In the window at City Lights. After the Empire The Breakdown of the American Order
Emmanuel Todd Translated by C. Jon Delogu Foreword by Michael Lind
"A powerful antidote to hysterical exaggeration of American power and potential by American triumphalists and anti-American polemicists alike. A best-seller in Europe, Todd´s book should be read by all thoughtful Americans for its provocative and well-informed analysis of their nation and its prospects." –from the foreword by Michael Lind
"The most effective and most talked about of the new anti-American texts." –Adam Gopnik The New Yorker
The efforts of the United States to sustain its position as the planet's only post-Cold War superpower show serious signs of back-firing. The current American method of operating in the world will lead to a gradual downsizing to normal nation status as the United States' military, economic, and ideological tendencies continue to anger allies and enemies alike, according to Emmanuel Todd. Todd anticipates that American hegemony will wane and an enhanced role for what he calls Eurasia will emerge, bringing together in common cause the world's two most productive industrial centers, Japan and Europe, and two regions of military and demographic force, Russia and the Arab-Islamic world.
A historian and demographer, Todd compiles and analyzes an astonishing breadth of data about birth and infant mortality rates, literacy levels, and marriage practices in the United States to uncover deep trends of decline. Against this backdrop, Todd points to a number of factors, including increasing resistance among the nations of the world to militant American unilateralism -nowhere more evident than in Iraq -and the faltering supremacy of the U.S. dollar, that suggest that the American century has come to an end.
Contents
Introduction The Myth of Universal Terrorism Democracy as A Threat Imperial Dimensions The Fragility of Tribute The Movement Away from Universalism Confront the Strong or Attack the Weak? The Return of Russia The Emancipation of Europe Conclusion: Endgame Notes
About the Author
Emmanuel Todd is currently a researcher at the French National Institute for Demographic Studies. He is the author of numerous books, including The Final Fall: An Essay on the Decomposition of the Soviet Sphere, The Making of Modern France: Ideology, Politics and Culture, and The Explanation of Ideology. C. Jon Delogu is an associate professor of English at the Université de Tolouse-Le Mirail.
-From the series European Perspectives: A Series in Social Thought and Cultural Criticism -- Michael Pugliese American imperialism has been made plausible and attractive in part by the insistence that it is not imperialistic. Harold Innis, 1948 http://www.monthlyreview.org/sr2004.htm