Chapter 4
Japan's Meiji Transformation: Selective Modernization
On July 8, 1853, four American warships commanded by Commodore Matthew Perry entered Tokyo Bay, triggering a national crisis that would transform Japan from an isolated feudal society into a modern industrial power. Unlike Finland's crisis, which erupted with military invasion, Japan's began with a demonstration of technological superiority that forced Japanese leaders to confront their vulnerability.
For over two centuries, Japan had maintained a policy of sakoku (closed country), prohibiting foreigners from entering and Japanese from leaving under penalty of death. This isolation preserved traditional Japanese culture but left the country technologically backward compared to industrializing Western powers. Perry's "black ships," powered by steam engines unknown in Japan, carried cannons capable of reducing Japanese coastal defenses to rubble. His demand that Japan open to foreign trade presented an existential threat: either modernize or face colonization like China and other Asian nations.
Japan's response was extraordinary. After initial resistance and internal conflict, the 1868 Meiji Restoration overthrew the shogunate and restored the emperor to nominal power. The new government launched a comprehensive modernization program under the slogan "rich country, strong army." Rather than wholesale Westernization, Japan pursued selective adaptation-studying foreign models and adopting elements that strengthened the nation while preserving its cultural core.
The Iwakura Mission of 1871-73 exemplifies this approach. This diplomatic delegation of Japanese leaders spent two years traveling through the United States and Europe, systematically studying everything from banking systems and factories to schools and prisons. Upon returning, they implemented a carefully curated blend of foreign practices: a German-inspired constitution and army, a British-modeled navy, French-influenced civil law, and American-style education.
This selective modernization produced remarkable results. Within a single generation, Japan transformed from a feudal society to an industrial power. By 1895, it defeated China in war; by 1905, it became the first Asian nation to defeat a European power when it vanquished Russia. All while maintaining its emperor, Shinto religion, and cultural distinctiveness.
Japan's success stemmed from several factors: widespread consensus about the Western threat, acceptance of responsibility rather than blaming foreigners, selective adoption of change while preserving core traditions, foreign assistance through advisors and technology transfer, strong national identity, patience through initial failures, and non-negotiable core values like loyalty to the emperor.
Unlike many national transformations, the Meiji Restoration involved relatively little violence, featured multiple leaders rather than a single dominant figure, and implemented changes based on a unified vision of strengthening Japan through selective Western learning. In these respects, Meiji Japan offers an instructive contrast with Finland, which received little foreign help and faced more severe geopolitical constraints despite sharing Japan's capacity for brutal honesty and strong national identity.
Chapter 5
Chile's Democratic Collapse and Rebirth
In 1967, Chile appeared to be Latin America's most stable democracy. Chileans proudly distinguished their constitutional government from other Latin American countries prone to military coups. "We Chileans know how to govern ourselves," they told visiting professor Jared Diamond. Yet just six years later, Chile's democracy collapsed into one of the world's most repressive dictatorships.
The crisis began with Salvador Allende's narrow electoral victory in 1970. Though a declared Marxist, Allende was a democratic politician who had lost three previous presidential elections before winning with just 36% of the vote against divided opposition. Despite his unthreatening personality, Allende's election terrified Chile's right wing, military, and the United States government, all determined to prevent a Marxist government in Chile during the Cold War.
Rather than moderating his approach given his slim mandate, Allende pursued radical policies: nationalizing American-owned copper companies without compensation, freezing prices, replacing free markets with state planning, increasing wages and government spending, and printing money to cover deficits. Though well-intentioned, his reforms were executed incompetently, with inexperienced people like a 19-year-old student setting consumer prices.
The results were economic chaos: hyperinflation, investment flight, trade deficits, consumer goods shortages, and severe rationing. Even workers, Allende's natural supporters, joined nationwide strikes. Street violence grew, with armed leftists and right-wing threats of "Yakarta viene" (referencing Indonesian anti-communist massacres).
On September 11, 1973, the military launched a coup. Allende committed suicide during the assault on the presidential palace. Though most Chileans expected the military junta to quickly return power to civilians, General Augusto Pinochet emerged as leader and established a regime that would last nearly 17 years.
Pinochet's government combined brutal political repression with radical free-market economics. His secret police force, DINA, eliminated leftists through executions, torture, and "disappearances." By 1976, Pinochet had arrested 130,000 Chileans (1% of the population), killed thousands, and driven 100,000 into exile.
Simultaneously, Pinochet handed economic management to the "Chicago Boys"-economists trained at the University of Chicago who implemented free enterprise, free trade, balanced budgets, and reduced government intervention. The results were impressive: inflation fell from 600% to 9% annually, the economy grew at nearly 10% yearly, and foreign investment soared. However, benefits were unequally distributed, with middle and upper classes prospering while many Chileans suffered below the poverty line.
Chile's democratic rebirth began in 1988 when Pinochet, confident of victory, called a plebiscite to extend his rule. With international attention ensuring an honest vote, the opposition organized a massive "No!" campaign that prevailed with 58% of votes. The 17 different opposition groups had learned cooperation through necessity. Chilean leftists who had spent 16 years in exile had moderated their views after observing European social democracies and the collapse of communist regimes.
The opposition alliance "Concertacion" won the 1990 election and the next three, alternating between Christian Democrat and Socialist presidents as agreed. They largely continued Pinochet's free-market policies while increasing social spending and reforming labor laws. The result was impressive economic growth, with Chile leading Latin America economically.
Chile's experience illustrates selective change: breaking its tradition of minimal military intervention while resolving economic tensions by adopting free-market policies. When democracy returned, socialists showed remarkable flexibility by continuing Pinochet's economic approach while restoring democratic governance. The country's strong national identity helped it emerge from military repression without deeper trauma, enabling reconciliation between left and right after Pinochet's fall, building "a Chile for all Chileans."
Chapter 6
Indonesia's Birth Through Fire
Indonesia, the world's fourth most populous country with 260 million people, emerged from colonial rule through a complex crisis involving revolution, mass violence, and the creation of national identity virtually from scratch. Unlike other nations discussed, Indonesia had no historical precedent as a unified state-the very concept of "Indonesia" didn't exist until coined by a European around 1850.
The Dutch East Indies consisted of thousands of islands spanning 3,400 miles, with over 700 different languages and multiple religions. For most of the last 2,000 years, no indigenous state controlled most of the archipelago. The Dutch themselves didn't consolidate control over the entire region until around 1910-more than three centuries after their arrival.
Japan's conquest during World War II fundamentally altered Indonesia's path to independence. When Japan surrendered on August 15, 1945, Indonesians declared independence just two days later. After four years of revolution against returning Dutch forces, Indonesia gained sovereignty in December 1949, though two significant limitations remained: the Dutch retained western New Guinea and Dutch companies maintained ownership of Indonesian natural resources.
Indonesia's founding president, Sukarno, faced enormous challenges in unifying this diverse archipelago. He formulated Pancasila, five principles enshrined in the 1945 constitution: belief in one god, national unity, humanitarianism, democracy, and social justice. When parliamentary democracy led to political gridlock after the 1955 elections, Sukarno proclaimed martial law and replaced democracy with "guided democracy" in 1957.
By the 1960s, Indonesia was embroiled in a complex three-way power struggle between Sukarno, the armed forces, and the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI). The struggle culminated in a poorly executed coup attempt on September 30-October 1, 1965, when leftist military units attempted to capture seven leading generals, ostensibly to protect Sukarno from a rumored CIA-backed coup.
The coup's failure created an opening for Suharto, the commander of the Army Strategic Reserve. The military's response was swift and devastating-within days, they began a propaganda campaign justifying the mass roundup and killing of Indonesian communists. Though the coup itself killed only about a dozen people, it provided Suharto the pretext for eliminating the PKI. Approximately half a million Indonesians were murdered in 1965-66, making it one of the world's largest mass killings since World War II.
After thwarting the coup, Suharto displayed remarkable political skill, gradually displacing Sukarno while pretending to act on his behalf. Over two-and-a-half years, he methodically replaced military and civil service officers with loyalists, finally becoming president in March 1968.
Suharto's regime left mixed legacies. The negative impacts were severe: mass murder, imprisonment of 100,000 for over a decade, and massive corruption. Yet despite these horrors, the Suharto regime achieved economic growth, attracted foreign investment, focused on domestic problems rather than anti-colonial politics, promoted family planning, and presided over an agricultural green revolution that improved nutrition nationwide.
Indonesia's crisis illustrates selective change between areas ripe for change and non-negotiable core values. Within the fence were major changes: Suharto's military dictatorship replacing civilian government (and later being replaced itself), embracing Western-trained economists, and abandoning Sukarno's Third World leadership aspirations. Outside the fence remained territorial integrity, religious tolerance, and non-communist governance.
Indonesia faced challenges as a new country with limited national identity and no history of successful change. However, it benefited from its island geography (freedom from external threats), economic models from other countries, and Western investment after abandoning pro-communist policies. Today, Indonesia has successfully built a national identity in remarkably short time through shared pride in the independence struggle, celebration of the country's vast territorial expanse, and widespread adoption of Bahasa Indonesia as the national language alongside 700 local languages.
Chapter 7
Germany's Phoenix-Like Resurrection
Germany's surrender in May 1945 left the country devastated: 7 million Germans dead, cities reduced to rubble, one-quarter of territory lost, 10 million homeless refugees, and an economy in collapse. The Nazi leadership was dead, and the population traumatized by bombing and defeat. Yet today, Germany stands as Europe's most powerful country with the world's fourth-largest economy. This transformation represents an extreme case of crisis and recovery.
Post-war Germany was divided into four occupation zones that became two separate countries: West Germany (Federal Republic) and East Germany (German Democratic Republic). While East Germany suffered under Soviet reparations and communist policies, West Germany received Marshall Plan aid and rebuilt rapidly. Under Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and Economics Minister Ludwig Erhard, West Germany created an "economic miracle" with modified free-market policies.
A critical aspect of Germany's post-war recovery was its approach to the Nazi past. Initially, most Germans adopted the view that Nazi crimes were the fault of just a tiny clique of evil leaders while ordinary Germans were innocent. Chancellor Adenauer's policy of "amnesty and integration" prioritized urgent reconstruction over investigating Nazi pasts.
The year 1968 became a watershed moment for Germany's confrontation with its Nazi past. German protestors, born around 1945, were too young to have been raised as Nazis but had grown up hearing revelations about ordinary Germans' Nazi crimes. Unlike American youth whose parents were seen as war heroes, these German youth viewed their parents' generation as complicit in Nazi atrocities.
Willy Brandt, Germany's first left-wing chancellor since 1949, accelerated social reforms while revolutionizing foreign policy. He established diplomatic relations with East Germany and Eastern Bloc countries, accepting the Oder-Neisse Line as Poland's permanent border-renouncing territories central to German identity. His most dramatic moment came in 1970 when he spontaneously knelt at the Warsaw Ghetto memorial, asking forgiveness for Nazi crimes.
When Hungary opened its border with Austria in 1989, thousands of East Germans fled west, leading to mass protests and the Berlin Wall's fall on November 9. Chancellor Helmut Kohl skillfully negotiated with Mikhail Gorbachev, securing Soviet acceptance of a reunified Germany remaining in NATO, culminating in official reunification on October 3, 1990.
Germany's central location surrounded by neighbors has been the defining factor in its history. With land borders to nine countries and coastal exposure to eight more, Germany faces unique constraints. Unlike countries protected by natural barriers, northern Germany sits on the flat North European Plain with no defensive mountains or significant rivers.
After World War II, Germans largely rejected self-pity despite the bombing of German cities, the flight of 12 million refugees, the deaths of 2 million civilians, and the rape of approximately a million German women. They recognized that the suffering inflicted on Germans resulted from horrors Germany had inflicted on others. This painful but honest reckoning with the past has given Germany better security and relations with former enemies than it had after World War I.
Germany illustrates several key factors from our crisis framework. It demonstrates selective change-drastically altering political borders and confronting its Nazi past while preserving core values like government support for arts, healthcare and community values. External support proved crucial through the Marshall Plan's aid to West Germany. Germany's strong national identity, based on cultural achievements, language, and shared history, helped it survive devastation and partition. Modern German history reveals a pattern of 21-23 year intervals between crushing defeats and explosive reactions-approximately one human generation-as young adults who experienced decisive events later became leaders positioned to complete or reverse those experiences.
Chapter 8
Australia's Identity Crisis: From British Outpost to Asian Neighbor
Australia presents a unique national identity crisis that unfolded gradually after World War II. Unlike the sudden crises of other nations, Australia's transformation centered on reconciling its British cultural heritage with its Asian-Pacific geographic reality.
My first Australian visit in 1964 revealed a country "more British than Britain itself"-with British streetscapes, overwhelmingly white British population, traditional British food, and British-style pubs. By 2008, the transformation was striking, symbolized by numerous Asian students at Queensland University, making me feel I was at UCLA rather than in the Australia I had known.
European settlement began in January 1788 when Britain sent 11 ships carrying 730 convicts, guards and administrators to establish a remote dumping ground for Britain's excess prisoner population. By 1820, 84% of Australia's European population consisted of convicts and former convicts. Europeans simply seized Aboriginal land without negotiation or payment, conducted sporadic massacres, and widely viewed Aborigines as subhuman and destined for extinction.
Unlike America's violent revolution against Britain, Australia's path to self-government was gradual and cooperative. The Commonwealth of Australia was finally inaugurated on January 1, 1901, with a constitution declaring "one indissoluble Federal Commonwealth under the crown" of Britain, demonstrating Australians' continued allegiance to British values and protection.
Preserving a White Australia was the unanimous goal when debating the federal constitution. The 1901 Immigration Restriction Act, supported by all political parties, aimed to keep Australia white by barring entry to non-whites. Rather than explicitly mentioning race (which Britain objected to), Australia required immigrants to pass a dictation test in any European language chosen by officials-a system designed to exclude non-Europeans.
Australians' identity as British subjects was demonstrated by their enthusiastic participation in British wars regardless of relevance to Australian interests. The ANZAC landing at Gallipoli on April 25, 1915 became Australia's most important national holiday despite ending in failure due to incompetent British leadership.
World War Two directly threatened Australia with Japanese attacks on Darwin and nearby islands. The fall of Singapore in February 1942 marked a turning point in Australia's self-image. Despite British promises to protect Australia, Japan sank Britain's only two large warships in the Far East just days after declaring war. When Singapore surrendered on February 15, 1942-Britain's worst military defeat in history-2,000 Australian soldiers were among the 100,000 captured. Instead of British protection, Australia's defense depended on American forces under General MacArthur.
After World War Two, Australia gradually loosened its ties to Britain and shifted from identifying as "loyal British in Australia" to an independent nation with its own identity. By the 1980s, Japan had replaced Britain as Australia's leading trading partner (receiving 28% of exports compared to Britain's mere 4%). Britain's decision to join the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1961 delivered a profound symbolic and economic shock to Australia. The British Commonwealth Immigration Act of 1962 ended automatic right of Commonwealth citizens to enter Britain. By 1968, Australians were classified as "foreigners" and by 1972 as "aliens"-painful symbolic rejections.
In 1972, Australia's identity changed dramatically when Labour Party Prime Minister Gough Whitlam launched a comprehensive transformation in his first 19 days in office. This included officially repudiating the White Australia policy, ending military conscription, withdrawing troops from Vietnam, recognizing China, granting independence to Papua New Guinea, banning racially-selected sports teams, and replacing British honors with Australian ones.
By the late 1980s, nearly half of Australians were either immigrants or had at least one immigrant parent. Asian immigrants have had outsized influence, with Asian students occupying over 70% of places in Sydney's top schools and making up a significant portion of university and medical students.
Australia's transformation centers on questions of national identity and core values: Is Australia a white British outpost near Asia, or an independent nation on Asia's periphery with its own interests? Australia demonstrates honest self-appraisal in recognizing its changed global position-that Britain is now a minor trade partner while former enemy Japan became its most important one, and that operating as a white British outpost in Asia is no longer viable.
Chapter 9
The Challenges Facing Modern Japan
Japan, with the world's third-largest economy, presents both remarkable strengths and serious challenges. Despite its large domestic debt, Japan remains the world's leading creditor nation with massive foreign exchange reserves. Japan invests heavily in research and development (3.5% of GDP compared to America's 1.8%), maintains excellent infrastructure, and consistently ranks among the world's top 10 countries in global competitiveness.
Japan's "human capital" is equally impressive. Its population enjoys the world's highest life expectancy, near-universal literacy, and remarkable socioeconomic equality (third most egalitarian nation globally). Japanese students rank fourth highest worldwide in math and science literacy, and nearly 50% of adults pursue higher education.
However, Japan faces serious problems. Its government debt stands at 2.5 times GDP-far higher than America's and double Greece's ratio. This debt represents an intergenerational conflict, with younger working Japanese essentially paying older Japanese who hold government bonds directly or through pension funds. This mortgage on Japan's future grows as the young population shrinks while the older population expands.
In theory, Japanese women have equal status under the 1947 constitution, but reality reveals the widest gender gap among rich industrialized nations except South Korea. At home, the "marriage package" creates an inefficient division where husbands work excessive hours outside while wives manage all domestic responsibilities. In workplaces, women represent 45% of entry-level positions but only 11% of management roles, 2% of board positions, and less than 1% of CEOs.
Japan's birth rate has plummeted to nearly the world's lowest at just 7 births annually per 1,000 people (compared to 13 in the US). The total fertility rate of 1.27 babies per woman falls far below the 2.0 replacement rate needed for population stability. Unlike other low-fertility nations where immigration offsets declining births, Japan's population is actually shrinking.
Japan prides itself on being the most ethnically homogeneous affluent country in the world, with immigrants comprising only 1.9% of its population-compared to 28% in Australia, 21% in Canada, and 14% in the US. Its resistance to immigration is stark: Japan accepts just 0.2% of asylum seekers, and foreign workers constitute merely 1.3% of its workforce versus 15% in America.
Japan's second major unacknowledged problem is its troubled relationship with China and Korea stemming from its wartime atrocities. During its undeclared war on China (1937 onwards) and 35-year occupation of Korea, Japan committed horrific acts: using Chinese prisoners for bayonet practice, massacring hundreds of thousands at Nanking, forcing Korean women into sexual slavery as "comfort women," and conscripting Korean men as slave laborers.
While Japanese officials have offered formal apologies, these appear insincere to Chinese and Koreans because they lack Germany's comprehensive approach to historical responsibility-no Japanese leader has made gestures comparable to German Chancellor Willy Brandt kneeling at the Warsaw Ghetto, Japan has few museums documenting its wartime crimes, and Japanese schoolchildren aren't routinely educated about these atrocities.
Japan has several factors in its favor for resolving its current problems: a history of successful crisis resolution, remarkable patience and ability to recover from catastrophes, geographic isolation providing freedom of choice, strong national identity and cohesion, friendly support from trade partners, and available models from other countries. However, three major obstacles remain: Japan's outdated core value of unrestricted resource access, its self-pitying narrative about WWII rather than accepting responsibility, and its lack of honest self-appraisal regarding population decline and immigration.
Chapter 10
America's Strengths and Growing Vulnerabilities
While not facing an acute crisis, the United States confronts serious, slowly unfolding problems in both domestic and foreign affairs. Before examining America's fundamental problems, it's important to first assess the country's long-term advantages, particularly in comparison to potential rivals.
The U.S. remains the world's most powerful country with the largest economy-a product of our large population (330 million, third highest globally) and high per-capita output. Unlike most populous nations which have low per-capita outputs, or rich small nations with tiny populations, America uniquely combines both factors. Our resource-rich, self-sufficient country with low population density can support its large population far more easily than resource-starved Japan with its population density ten times higher than ours.
America's geographic advantages are exceptional. The lower 48 states lie entirely within temperate zones-optimal for agriculture and public health. Our continent's unique wedge shape funneled Ice Age glaciers southward, creating the extraordinarily fertile soils of the Great Plains. We possess the world's largest network of navigable waterways: extensive coastlines with numerous protected harbors, the massive Mississippi River system penetrating 1,200 miles inland, and the Great Lakes-more navigable internal waterways than the rest of the world combined. These waterways facilitate inexpensive transport while our oceanic borders simultaneously protect us from invasion.
America's democracy provides citizens peaceful outlets for expression, reducing the risk of civil violence. Democracy requires compromise, which reduces tyranny while preventing minority paralysis. Universal suffrage incentivizes government investment in all citizens. America's federal system creates 50 competing experiments testing different solutions to shared problems. The U.S. has historically offered high socioeconomic mobility, ease of business creation, strong investment in education and research, scientific leadership, technological innovation, and benefits from immigration.
However, America's accelerating deterioration of political compromise threatens democracy itself. While the Constitution created checks and balances to force compromise, this system is breaking down. Unlike the productive relationship between Republican President Reagan and Democratic Speaker O'Neill in the 1980s, compromise has deteriorated since the mid-1990s. The Republican Party's extreme Tea Party wing now challenges moderate Republicans who compromise with Democrats. Filibusters exemplify this breakdown-in America's first 220 years, only 68 presidential nominees faced filibuster, but Republicans blocked 79 Obama nominees in just four years.
The breakdown of political compromise is self-reinforcing, driving respected moderates from government service. Three key causes emerge: First, skyrocketing campaign costs make large donors increasingly influential. Second, domestic air travel allows representatives to return home frequently rather than socializing with colleagues in Washington. Third, gerrymandering creates safe districts that reward partisan extremism.
Polarization extends far beyond politics into everyday American life. We've lost inhibitions against rudeness that naturally exist when facing another human being, as digital communication reduces people to words on screens. While this technology has spread globally, America's political breakdown may be unique due to our lower social capital. The U.S. has 25 times greater area than most affluent countries, lower population density, stronger individualism, and higher mobility (Americans move every five years on average).
Political polarization represents a genuine danger. Chile and Indonesia both experienced breakdowns of compromise that led to military dictatorships-outcomes that seemed absurd to citizens beforehand. While America's democratic traditions make a military takeover less likely, our high gun ownership and history of group violence create different risks. The more probable scenario involves a party in power manipulating voter registration, stacking courts, challenging elections, and using law enforcement to suppress opposition. This internal polarization poses a far greater threat than external competition-only Americans can destroy America.
Chapter 11
Global Challenges in an Interconnected World
What factors threaten human populations and living standards globally? Four sets of problems present potential for worldwide harm: nuclear weapons, global climate change, global resource depletion, and global inequalities of living standards.
The Hiroshima bomb killed about 100,000 people instantly, but a nuclear war between major powers would kill hundreds of millions immediately and potentially billions through "nuclear winter"-when smoke, soot and dust block sunlight, creating freezing conditions, destroying crops and causing global starvation. Despite the Cold War's end reducing fears initially, the risk has increased again. Four nuclear war scenarios exist: a planned surprise attack to destroy a rival's nuclear arsenal completely; an escalating series of miscalculations, like the Cuban Missile Crisis; accidental misreading of warning systems; and terrorist acquisition of nuclear weapons.
Climate change is so complicated that few people except specialists truly understand it, while many influential people dismiss it as a hoax. The cause is simple: increasing human population combined with increasing resource consumption and waste production per person. Carbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning acts as a greenhouse gas, trapping heat by allowing sunlight to pass through but blocking re-radiated infrared energy. CO2 also acidifies oceans, dissolving coral reefs that protect coastlines and nurture fish populations.
Consequences include widespread drought (affecting Southern California, the Mediterranean, Africa, and the Himalayan snowpack that supplies water to billions), decreased food production just as global demand increases by 50%, tropical diseases spreading into temperate zones, and rising sea levels threatening coastal populations worldwide. While some benefits exist (like northern shipping lanes), the negatives vastly outweigh them.
Fossil fuels represent the third major global problem. These hydrocarbon resources (oil, coal, oil shale, and natural gas) have become our primary energy source because of their apparent low cost, high energy density, and transportability. The Industrial Revolution in the 1700s began large-scale fossil fuel use, starting with easily accessible sources and gradually shifting to deeper, more expensive, and more damaging sources. The true cost of fossil fuels includes not just extraction costs but also externalities like air pollution (causing millions of deaths annually) and climate change damages.
Alternative energy sources like wind, solar, tidal, hydroelectric, and geothermal appear virtually inexhaustible and are already proven technologies. Each alternative has drawbacks: solar panels disrupt desert habitats, windmills kill birds and bats, and dams block fish migration. However, when compared to fossil fuels' massive problems, these alternatives often represent the lesser evil.
Beyond energy concerns, several other natural resource categories present challenges for our future. These differ fundamentally in their renewability-minerals are finite, while forests and fisheries can regenerate if properly managed. We know how to manage renewable resources sustainably-Germany's forests and Alaska's salmon fisheries demonstrate this-but most of the world's resources are being mismanaged and depleted.
The final major global challenge is inequality. While consumption rates and human well-being aren't tightly coupled, the disparity between First World and developing nations remains unsustainable. Western Europeans demonstrate this by consuming half the oil Americans do while enjoying higher quality of life by meaningful measures like life expectancy, health, financial security, and public services.
Applying our crisis framework to global problems reveals formidable obstacles. Unlike individual nations, the world lacks a coherent shared identity, established forums for political debate, historical precedents for global problem-solving, and external allies offering help or models.
Nevertheless, progress toward solving world problems is occurring through three routes: bilateral/multilateral agreements between nations; regional agreements (like the European Union, which despite its challenges has prevented war between member states for decades); and world agreements through international institutions (such as smallpox eradication and the Montreal Protocol).
Globalization both causes problems and facilitates solutions. It spreads resource competition, pollution and disease, but also information, communication, and recognition of our interdependence. As Diamond wrote in his book Collapse, this resembles an exponentially accelerating horserace between destruction and hope. While the outcome remains uncertain, fewer decades remain until the race is settled, for better or worse.
