Any history student knows that there are no lasting empires; each emerges, reaches maturity, even glory, and then invariably falls apart.
Prof. Samuel P. Huntington noted that every continent (subcontinent, region) produces a leader in the course of its historical development. He calls such leadership environs regional states. As a rule such giant polities have control over more than 50% of a given demographic, economic, or political area (continent). Such was the Soviet empire, and the same is true of the United States, it being a continental as well as world superpower; the same is true (to varying extents) of Brazil, South Africa, China, India, and Indonesia. Most of these should have grown unstable by now, which makes the main question is not whether they will eventually fall apart (demographers predict that the number of states on the planet will reach 300 in 50 years), but when.
There is no denying the fact that the life of the man in the street does not get any better after an empire collapses, but the very fact of its collapse — especially in the case of a superpower — manifests a new stage in the development of a given region. The Maastricht process has received a powerful impetus after the fall of the Soviet empire, since 1992 to be precise, climaxing in the formation of the European Union, a fundamentally new institution.
Let us recall the objective prerequisites of Soviet instability in the early 1990s.
An empire is a living organism that always needs manpower and natural resources to maintain its existence as well as to secure and increase its military might. It is common knowledge that the Soviet Union’s economic growth was markedly intensive, starting in the 1970s and toward the end of its existence; the number of “workers in the national economy” would grow by over ten million with every five-year plan; fuel output rate by 25-30%, and the stockpile of nuclear weapons was enough to annihilate all life on the planet several times over. This could not go on forever, of course. In 1982-83, KGB and CIA analysts (working independently, of course) prepared reports (forwarded to the CC CPSU and US administration respectively), emphasizing the high likelihood of a deep systemic crisis in the USSR in the early 1990s. Subsequent events proved these clandestine experts right.
In 1991, the world learned about the Russian cross, meaning that the Soviet birth and death rate curves were crossing each other, with the death rate going up. Earlier, in 1989, oil and coal output showed a dramatic decline. The disarmament process began in 1988, very painful for all states concerned (for it contradicted the very imperial idea). Hence, the USSR experienced energy-demographic stability, while the empire, like a cancer, could exist only in conditions of demographic and energy growth.
Suppose we compare the Soviet and US situations in 1991. In the United States, owing to an active immigration policy, demographic stability was planned toward the end of the current decade, with the population’s age structure changing, the share of citizens in their active age, being most active consumers of immovable property, cars, etc., declining, thus providing preconditions for lessened consumption of the natural resources. For this reason the Clinton administration planned reductions in CO 2 discharges not earlier than 2012 (otherwise GNP would show a 3% decline by 2010).
The Western European countries decided to lower CO 2 by 15% compared to the 1990 level, meaning that the EU economies were showing intensive growth accompanied by reductions in energy consumption and labor time (at present, an average European employee works 20% shorter hours than his or her counterpart in the US). The US economy, despite the active introduction of progressive technologies, looked more like the Soviet extensively militarized economy. So one should not be surprised at Robert Solow’s well- known paradox that we see computers everywhere except in labor productivity statistics.
When a new president takes office in a democratic country he is invariably acquainted with highly classified information. His subsequent decisions may look unreasonable or rash at best to all those without a need to know. When George Bush the Younger demonstratively disowned the Kyoto Accords shortly after inauguration and launched his national missile defense program, this was sharply condemned by Russia, China, and even by most of his European allies. In actuality, he had simply realized that he was inheriting the US economy in a hazardous condition, so he decided to rehabilitate it using time-tested methods, boosting energy consumption and the arms race.
Experts have recently begun to compare the US economy to that of Japan in the late 1980s. At the time, Japan experienced a speculative stock exchange boom, giving an impetus to economic growth. The result was stagnation of the 1990s. Japan, however, is an ethnically homogeneous state and, unlike America, is not threatened by collapse. The United States at present strikingly resembles the Soviet Union on the eve of collapse. There is the same awareness of own might, unlimited opportunities, and resources; there are even mottoes sounding much like Soviet ones. In the USSR it was “new thinking” and perestroika; in the United States, it is a “new economy” and the “end of history.” The rulers of both superpowers hoped they had found access to everything in the process of formation. In the USSR, this was supposed to have been achieved by glasnost; in America, they worship the Internet. Most amazing of all is that America seems to have fallen into the same trap as the Soviet Union did when it starting the Afghan War.
The Americans seem to have forgotten George Soros’s statement made after the unprecedented economic growth of the 1990s: every upsurge is invariably followed by a decline. They were reminded of it by what happened on September 11.
The terrorist attack on America is striking not only because of its unprecedented cruelty and Hollywood scenario, but also its jeweler’s precision. It not only caused an avalanche on world stock exchanges, but also dampened consumer confidence: the US economy might collapse (it is a consumer society). The greatest hazard is a sharp decline in US air carriage and the likelihood of severe amendments to the immigration laws, meaning lower demographic growth (especially if and when the war against terrorism drags on). The world’s remaining superpower could indeed crumble under such blows.
Of course, the United States is far better equipped to meet the challenge of collapse than was the Soviet Union with its administrative-command system. Every American state has its own laws, police force, budget, even representations in different countries, etc. In addition, the Americans are inherently inveterate individualists. They remember their state only at times of real crisis. In fact, there is an American joke about them being different, united only by the dollar and baseball. Yet I think that they are actually united by the dollar, stock exchange, and army. The dollar symbolizes world currency, the New York Stock Exchange is the global financial bulwark, and the US army imposes world order on every country in conformity with US interests. Owing to the above three institutions, America became what it is now, a superpower, so that being an American citizen is not only an honor, but also a convenient thing to have.
Yet there is the euro, to be launched into circulation on January 1, 2002. If this happens with the United States fighting terrorists, the situation might prove the precise opposite to what happened in 1999. At the time, the senseless Balkan war was started in Serbia, shortly after the euro had been launched as a unit of account, and the armed conflict was certainly the main reason for the euro’s fiasco. Next year everything is likely to happen the other way around, and the dollar will be threatened by decline.
National stock exchanges are being united among the EU countries and the US economic recession will boost the European integration process; united European stock exchanges are likely to become a serious challenge to the New York Stock Exchange.
After the Kosovo war, the European Union decided to form a European corps capable of handling problems independently of the United States.
If and when the above three institutions (euro, united European stock exchanges, and Eurocorps) start functioning, America will no longer be a superpower. One is reminded of astrologers warning that the “symmetrical” year 1991 would mark the end of the world. They were a little mistaken, because that end would come to just one country. Could the United States perhaps show imperial solidarity and repeat the Soviet Union’s feat in 2002? Or could the domino theory also effect the US-Canadian duo, the way it happened in 1991, when the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia fell apart.
P.S.: The terrorist attack on America leaves one wondering at the intuition of Hollywood producers. The world was shook by the 1998 financial disaster and there was the Film of the Year, Titanic. Now there is the 2001 all-time winner, Pearl Harbor. Certainly, it was not without reason that recently FBI representatives met with Hollywood producers and screenwriters. The announced purpose was to analyze possible scenarios for terrorist acts. Without doubt the Hollywood blockbusters have given form not only to lifestyles, fashions, and such, but also to terrorism. Could we perhaps see a blockbuster about the fall of the superstate?
