American Tianxia: Chinese Money, American Power and the End of History

by Salvatore Babones

Overview

After a meteoric rise, China's once inexorable growth has come to a screeching halt. With it ends China's dream of establishing a new tianxia (‘harmonious order’) in Asia with China at its centre. Salvatore Babones provides an up-to-date assessment of China's economic problems and how they are undermining China's challenge to the Western-dominated world order. As China's neighbours and many of its own most talented people look to the United States to ensure their security and prosperity, global power is slowly but surely consolidating in a twenty-first century American Tianxia. A closely argued antidote to defeatist accounts of Western decline, this book tells the story of how liberal individualism has become the leitmotif of the American Tianxia, an emerging world-system in which people of all nationalities seek a share in the economic, cultural, and political system that is America writ large.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781447336808
Publisher:	Bristol University Press
Publication date:	07/19/2017
Pages:	96
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Salvatore Babones is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Sydney. He is the author or editor of ten books and more than two dozen academic research articles. His research covers the macro-level structure of the global economy with a particular focus on China. Babones writes extensively on international affairs and is a member of Foreign Affairs magazine's "China Brain Trust." He writes a monthly column on China for Al Jazeera English and is a frequent contributor to The National Interest and the Asian Review of Books.

Table of Contents

Preface iv

1 Right concept wrong country 1

2 One master, one sovereign 19

3 One belt, one road to nowhere 37

4 The hiatus of history 55

References 71

Index 85

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"This is a book that everyone interested in the future of world politics cannot afford to ignore. It argues two important positions: that the USA domination of the world is the most robust and sustainable that can exist; and that China's bid to replace the USA must of necessity fall away. This may seem an unlikely scenario but read American Tianxia before adjusting your prejudices." — David Goodman, Professor of China Studies, Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University

"Dismisses the dead end road of hegemonic cycle theories and opens a fresh, sound and convincing analytic frame for the present and future world-system." Prof. Dr. Volker Bornschier, University of Zurich, Switzerland

"An original and persuasive analysis of the changing nature of US dominance....required reading for anyone interested in contemporary history, international relations, and the shape of tomorrow’s world." Robert Holton, Trinity College, Dublin and University of South Australia

"Strikes at the heart of the rise of China argument: that China will replace the United States as the world’s most influential power. Insightful and intellectually sound... an excellent contribution to our understanding of the limits to China’s rise as a global power and America’s enduring centrality to the world order.” Elizabeth Freund Larus, University of Mary Washington

Editorial Reviews

"It is a welcome corrective to the often-unchallenged conventional wisdom that the 21st century belongs to a rising China that is fast overtaking US global predominance." Asian Review of Books

From the Publisher