Says the author:
In Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World’s Sole Superpower, Michael Beckley “rejects the notion that America’s relative power is declining, and asserts that the rise of Chinese power...has been greatly exaggerated.”
Beckley supports his argument by rejecting standard measures of national power, and claiming that the usual narrative of the “emergence, ascent, and decline of great powers does not apply to the United States.”
Rather than using GDP to measure a state’s power, Beckley “proposes a new yardstick that measures a state’s net power….This calculation, he asserts, reveals that America’s economic dominance ‘is much larger than typically assumed—and the trends are mostly in its favor.’” Beckley also argues “that the U.S. is too powerful, and too distant geographically, to be challenged by any other major power.”
On the latter issue of our geographic advantage:
Beckley argues that the U.S. is too powerful, and too distant geographically, to be challenged by any other major power (6). Moreover, he observes, all of America’s potential geopolitical rivals live cheek by jowl with rival regional powers and “therefore are more likely to fight each other than band together against the distant United States” (6). Therefore, Beckley concludes, rather than balancing against the U.S., other states will bandwagon with it (7).
I've long argued exactly that. So I won't spend time on that.
Other than to say that our geographic advantage rests on the assumption that no hostile power will control the great economic potential of Europe or East Asia. So our geographic edge doesn't mean we can pull back to the Western Hemisphere in secure isolation and abandon our allies abroad who shield us.
On the former issue of power advantage I've long held we are too pessimistic if we assume we will lose the economic race even on the terms power is currently measured.
But what of his belief that we need to upend the traditional measures for his own. That makes me suspicious--as others have made me skeptical--but let's look, shall we?
First, he challenges the rise and fall "imperial overstretch" narrative that America is a declining power soon to see China pass us by:
Beckley develops a “new framework for projecting the rise and fall of nations.” Specifically, he argues that “economic growth depends on three broad factors: geography, institutions, and demography.” Based on these factors, Beckley concludes that of all the major powers in the international system, the U.S. “by far” has “the best growth fundamentals” (7). Adding it all up, he finds that the U.S. has the greatest future growth potential, and a huge lead in economic and military power. Hence, unipolarity “will last for many decades” (8).
I have long been critical of applying that imperial overstretch concept fully to America, which has free allies and not imperial subjects that impose an increasing burden over time. Remember the recent complaints that America is "abandoning" allies to focus more on home? Clearly the costs don't have to ratchet up until we can't afford them because we don't have an empire.
This objection doesn't deny that we could fall to second. But it does say we are not done yet. Who knows what the future will say about our demography and China's that is the basis of China's supposed advantage. Which I've noted. China's rising path is not infinite.
On how to measure power:
Beckley also uses per capita GDP as a proxy to measure a state’s military efficiency (18). Employing this methodology, by multiplying GDP by GDP per capita, Beckley constructs an index of national power that is based on net stocks of wealth (Chapter 2).12 This calculation, he asserts, reveals that America’s economic dominance “is much larger than typically assumed—and the trends are mostly in its favor” (2).
I do think there is something to the per-capita GDP factor. I've pondered that as a multiple to troop strength to measure military power. And by using that plus the GDP you would have the building blocks of a national power measurement. I might have other factors, too.
My motive was that I rejected purchasing power parity applied to GDP that elevates China's economic power beyond what I think it deserves. Now, I do think that PPP has a role in specific comparisons like correcting for their much lower overhead in feeding, clothing, and housing troops on a cheaper local economy compared to America. I was trying to combine short-term actual power with long-term power generation capabilities to get measures that address more than power at the moment a war starts. Corruption is one area I wanted to add. And education. I think it is in a notebook somewhere languishing in skeletal form because I don't know what kind of math should join them together. Commentary of Beckley's measure do recognize that we need to have a better measure of power.
But objections that China's military strength has already changed the balance of power in the western Pacific--and so we have a bi-polar situation already--should be addressed by my hope to have two measures of power. And even in the relatively short term, you have to consider that China's short-term power is all right there in China while America's short-term power is distributed around the world and in far-way America, and so it would take time to gather to fight China with our full short-term power.
So I don't dismiss this effort. And I noted his pre-book work in 2012. Although the measure clearly misses outliers like small oil-rich states that should not be considered powerful and also poor states with a tradition of well-trained or motivated infantry that punch above their weight.
And as one commenter notes, it still ignores whether a better measure right now will be the right measure by the end of this century.
I'll ignore digression into policy away from his core power measurements issue.
But I would like to address an aside that wonders whether America can really be as dominant as Beckley says when a much economically weaker USSR was the other half of a bipolar world.
I'd answer that by noting that the USSR was able to exert global impact with the potential ability to advance just 100 miles into NATO. Does China have a similarly outsize impact with a local advance? That's the question to ask in addition to having a (more accurate) basic power comparison.
Also, complaints about a return to great power competition is poorly described. It is not a recognition that we have peer competitors. It is a signal that we are switching emphasis from counter-insurgency to conventional warfare.
And the point about a society that in America may be too focused on redistributing wealth (to those with influence and power) rather than creating new wealth is a major factor that is apart from how to measure power among states is well taken.
But I digress (as I can!).
What I worry about is that seeking a new measure of national power is a means to ease our worries about losing ground under traditional measures of national power, rather than being a way to more accurately measure national power.
But still, it is a needed angle we need to explore. I do think people write us off too easily in the face of a new rising challenge.
Anyway, I just put that book on my wishlist.
