Download 2017 Syllabus

Who Will Rule the 21st Century? Implications for America
Michael O’Hanlon, [email protected]
January 2017
In the late 1980s, as U.S. GDP growth slowed, budget deficits remained stubbornly high,
and other economies outperformed that of the United States, it was frequent to hear
people argue that “the Cold War is over—and Japan and Germany won.” At least those
latter powers were U.S. allies. Since that time, moreover, they have encountered their
own challenges—Germany in reintegrating its own eastern half and then helping
establish the viability of the EU and Euro systems, Japan in dealing with prolonged
economic difficulties and demographic decline.
Today, we are witnessing a period of even greater American economic travails, greater
national debt relative to the size of the economy, and the concern that less friendly
powers—especially China and Russia—may be poised to benefit from the relative
decline of the United States in specific and the West in general. The Sanders and Trump
phenomena of 2016 are perhaps the most dramatic manifestations of these concerns—and
the election of Donald Trump as president could be the most consequential manifestation
of such anxieties since the beginning of the Cold War, or at least the end of the Vietnam
War. But beyond immediate electoral changes, what do these shifting economic realities,
as well as broader changes in global demographics and developments in technology, bode
for the future of American power and ultimately the security of this country and its allies?
This course, informed by both historical and technical perspectives, will wrestle with
such broad questions about the architecture of the international power system. It will
consider the relative decline of the United States and many of its major western allies that
many consider to be already underway, and only likely to accelerate. It will examine the
promise of the rising powers, together with the structural constraints and other
impediments that they will have to face themselves as they seek greater stature, clout, and
prosperity in the 21st century.
The course will also include readings focused on books about the big issues and the big
countries. These will be supplemented by side presentations in class on related issues.
Grading will be based on class presentations, discussions, and a final paper or exam.
The ultimate purpose of the course is to help students assess the emerging power
structures of the 21st century and determine how they think the United States as well as
other countries can best adapt to, or if possible alter, the tectonic shifts that are already
evident and only likely to intensify.
SYLLABUS
Session 1: Bob Kagan, The World America Made
Session 2: Global Military Trends, selections from The Military Balance 2017
Session 3: Global Economic and Energy Trends, selections from World Economic
Forum Competitiveness Report, International Energy Agency, other readings
Session 4: Global Environmental, Demographic and Resource Trends (water, fisheries,
farmland, climate, human population)
Session 5: Global Technology Trends, including Singer and Friedman, Cybersecurity
and Cyberwar
Sessions 6 and 7: Bruce Jones, Still Ours to Lead
Sessions 8 and 9: Aaron Friedberg, A Contest for Supremacy: China, America, and the
Struggle for Mastery in Asia
Sessions 10 and 11: Richard K. Betts, American Force, pp. 50-200
Sessions 12 and 13: Fiona Hill and Cliff Gaddy, Mr. Putin, revised ed. (pp. 227-398)
Session 14: Bruce Riedel: Deadly Embrace (on Pakistan)
SUPPLEMENTAL READINGS
Boot, War Made New
Brown, Higher Realism
Burtless et.al., Globaphobia
Bush, O’Hanlon, A War Like No Other
Carter, Perry, Preventive Defense
Clarke, Cyber War
Fishman, China, Inc.
Friedberg, Aaron, A Contest for Supremacy
Friedman, Tom (and Mike Mandelbaum), That Used to Be Us
Hobbes, Leviathan
Hu, China in 2020
Ikenberry, John, After Victory
Jones, Pascual, Stedman, Power and Responsibility
Keohane, After Hegemony
Khanna, The Second World
Kose/Prasad, Emerging Markets
Lake, Six Nightmares
Lieber, Power and Willpower in the American Future
Lieberthal, Managing the China Challenge
Machiavelli, The Prince
Slaughter, A New World Order
Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War
Tzu, The Art of War
Van Agtmael, The Emerging Markets Century
Van Tol, AirSea Battle
Von Clausewitz, On War
Walker, Comeback America
West, Brain Gain