Robert Kagan on American declinism:
[T]he evidence of American decline is weak. Yes, as Zakaria notes, the world's largest Ferris wheel is in Singapore and the largest casino in Macau. But by more serious measures of power, the United States is not in decline, not even relative to other powers. Its share of the global economy last year was about 21 percent, compared with about 23 percent in 1990, 22 percent in 1980 and 24 percent in 1960. Although the United States is suffering through a financial crisis, so is every other major economy. If the past is any guide, the adaptable American economy will be the first to come out of recession and may actually find its position in the global economy enhanced. Meanwhile, American military power is unmatched. While the Chinese and Russian militaries are both growing, America's is growing, too, and continues to outpace them technologically. Russian and Chinese power is growing relative to their neighbors and their regions, which will pose strategic problems, but that is because American allies, especially in Europe, have systematically neglected their defenses. America's image is certainly damaged, as measured by global polls, but the practical effects of this are far from clear. Is America's image today worse than it was in the 1960s and early 1970s, with the Vietnam War; the Watts riots; the My Lai massacre; the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy; and Watergate? Does anyone recall that millions of anti-American protesters took to the streets in Europe in those years? Today, despite the polls, President Bush has managed to restore closer relations with allies in Europe and Asia, and the next president will be able to improve them even further. Realist theorists have consistently predicted for the past two decades that the world would "balance" against the United States. But nations such as India are drawing closer to America, and if any balancing is occurring, it is against China, Russia and Iran.
Kagan has been tough on the "realists" lately, in The Return of History and the End of Dreams, and his appraisal of the Bush legacy in Foreign Affairs, and this piece for the Wall Street Journal from a few months back. All this has me thinking that Kagan's next book ought to be a takedown of the new "realism," and an articulation of what a "real realism" looks like.