In a previous article, "Is the USA in 'irreversible decline'?" I argued that China was unlikely to supplant the USA as global hegemon any time soon.

(See: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=13872)

I qualified this by writing:

>>I am using the word "China" to mean China under the current Communist Party regime.>>

And went on to write:

>>It is always possible that China, like Taiwan and South Korea before it, morphs from dictatorship into a decent democracy. If that happens all bets are off. ...>>

Here is a contrary argument from Foreign Policy Magazine:

POSTCARD FROM THE FUTURE THE 75 MOST DYNAMIC CITIES OF 2025

(http://www.foreignpolicy.com/cities_issue )

>>Our special issue dedicated to the cities of the future has its eye squarely toward China, because the cities of the future are increasingly going to be speaking Mandarin -- even more than you realize….In an exclusive index for FP, the McKinsey Global Institute has run the numbers to produce what we're calling The 75 Most Dynamic Cities of 2025 -- an extraordinary 29 of which are in China….Europe, meanwhile, will manage only three cities on the list by 2025; the United States finishes second to China -- a very distant second -- with 13. Still think that debate about Western decline is overblown?>>

See especially:

Cities of the Future: Made in China

>>From traffic-jumping buses to electric taxis, China is at the forefront of the world's flashiest urban innovations.>>

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/08/13/cities_of_the_future_made_in_china

In my article I also wrote:

>>In many ways America's worst enemy is America>>

If we look at the current US presidential campaign nobody is discussing the issues raised by the Foreign Policy piece. They're just recycling the old sterile sound bites. America real is America's worst enemy.

Come to think of it, this pretty well describes Australian politics as well.

>>If the speed of China's rise has been astonishing, it's about to get even faster. A Chinese construction firm has pioneered a modular construction technique that allows it to build energy-efficient skyscrapers in a matter of weeks, ...>

Steven like that well known lover of all things American, Bob Carr, I have an interest in this.
In fact have once tried to launch a thread on the matter, rejected.
I had gone too far in defending Americas right to defend its self/kill its enemy's.
I care not who is to become the worlds economic leader, almost as little for its super powers of the future.
I care however that America has so many street people, that so many of them once served in its military.
That universal health care can be seen as unnecessary, that a Nation with the greatness to land on Mars with all that meant, values money more than those it eats up.
Yet if it falls and the wrong nation rises?
America may well look like heaven in compassion.

Belly wrote:

>>Yet if it falls and the wrong nation rises?
America may well look like heaven in compassion.>>

I appreciate your point but I'm trying to keep the moral judgments out of this.

The question I'm posing is not:

"Is it desirable that China supplants America."

It is:

"Will China supplant America?"

And I want to emphasise yet again that I am using "China" as shorthand for "China ruled by the current authoritarian regime."

If China, morphs into a decent democracy, as have Taiwan and South Korea, then I think it probably will supplant the US. But then, from the Australian perspective, it will not really matter.

Sorry Steve will leave you to it and try not to invade your fixed opinion threads again.

Dear Steven,

Centuries ago, Napoleon commentated that China
was a "sleeping giant, and when she wakes, she will
shake the world." Much the same could be said today.

China is now irrevocably embarked on the path to
modernisation. Yet China has a long way to go.
For example, in rural areas where electricity is available,
peasant families, even now, are often permitted only
one 25-watt bulb a year to light their homes.

China is still determinedly socialist and authoritarian.
It will be interesting to see how far the country will
stray from the socialist path and whether economic
liberalisation will in turn lead to political
democratisation.

Predicting the future is not easy - the best that can be said
is that given China's size and potential, it's economic
future will undoubtedly be of world historical significance.

I think China will probably break up.

She has been great before, but could not maintain cohesion, & disintegrated. I think today the pressures for this are greater than ever before.

With the advance of the internet, & millions of migrant workers seeing for the first time, the inequalities between different areas on the country, I doubt break up, or extreme civil strife can be avoided.

In the US there is the perception, & probably the fact, that anyone can make it. This is obviously not the case in China, & unless it becomes in fact possible, disruption is bound to occur.