Edited by W. Joseph Stroupe with the mission of explaining world events correctly via strategic analysis & forecasting
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No one doubts the existence of a number of new rising powers (or "poles") in the East, or that the two primary poles are identified as Russia and China with India rapidly rising as a third pole of mounting importance, or that the rising economies and markets in the East are increasingly attracting the main attention and the tangible interest and respect of the rest of the world. Few would argue that the US and the wider West have little to worry about as a consequence of the unrelenting rise of the new poles in the East. Notably, their dramatic rise is a phenomenon that has been judged as carrying real meaning only in the last three years or so, demonstrating how quickly the geopolitical landscape can change - is changing. These matters are not debatable.
But significant uncertainties still plague the minds of many observers when it comes to a discussion of whether the Russia-China axis will continue to hold together and whether it will further tighten its cohesiveness, whether India will align with Russia-China to form a strategic triad, whether the lesser poles in the East, along with the bulk of the energy-exporting states (poles) around the globe and even key EU states (poles) might be ever more cohesively aligning with Russia-China and whether a tangible arrangement of some kind that encompasses all of them might be coming together, and whether any such arrangement would pose a real challenge to US global dominance anytime soon. These are the key questions that demand sound answers.
The view has been put forth by this author/analyst that the rising powers in the East, along with the bulk of the world's energy exporting states and certain key European powers are in fact already coming together to form a tangible and ever more cohesive phenomenon of truly global proportions and leverage, yet one that is of necessity multifarious in composition - in essence, a comparatively loose global confederation of sovereign states that nonetheless shares a common vision and increasingly finds itself firmly 'on the same page' respecting a few grand issues of overriding importance that increasingly trump all else. Its structure has been presented as less than (and different from) a full-fledged NATO-style formal military alliance, yet its reach, potency and cohesiveness as potentially much greater than that currently enjoyed by NATO and the wider West. It has been called "the rising multifarious East" that is mounting an ever more potent challenge to US-led unipolarity. Is such a phenomenon real or only imaginary?
The term "multifarious" was chosen intentionally to describe the nature and composition of the rising East. Webster defines "multifarious" as "having great variety, diverse, composed of many varied parts". The rising East is not monolithic in its composition, but neither is the West, which at any point in time has been composed of the US and its diverse allies around the globe, some of which are democracies and some of which are culturally, politically and economically very different from democracies, those that have been cruel dictatorships with miserable human rights records, for example. During the old Cold War when the far-less-than-monolithic West faced a common foe, the Soviet Union, its diverse members acted cohesively and in accord as against a common threat. The greatly varied membership of the bloc of the West had one overriding interest in common - they did not want to be dominated by communism and the Soviet Union. They owned a galvanizing common vision - the defeat of communism and the spread of "freedom" from external oppression worldwide. The phenomenon of greatly varied component parts becoming galvanized, uniting and acting cohesively against a common foe isn't grandiose - it's rather mundane.
In view of the foregoing, the objection that the rising East is far from "monolithic" in its composition is merely a distraction from the real subject of whether there exist unifying issues of adequate potency, ones that transcend the differences among its members, so as to produce cohesion among them and the subsequent arising of sufficient structure to facilitate collective action against what they perceive as a common foe. Does the rising multifarious East share a common, galvanizing vision?
There definitely exists an issue of such fundamental importance, value and potency that it far transcends the inherent differences among the members of the rising East. It is an issue that is embraced by the potential membership with passion and intellectual readiness, one of a nature such that the membership requires little elucidation and articulation of its core importance and practical worth to them individually, an issue that reaches immediately to the very core interests of every potential member. It is therefore an issue that inherently possesses a commanding power to unify. It is an issue that has already proven itself as a potent unifier of greatly diverse poles and that is continuing to prove itself along that important line. It is incorporated as an integral part of a truly galvanizing vision. What is the issue and the vision?
It is the issue of the desirability or the undesirability of continued excessive US global dominance in the economic, diplomatic, geopolitical and military spheres. That issue touches immediately upon the vital interests of all the world's powers for the simple reason that what is perceived as the increasingly greedy and headstrong militaristic fashion in which the US has tended to exercise its global role since 1991 cuts directly or indirectly into what mounting numbers of the world's players see as their legitimate economic, security, political, diplomatic, regional and geopolitical aspirations, goals and interests. The US has inordinately cornered for itself far too many of the viable possibilities for wealth and power since 1991, and this is ever more deeply resented across the globe. The disparity between the excess the US has traditionally possessed in the way of wealth and power and what much of the rest of the world is left with and what it cannot readily obtain because of the inequitable unipolar world order is continually showcased, and often heaved in its face. Added to this is the fact that US foreign policy is seen virtually in every corner of the globe as the runaway risk to international peace and security. The galvanizing vision is that of the ushering in of a new and more equitable world order that will end excessive US dominance.
By its shockingly self-centered focus since 1991, and especially since its ravenous 2003 invasion of Iraq, the US has made itself a persuasive and compelling galvanizing force for those opposing US-led unipolarity, a force at least as potent as that inspired by the entirely disreputable and aggressive Soviet Union during the old Cold War that deeply united and powerfully galvanized the West against a common foe. Now, there is every indication the grossly unrepentant US administration will soon embark upon a course in the Iran and North Korea crises that the world at large perceives as even more greedy and reckless with respect to the exercise of US power, bringing in additional ill-advised and enormously destructive military options aimed at forcibly consolidating America's avaricious clutch of global power and the exclusive multidimensional wealth that accompanies it. Notwithstanding the recent Democrat election victory, the issue of the desirability or the undesirability of continued excessive US global dominance is one that is gaining, not losing, potency to galvanize the rising powers in the East and their energy-exporting partners around the globe in opposition to continued US-led unipolarity and in furtherance of the vision of the creation of a new world order.
The skeptic will often acknowledge all the foregoing analysis as that based solidly on the observable facts, yet will cling to the objection that the arising of any truly cohesive yet multifarious pole of the East requires a grand unifying organizational or institutional structure that formally encompasses its multitude of diverse members. The skeptic will assert that it needs a NATO-like institutional arrangement or an EU-like organizational structure, for example, to achieve genuine cohesiveness and the ability to collectively and effectively challenge the US Colossus.
However, as it relates to the origination of unity and the achievement of fundamental cohesiveness among diverse members, that argument essentially confuses cause and effect, mistakenly reversing their roles. With respect to the origination of a deep-seated unity and cohesiveness among members of a diverse group, the organizational and institutional structures are much less the cause producing unity and cohesiveness; they are rather much more the effect, that is, the corporeal expressions of a more ethereal but profoundly potent and persuasive cause - the commonality, the shared aims and goals that come to exist first within and among a group of individuals or powers and that galvanizes them. If that commonality (shared vision) exists first then the members may subsequently and progressively come together to form a tangible organizational or institutional structure or structures that properly and more effectively express their common will. Therefore, the commonality and cohesiveness come to exist first and they serve as the cause, which then often produces the follow-on effect of the formation of organizational or institutional structure.
It is vitally important here to understand the fundamental distinction between cause and effect as it relates to the rise of the multifarious East as a cohesive center of power, because those who calculate and judge, based on its present seeming lack of a sufficiently all-encompassing (NATO-like) organizational structure, that no such cohesive pole is actually arising, have seriously miscalculated. The arising of such a structure or structures will mark, not the mere start of the rise of such a pole, but rather the near-completion of its imposing emergence on the world stage. Such structures do not originate unity and cohesiveness; they may only augment and improve it. Therefore, all too many observers are currently far behind the curve, failing to properly assess how genuinely far advanced geopolitical developments leading to a new global order have already become.
The rising multifarious East is not shaping up to be a conventionally-structured entity that is arranged primarily in a hierarchical style. For that reason many observers have difficulty understanding the genuine effectiveness of its unconventional structure, the fact that it is already achieving profound cohesiveness and that its potency is an impending and grave risk to the West. While they are looking for the arising of conventional structures to signal the beginning of something to be taken seriously, the multifarious East has already set in place virtually all its levers to power and has advanced to very near the completion of its imposing emergence on the world stage.
| Note: This Gold version of the analysis is significantly condensed as compared to the full text Platinum version available only to subscribers. The Platinum version addresses head-on the issues of the proven power of the common vision of a "multipolar" world order to unite its adherents, the already-proven potency of the rising multifarious East along economic lines, India's ever more important role in the East, and the proven cohesion and potency of the unconventional organizational structure of the rising multifarious East. |
© Copyright 2004-2008 This article may not be reproduced, reprinted or otherwise disseminated, nor may its inherent distinctive and original ideas be used elsewhere without the prior written permission of W. Joseph Stroupe. No journalistic, analytical, editorial or forecasting substance from GeoStrategyMap.com may be republished or employed in any form without prior written permission. Send all requests for permission by email to: editor_in_chief@geostrategymap.com. |
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