In the course of these brief elaborations, I wanted to contribute a bit more to this picture we have of the world system and its tensions and shifting character. We are living in this moment in which the empire we call the "West," presided over by the United States, is in a gradual state of decline after having enjoyed almost a century of hegemonic control over much of the activities of the global economy. We could easily resituate the gradients of the rising and falling of the empire in that period, or argue a different naming scheme altogether, where the "West" - or whatever we would want to call it - is something that extends much further back. For now, I just want to look at the US-led order that rose out of the challenges of the World Wars and then accelerated its decline in time for a new round of global upheavals.
Yes it is true that regime changes on this scale can take quite a bit of time given the study of history, setting aside the argument that the modern era is characterized by a profound acceleration of the movement of energy and transformation of matter, which could involve time dilation as well. But surveying the Western-constituted world system, it does appear desperately unsustainable and growing more unstable by the minute, and as such, an increasingly unwelcome place for a US empire desiring its brand of control, or at least its brand of controlling and encouraging the spread of chaos anyway; we'll get to that.
The Western imperialist could cast a worried glance at a number of red flags: the processes of de-industrialization that shifted the central locus of control and center of industrial gravity away from the US, processes that can be readily attributed to a degradation in national coherence and coordination and competence of the ruling elite. And let's be clear: it is the control and leverage of industrialization that is the modern king-maker in this world. Also, the degradation in domestically controlled raw materials and energy products. The shredding of what was left of public feeling and political trust. The shutting down of novel problem-solving forms, and the subsequent never-ending stream of collective problem-solving failures in the form of derailing supply chains, collapsing public health systems, random and senseless violence, and so on. There is the cultural cynicism and despair. There is the prominence and priority of propaganda and manipulating image. I could go on. The average person can look at a rotting wooden plank, and perhaps put a little weight on it and tease out its strength, and then judge that the plank will not bear weight and it is only a matter of time before it falls through, refusing to trust it any further. The Western world system is certainly looking that way.
I also have to give the begrudging admission that I am constantly impressed by the sheer persistence and longevity of a system that seems like it should blow up just by looking at it. Historically the US has been incredibly reckless in its foreign policy, and continues to behave that way as some very obvious and noisy chickens come home to roost. The history of its foreign policy has been to smash any alternative systems that attempt to maintain some sort of coherence to the bounded nations it trashes and drains of wealth, and then to set all of the tattered and flaming constitutive elements free, to be taken up into a rigged world market, with benefits funneled to the hegemon and costs sprayed about everywhere else. And part of why it can do that is the unprecedented material bounty it has presided over, helped along by an intense exploitation of the most powerful energy source known in human history, at least in terms of net return to human needs.
There is such an incredible and sheer ebullience of material production and reproduction: it is a system that proceeds to literally cheapen life, allowing it to continuously and messily expand with wanton waste and ruin. Which is where my nagging hesitation comes from when calling the pocket of that eight-ball shot where the whole rotten, yet blooming edifice tumbles down. Figuratively anyway: we know about major shocks and shifts, but the change is messier and more gradual than all that. Historians still debate when the Roman empire actually collapsed after all, with some wondering whether it ever collapsed at all.
From the outside looking in, there is also the impression that China and its allies - with the obligatory reciting of their own serious problems - does in fact display a problem-solving dynamism, or at least problem-solving that is more dynamic anyway, and an overall seriousness in intent that suggests a future direction for the greater system to take. Much of this endeavor does have a tragic quality however, considering our collective predicament.
