Default Power: The Endurance of American International Preponderance

In an earlier entry, "The Coming Post-American World?," I suggested that the thesis of Fareed Zakaria's new book, The Post-American World, bears a striking resemblance to the debates on American international decline from the late-1980s.

I noted, as well, that Zakaria's notion of the "rise of the rest" is probably overrated (with reference to the rise of countries like China and India):

We're ... not genuinely in a "post-American" world, for while we are seeing the "rise of the rest," the traditional bases of American global preponderance remain intact - other key actors are just not so far behind.

We'll see more economic, cultural, and technological diversity on the world stage, but it's not likely that a new great power will supplant the United States soon, at least in the traditional conception of international power transitions.

Well, it turns out that Joseph Joffe, in his review of Zakaria at the New York Times, makes some simliar points.

He calls the United States the international system's "default power," a coinage I just love!

But note his hypothetical matchup of comparative U.S.-Chinese GDP growth projections, which puts the "rise of the rest" in perspective:

The real problem [of America's relative decline], Zakaria argues, is the rise of China, trailed by India....

“The problem is size,” Zakaria writes. “China operates on so large a scale that it can’t help changing the nature of the game.” True, but let’s play another game, that of compound interest. China’s (nominal) G.D.P. is about $3 trillion, while America’s is $14 trillion. Assume indefinite Chinese growth of 7 percent. That will double G.D.P. to $6 trillion in 10 years and double it again to $12 trillion by 2028. Assume now that the United States will grow at its historical rate of 3.5 percent. By 2028, G.D.P. will measure $28 trillion. This is a silly game, but no more inane than those projections that see China overtaking the United States as early as 2020. American output would still be about one-quarter of the world total, the average for the past 125 years, as Zakaria reminds us.

Note once more, for clarity: According to Joffe's power projections, in 2028 U.S. GDP would be $28 trillion to China's $12 trillion, more than twice as large!

Now that is stylin'!

But wait! Zakaria's own analysis on the continuing dynamism of the United States tends to discount the importance of the "rise of the rest" meme:

What’s the problem, then? “America remains the global superpower today, but it is an enfeebled one.” It has blown wads of political capital, but it is still better positioned to manage the “rise of the rest” than its rivals. Europe is rich, but placid and graying. Resurgent Russia is too grabby. China is more subtle in its ambitions, but still a classic revisionist that wants more for itself and less for the whole. It craves respect but will choose bloody repression in the crunch, as in Tibet.

The United States, too, has acted the bully in recent years, and it has paid dearly. Still, why does it retain “considerable ability to set the agenda,” to quote Zakaria? How can it muster the convening power that brings 80 nations to Annapolis? The short answer (mine) is: America remains the “default power”; others may fear it, but who else will take care of global business? Maybe it takes a liberal, seafaring empire, as opposed to the Russian or the Habsburg, to temper power and self-interest with responsibility for the rest.

Exactly, "with responsibility for the rest."

No one else is likely to take that responsibility for decades (see here for more on that).