Curtis asked for the definition of "superpower" I'll be using in this series. Here it is:
A superpower is an organization that drives interpolity relations in the medium term (decades) and leaves a legacy across polities in the long term (decades to centuries).
I use "organization" to leave open the possibility of non-state actors being superpowers. Another aspect of "organization" is that it excludes the actions of lone geniuses, e.g. Alexander of Macedon or Shaka Zulu, from consideration as superpowers. I'll talk more about future organizations later.
"Polities" instead of "nations" or "states" reflects my reading of Martin Van Creveld: the state as we know it is an invention of European bureaucracies in 1500-1945.
"Drives" implies an active, chosen component. Hence the US, the only entity capable of being a superpower from 1918-1945, was not one because it had no such desire, despite Wilson's international progressivism.
Why "legacy"? It is the residue of that drive; it reflects a psychological impact hardened into memory and culture.
Examples of superpowers?
Rome: Rome drove affairs in the Mediterranean from Scipio's victory at Zama (202 BC, crippling Carthage for good) for about six centuries in the west. Construing Byzantium as Roman, Rome remained a superpower in the eastern Mediterranean until at least the rise of the Caliphate (or Manzikert, the Fourth Crusade, the Turkish conquest of Asia Minor). Rome's legacy? Latin still influences the English language, e.g., viz., etc., sic and its descendants are spoken by hundreds of millions of people with little, if any, ancient Italian descent. Thanks to the Romans, Christianity is a world religion; ten percent of Egyptians still adhere to it after fourteen centuries of Muslim domination. Last point: a European political leader claimed the title "Roman Emperor" until 1806; Franz II abolished the title, not because it had no meaning, but because it had too much meaning to let it fall into Napoleon's hands.
Other examples:
· The Muslim caliphate.
· Classical China--compare the area settled by the Han ethnicity in 200 BC with the area currently ruled by the PRC.
· Britain in the 19th century: it unilaterally banned the trans-Atlantic slave trade and conquered a quarter of the world. No European great powers fought a war without Britain's express or implied permission from 1815-1914, except of course for Bismarck's wars for German unification. Britain's legacy lives on in the prevalence of the common law, the pervasiveness of colonialism in 1880-1960, and the corrupt and inefficient socialist economies across the Third World born when future Third World dictators studied under Keynes at the London School of Economics.
· The USA is obviously a superpower, and even were it to vanish today, the WTO, GATT, IMF, World Bank, and all its other Bretton Woods offspring would survive.
· The USSR? Yes, it too was a superpower, and its legacy is tangible: UN obstructionism and the AK-47, the tool of choice of the DIY guerrillero.
What will "superpower" mean in the future? Accepting arguendo Curtis's view that 5GW is inevitable--a view consonant with both my reading of Van Creveld and my sfnal thoughts on molecular manufacturing, cheap simple robotics, and distributed emergent computing--the time will come when no state has the power to police its territory for criminals and rebels. When no state can prevent pirate and terrorist predations. When no state can conquer territory save by nuclear genocide. Yet within these constraints, some states could be superpowers and drive the international agenda, just as ancient rulers could, in one sense, dominate a large chunk of the world while, in an another, being utterly ignorant of the assets and attitudes of their subjects and the capabilities and intentions of their neighbors. For this reason, the term "superpower" has legs left.
Alternatively, could a non-state actor be a superpower? Picture a James Bond supervillian who really can build a moonbase with a giant "laser" capable of destroying a city; or more plausibly, an organized crime gang using molecular manufacturing/robotics/computing to dominate affairs in Third World slums or the communes of an ethnic diaspora. Whether such an organization can drive international affairs for decades is another question, but it's not automatically ridiculous to ask. I'll leave the question of whether such an organization would leave any legacy other than "you too can become Keyser Soze/Dr. Evil" to the reader.
Labels: Eight Futures
3 Comments:
I'm not sure where it was that I picked it up but I remember an off-hand definition of superpower that always rang with a bit of truth to me. A superpower is a country that can do whatever it wants, whenever it wants, wherever it wants and there isn't anything anybody can really do to stop it. By this particular definition I'm not so sure that the United States qualifies as a superpower. It does, however, have some interesting implication for the shadowy worlds of 4/5GW warriors.
I like Raymund's broad definition, because it's utilitarian and addresses the real dynamics at play. It can be applied without worrying overmuch about developing a continuum of effects (more effect here, a little more here, a little less here), although such a continuum might be applied for greater clarity.
The "whatever/whenever/wherever" definition is too strict, too absolutist, and I doubt that any nation or state or nation-state or group of 4/5GW warriors could be found to be a superpower if we used it. There have always been limitations. (Even Rome did not extend all the way north on the British Isles, for instance.) However, one solution to being able to meet the absolutist standard would be: superpowers saw their limitations and did not actually always try whatever, whenever, and wherever they might have, but only what, when, and where they could.
It's been over a week, Raymund!
I hereby assign (consign) you to write on "five weird habits".
Gus
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