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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: combjelly who wrote (259638)	11/12/2005 2:11:25 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1571798

But what if this view is wrong? What if the world is heading for a period when there is no hegemon? What if, instead of a balance of power, there is an absence of power? Such a situation is not unknown in history. Though the chroniclers of the past have long been preoccupied with the achievements of great powers--whether civilizations, empires or nation states--they have not wholly overlooked eras when power has receded. Unfortunately, the world's experience with power vacuums is hardly encouraging. Anyone who dislikes U.S. hegemony should bear in mind that, instead of a multipolar world of competing great powers, a world with no hegemon at all may be the real alternative to it. This could turn out to mean a new Dark Age of waning empires and religious fanaticism; of endemic rapine in the world's no-go zones; of economic stagnation and a retreat by civilization into a few fortified enclaves. Human history is relatively brief. To assume another Dark Ages in the absense of power is a bit of a leap IMO. In fact, it might prove to be a golden age where economic growth and innovation are the twin goals and not the accumualation of power. One thing is clear that even when a country is a democracy, there is no guarantee the administration of power by a superpower will be wise and good. Bush has undermined that theory. ted