19:13, 28 August 2010
By James Rogers
Last week, economists stated that China overtook Japan to become the world’s third largest economy (after the United States and European Union). By 2050, China is projected to have overtaken both to become the world’s largest economy; by 2100, China may be larger than both combined. On some accounts, it is already the leading industrial power, consuming the lion’s share of iron ore and manufacturing more steel than any other country – and by a large margin. The nine-day long traffic jam on the motorway between Beijing and Jining reported on Tuesday only symbolises the vast scale of China’s economic and industrial enterprise. Many of the vehicles involved were lorries carrying coal to power up the large factories in China’s rapidly growing coastal cities.
What does this all mean? At the very least, it seems that seven centuries of European (or Western) hegemony might be very near its end. China (and India) may be about to retake their positions as the nodal points of the global economy, a position they held for much of human history. This is still not pre-ordained: China may experience many social, environmental and political dislocations, which could derail its progress, either permanently or temporarily. This led me to wonder a bit more about the foundations of European power. How did such a small and seemingly irrelevant region of the world become so powerful? Why are the world’s leading languages today English, French and Spanish and not Chinese and Hindi? Why do modern Chinese and Indian cities resemble those of Europe and America and not the other way round?
The old argument is that Europeans raped both countries of their resources, setting them back by two centuries. Yet this ill-conceived and exceedingly tired argument – even if true – still begs the question of how they were able to do so in the first place, given that China and India seemed, initially, to be stronger and more advanced than Europeans? There are, as I see it, ten key foundations of European power, which have enabled this relatively small continent to rise up over the past six centuries and transform the world:
The key thing, of course, is that none of these components were by themselves sufficient. It was only as the foundations of power came together in synthesis that Europeans achieved an edge over other continents. The only question remaining, then, is what will happen to Europeans if they give up the means that provided them with this ‘edge’ – and if the rest of the world catches up?
• For anyone interested in these questions, I recommend the documentary series entitled The Day the World Took Off, which was made to commemorate the Millennium by a group of academics based at the University of Cambridge. Click here to download each programme.
• Images: World Map: RokerHRO; Fields: Mattias Süßen; Horses: Mikel Ortega; Bread: Chmee2; Star Fort: Gebruiker: Bourtange.
