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 enlarge | Author: Fareed Zakaria
Publisher: W. W. Norton
Category: Book
List Price: $25.95
Buy New: $14.44
You Save: $11.51 (44%)
New (63) Used (24) Collectible (2) from $14.35
Rating:  152 reviews
Sales Rank: 163
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 288
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 9.6 x 6.2 x 1.3
ISBN: 039306235X
Dewey Decimal Number: 303.49
EAN: 9780393062359
ASIN: 039306235X
Publication Date: May 5, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Showing reviews 116-120 of 152
 The Logical Future June 13, 2008
Larry Kizer (Mountain City, TN)
What a refreshing and detailed view of our future as Americans. After watching Fox News, CNN, etc. One can come to believe that our country and world is headed straight down the drain. This book is optimistic in our future if only we have the right leadership in government, business, and education. I feel better having read this book and will limit my watching the 24 hour news cycle in the future. Everyone, especially voters come November, should read this book.
Pre-election Reading June 12, 2008
P. Supplee (NJ, USA)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is a must read for everyone who plans to vote in November's election. The world presented by Zakariah can open the eyes of Americans who have not had the opportunity to travel to the rising countries. In readable prose, Zakariah describes what is happening now in places like China and India and we what we, in America, must face in the near future as a result. The balance of power is changing, and we need leadership prepared to understand the world of tomorrow, act responsibly within a new framework and help our nation accommodate to the changes.
The Sky Is Not Falling June 12, 2008
Tennjersey (Tennessee)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Calm down. China is not taking over the world and the U.S. is not about to become a second rate power. However, Zakaria presents realistic thoughts on why the U.S. must adjust to a world in which it will not be the only major player. The current (June '08) runup in gasoline prices is evidence that we will compete with rapidly growing economies such as those of China and India for many years to come. Zakaria's narrative is readable and not inundated with statistics. At the same time, it lacks the statistical depth that would be needed to be a definitive argument.
The Post American World June 12, 2008
John P. Seabrooke (NC, USA)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
The book is new. Ihave not completed reading it, but so far it is exellent.
All Americans Should Read This Book June 9, 2008
M. G. Moore (Elk Grove, CA)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
The hegemon that is America is at a crossroads. This is the central and compelling idea behind Fareed Zakaria's most recent book entitled The Post-American World. In his wide-ranging and optimistic look at the future of the United States, Zakaria makes the case that hegemonic America is no longer the youthful and ambitious democracy it was a hundred years ago. On the dawn of the 21st century, the U.S. is much more like an elder statesman who has taught other nations of the world how to be democratic - and perhaps more importantly, capitalistic - and now it is time for the planet's hegemon to step aside and let the "rise of the rest" take place. The economically youthful "rest" includes China, India, Brazil, Nigeria and other non-Western countries whose economies and governments are emerging on the world scene with vigor and vitality. In economic terms, these countries are second tier nations that are embracing capitalism and resource nationalism in an effort to compete with the West.
And so, the crossroads: America can allow the democratic and capitalistic rise of the rest to take place with grace and magnanimity, or America can resist the rise of rest with bitterness and distrust. It is America's choice to make and it is America's future to lose, claims Zakaria. Thus, the reader arrives at an explanation for the title of the book. Zakaria makes the case that American power is not waning so much as it is changing, and that change is what will determine the quality of the 21st century, the post-American future. Indeed Zakaria makes an artful distinction between society and economics when he claims "ultimately, the base of American power - a vibrant American society - was its greatest strength and its weakness. It produced America's gigantic economy and vibrant society. . . [and] this tension between society and the state persists in America to this day" (166). Zakaria maintains that the U.S. will continue to be the most important country in the near future but he also "ask[s] how America itself will react to a post-American world" (166).
If there was ever a vindication for the worn out cliche about the value of understanding history or being doomed to repeat it, this book is it. The answer to the question about America's reaction to its own shifting power can be found, according to Zakaria, by understanding history. And although he uses other examples of historical hegemons, the most poignant, immediate and obvious is the case of Pax Britannica at the end of the 19th century. Britain of 1897 was the sole world power. Even so, Britain's grasp on that power was waning. Zakaria claims that Britain choose - quite wisely - to allow power to shift away from Britain to the newly emerging center of power known as the United States. Furthermore, Zakaria claims that "Britain was undone as a great global power not because of bad politics but because of bad economics . . . its economy was weak" (180) and this weakness was what led to its hegemonic demise. This is significant for an understanding of the post-American world because, as Zakaria points out, "Britain's decline - irreversible economic deterioration - does not really apply to the United States today" (180). According to Zakaria "the U.S. economy has been the world's largest since the middle of the 1880s, and it remains so today" (180). Importantly he claims that "America will remain a vital, vibrant economy, at the forefront of the next revolutions in science, technology, and industry - as long as it can embrace and adjust to the challenges confronting it" (182).
Those challenges include science in areas such as nanotechnology and biotechnology, manufacturing and American competitiveness, the quality of higher education, demographics and, perhaps most importantly, immigration. Zakaria's compelling exploration of these challenges to America's future is rich and, in the mind of this reader, clearly hopeful about the future. He thinks America can and will overcome obstacles such as these, and he concludes with the optimistic perspective that a post-American world is one where "American influence is strengthened by the growth" of other nations (233). Indeed, the central idea is that countries like China and India "want to gain power and status and respect . . . by growing within the international system, not by overturning it" (232).Therefore the 21st century presents the "United States [with] an opportunity to play a large and constructive role at the center of the global order" (233). This is the post-American world, one where America is a power broker within and amongst other emerging nations. Despite all of this high level, global power and with Zakarian finesse, the case is also made that the American people have a role to play in this unfolding global drama. How Americans solve the inequalities in education and how Americans resolve the snares of immigration and latent nativism are integral to Zakaria's vision of this post-American world. Ultimately he claims that "being the global broker today would be a job involving not just the American government but its society" (233). Zakaria claims it is the American people who are standing at this crossroads. Furthermore it is the American people who will decide - based on their choices at this crossroads - the quality and direction of the 21st century.
So there it is. Our system of government is the envy of the world. Our economy is strong and resilient, and will continue to be so. The American institution of "higher education is [our] best industry" (190) and our scientific discoveries are decades and dollars ahead of all other nations. Immigration, one of our greatest issues of contention, is also one of our most potent strengths. These realities serve as the foundation upon which Americans stand as we collectively look into the future. Our choice: gracious acceptance of the rise of the rest, or bitter resistance to its inevitability. It is no simple irony that in a land where we jingle the coins in our pocket engraved with the Latin phrase e pluribus unum, the quality and the direction of the 21st century world might really come down to the living out of its translation in English.
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