THREAD: I (very belatedly) wanted to flag this excellent
@ProSyn
piece by
@arvindsubraman
, who questions the conclusion that we're witnessing a traditional power transition between the United States and China.
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Dr. Subramanian asserts that "the powers of both the aspirant and the incumbent are eroding—albeit in different ways."
The United States is undercutting its soft power, damaging its political institutions, and sowing doubts about its ability to play a stable role abroad.
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China, meanwhile, is accumulating unsustainable debt, doubling down on its inefficient state-led growth model, and harming its international reputation by intensifying its repression of Hong Kong and detaining mass numbers of Uighurs in Xinjiang.
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The upshot? Dr. Subramanian concludes that "in the current struggle for global pre-eminence, China is depleting its accumulation of soft power, while America is as well – and losing its economic strength in the process."
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I wanted to flag two pieces that echo his thinking.
First, I suggested at the beginning of the year that we might see "[a]n uneasy, fluid coexistence between the United States and China."
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Second,
@BonnieGlaser
and I argued last month that "Washington and Beijing would be remiss to assume that middle powers will be passive spectators to strategic gridlock between the two."
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@Ali_Wyne
@AxelDessein
@ProSyn
@arvindsubraman
"Traditionally, a strong rising power has challenged a weakening incumbent, making the outcome preordained."
Is this actually the case? The British Empire reached its territorial and financial apogee decades after the US became its undeniable economic superior, didn't it?
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@TS_Allen
@AxelDessein
@ProSyn
@arvindsubraman
Mm, good point. My dates might be a bit off (paging
@KoriSchake
!), but I believe that while the United States overtook Great Britain in overall economic size by the 1880s or 1890s, the latter was still considered the world's foremost power through at least the late 1930s.
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@Ali_Wyne
@ProSyn
@arvindsubraman
There's this idea that not just oxymoron, it's illogical. If Chines is "doubling down on its inefficient self-destructive state-led growth model", why not let China go its way of self-destruction? Is there anything easier in GW? Just sit tight.
Or is it
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