The New Bipolar World
In his book on how COVID-19 might (re)shape the world, Fareed Zakaria has a chapter on whether the epidemic is accelerating the rise of a new bipolar system. Even as America got bogged down by the war on terror, the Iraq war, the 2008 financial crisis, China grew and grew. And while China hid the COVID-19 danger for far too long, when they did launch into action, they got it under control (within China). On the other hand, America’s (mis)handling of the epidemic has been so hopeless that it has evoked a feeling that has rarely been directed towards America, as columnist Fintan O’Toole wrote: “There is one emotion that has never been directed towards the US until now: pity.” Some take all these as signs that China is going to take over the world even as America keeps fumbling. On the other hand, as Zakaria points out, America is still the world’s largest economy. The world’s reserve currency is still the US dollar, which gives America the enormous advantage of printing m...