ECN 102 TERM PAPER
Is the American Century Over?
Toni A. Jacque
Holyoke Community College
ECN 102 TERM PAPER
ABSTRACT
For more than a century, the United States has been the world’s most powerful state. Now
some analysts predict that China will soon take our place. Or will the European Union? Joseph S.
Nye Jr takes his own stand on this matter which seems to be an undertone in this country.
He mentions current statistics, historical events and stands for his prediction that the
American Century is far from over.
In this Essay, I will take my stand to explain how I feel that the American Century is not
over for us, but it easily could be if America does not play their cards correctly. I have presented
the Essay with headers of the competitors and the topics I feel are crucial to touch base on
regarding this topic.
ECN 102 TERM PAPER
European Union
During my reading of the short book “is the American Century Over?” I found that we
are not only competing with China, but we are also competing closely to the European Union.
The European Union is populated by 500 million people while the United states is only
populated by 310 million people. Aside from their population the American per capita income is
still larger than that of Europe’s because of their human capital, technology, and exports. Europe
is still considered an economic competitor to the United States.
The United States spends quite a bit of their money on military and country defense.
Europe spends almost less than half of our cost on their military, but they also have more men
under arms than we do in the U.S.
In chapter three of this book, titled Challengers and Relative Decline, Nye has a header
just for Europe (where I have pulled this information) but he also mentions that in world
organizations such as the World Trade Organization and International Monetary Fund Europe
and the United states are very similar to one another. When I kept reading I had found many
similar things that Europe shares with the U.S. Europe is leading in economic market with
representing 17% while the U.S is just behind at 12%. This sections offers much valuable
information but as Nye mentioned at the end of this section and the research I have done I agree
with him saying “While political fractions will exist, the probability of a united Europe
becoming more powerful than the United States and helping to cause the end of the American
century is very low”.
ECN 102 TERM PAPER
China
“Analysis view China as the most likely contender to balance American power, surpass
it, and end the American Century” (Nye). China has a rapid growth rate with their GDP and has
very significant power resources. The Chinese territory itself is the same size as the United States
and is home to 4X the united state population of people. We believe that we have a large army
and military forces? Well China has the largest in the world and the accesses to more than 250
nuclear weapons.
Aside from that, Chinas soft power resources lack greatly when compared to Hollywood
or Bollywood. Their universities also aren’t top ranked and lacks nongovernmental organizations
