likely it will create even more social upheavel and war than already exists. This is not coming from Africans but the West who want to impose 'civilisation' on Africa, like it was so successful last time!
Our politicians are demented idiots who think they are Gods, they want Russias oil and gas supplies, along with an added population of 400 milliion people to contribute to Superstate status.
I don't look foward to Russias response to our grubby eyed wannabe dictators, turning off the taps is nothing compared to the nuclear weapons they are pointing in our direction in preparation for military aggression. Nato has surrounded them in all Eastern European countries. Russia has closed down all foreign sponsored media now as they are rightfully paranoid of W. Europes intentions toward them.
Obama has his work cut out for him, for sure. And the U.S. will be very soon seeing the strong ripple effect -- both on the domestic and international front -- due to a lack of foresight plus a stubborn and intentional disregard by the the Bush Administration for long-term economic realities, as they favored short-term perks. Obama will no doubt be blamed as these ripple effects from the Bush Administration's negligence begin to hit our shores in earnest over the next two years. Perhaps Obama -- blameless -- will nonetheless be blamed.
However, I believe that a little Barack integrity, combined with his ability to bring the right people together, will go a long way toward our being, "mindful of the morality of this struggle to create a world in which hundreds of millions of people can live better lives than ever before."
Our economy, as well as our national conscience, depends upon it.
"In such a world, the strategic vision of US leadership ought to be to make the world safe for interdependence since we will not always be on top."
Exactly --
I knew we were in trouble when the imperialists started talking about a "Project for a New American Century." Shades of the British Empire.
We are brothers on the beautiful little planet.
HuffPost's Pick
"This is a world where the U.S. had the lowest corporate tax rate 20 years ago and now has the second highest -- not because the U.S. rate was raised, but because everyone else lowered theirs!"
And to show their gratitude to the U.S., these corporations have moved their manufacturing operations off-shore to the detriment of the U.S. workforce and economy.
The primary reason tht the U.S. has enjoyed its high-flying world dominance is that it was achieved mostly at the expense of the rest of the world. Now the rest of the world has gotten smarter and learned to utilize their own natural resources instead of giving them to U.S. corporations for a fraction of their true value. Our sense of entitlement is rapidly becoming nostalgic.
The need to shape our economy, jobs and industries for the rising global competition is unquestionable. We either change or see the continued erosion of American jobs, industries and the economy.
Hopefully, Obama and his staff will shape the American economy so it embraces and thrives with the global influences.
As my username suggests I am an American living abroad and from what I have heard Fareed Zakaria makes a good point in saying that foreigners don't hate America as much as they don't really care because they have their own problems.
The following simple things would help normalize relationships:
1/ Stop calling the President of the USA "leader of the free world". The cold war is over and following the current administration's performance in response to the aftermath of Katrina very few people are seeking American leadership.
2/ When foreign diplomats say they want the US to lead, they mean: "would you please take care of your domestic problems and get off our backs".
3/ In your own interest please adopt the metric system. It won't be long before the American consumer will be asked to pay the price for "US market" versions of everything.
4/ The symbol "America land of the free" is still popular abroad and most people make a clear distinction between this dream and any particular administration. So please America take back your country from the cronies and war profiteers.
Ultimately the next president will just have to keep in mind that 19 out of 20 people on this planet are not American.
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