Transcription
So, we're at the end of that western-led world. And truth be told, it's not only the United States that's crazy. It's also Europe. And in many cases, and China's of course the most notable in the world, moving from catching up to moving forward. I raise all of this because what has happened is a normal process where Asia and now Africa and uh other parts of the non-western world are achieving economic development. It's driving the western world nuts, especially with our nutty government in the United States. And now that China really is a rival as innovator in the world.
In this powerful video, Professor Jeffrey Sachs breaks down why the American world order is nearing its end. He says it's not that the West is crumbling, but Asia, Africa, and the Middle East are rising fast and they're starting to challenge US dominance like never before. You'll want to watch this one till the very end.
Well, first let me uh say uh just to clarify one major point. Uh the West is not in decline. Uh the rest of the world is catching up. Uh so from a historical point of view uh modern economic development uh meaning the industrial revolution, the industrial age of the 19th century uh then uh the age of electricity, uh the age of the automobile, uh now the age of information and the digital age, uh was led initially by the North Atlantic, what we call the West. Uh Britain was the first industrialized country. Uh Britain was the place where the steam engine created industrialization. Now, uh it was uh in the 19th century, uh when the gap between the West, so-called, and the rest widened considerably, and that came partly because of the uh advances of technology, literacy, science in the western world and the imperial uh domination that that brought over much of Asia, and by the end of the 19th century, all of Africa. Uh so the West widened its lead both through its economic and technological uh advances, but also the brutal uh uh age of high imperialism of Europe in the 19th century, uh and indeed until the middle of the 20th century.
At the end of World War II, uh Europe had basically battered itself to death uh in two civil wars in the first half of the 20th century. And that opened the way for uh the colonized parts of the world to gain their political independence. And that happened, of course, in the late 40s and the 1950s, and then stretched out into the 1970s and some cases the 1980s, depending on whether the European powers fought wars to try to keep their colonies or let them go through exhaustion or for other reasons. But in any event, from the second half of the 20th century, countries were independent for the first time, typically in more than a hundred years. And what did they do? They began to catch up. First thing they did was engage in education, which the European imperial powers did not offer to most of their subjects. Uh certainly not in any quality that would enable their colonies to achieve economic development.
I raise all of this because what has happened is a normal process where Asia and now Africa and uh other parts of the non-western world are achieving economic development by raising educational standards, most fundamental part of economic development, building infrastructure, and in many cases, and China is of course the most notable in the world, moving from catching up to moving forward by becoming great innovators of new technologies on their own. So this is a a normal process. It's a healthy process. It's a good process. It's driving the Western world nuts, especially with our nutty government in the United States. Why? Because the Western world came to believe in its superiority over several centuries. Because when you're ahead, you say, "I'm ahead because I'm better. I'm ahead because uh of the God I believe in. I'm ahead because uh of some kind of intrinsic superiority." Uh a lot of white supremacy, a lot of religious supremacy, uh all sorts of reasons have been given in the last 250 years by Europeans and Americans about why they naturally run the world.
So, we're at the end of that western-led world. And truth be told, it's not only the United States that's crazy, it's also Europe. They don't want to give up these advantages because they came to believe, and again for a lot of reasons, some absolutely vulgar, uh some uh mistaken ideas, uh some sophisticated fallacies, the belief, for example, that Max Weber proposed that it's Protestantism that would be the key for economic success. So even the Catholic regions of southern Europe would not be able to catch up. All of these reasons uh led to a mindset that I think is still very much alive in Europe and the US. An air of superiority, a belief that how dare the Russians threaten us. They're not quite US. They're not quite Europe. And China? My God, you know, the deep antipathy to China is shocking to me. I believe basically it's racism uh in the end because it's widely held. Uh it is taken for granted in the United States, especially in the political class, of course, but it's a part of our deep-seated history. Already by the 1880s, there were anti-China laws on Chinese migration. The racism and antipathy has been there for a long time. And now that China really is a rival as innovator in the world. Uh definitely has surpassed the United States in industrial output by quite a large margin. Is the low-cost producer of much of what the world really needs, whether it's zero-carbon energy, the new electric vehicles, uh 5G digital technologies. China's just wonderfully uh adept, competitive, uh and innovative. And this is really driving the political class crazy in the United States. How dare they be an insult to the western dominance?
So, to my mind, your question is really a question of almost psychology, uh that is not grounded in uh actual facts about security or threats, but rather is an attitude issue. And if you ask me what does America First stand for? It stands for America First and uh dominant. And uh what Trump exposes every day, by the way, in a cruder and cruder and more dangerous way, is his belief that he can post something on Truth Social and the world has to respond to it, and that he can give orders to Putin, or he can give orders to Xi Jinping, or he can give orders to Lula, or he can give orders to the BRICS, and everybody's going to fall in line. That's his real belief. It's at a personal level, rather crude, but it's kind of in the air in Washington that, oh yes, multipolar, Marco Rubio says these things once in a while in speeches, but really America is going to tell the world what to do. And what's problematic right now is the rest of the world isn't going to follow the US line.
And we have a president that is out of control of law in the United States. He just issues executive decrees. He issues orders every day. The Supreme Court has basically said, "We're not going to stop him." Congress has said, "We're pathetic. We have nothing to do with this." And so we have one person, nearly an octogenarian, uh, who has delusions of American power, who is giving orders every day to the world. The orders change by the hour. The rest of the world is, some are trying to say, "Yes, please, we love you, we respect you, we honor you." But in fact, uh, a lot of the world follows President Lula's line, although President Lula is just about the only one with the gumption to say it. He said last week, "We don't want an emperor." Period. And he meant it. And when the United States, not the United States, by the way, when Donald Trump responded by saying, "Okay, Brazil gets 50% tariffs," President Lula said, "Okay, we have a reciprocity law. We retaliate. We don't want an emperor." This is where we are this week. It's rather shocking. It's rather amazing. It's not, "Let's live in a multipolar world. Let's make peace. Let's make business. Let's get along." It's more dangerous than that right now. Uh, it is an erratic leader that has no institutional control who both exemplifies and exacerbates this western uh delusion of power over the rest of the world. Something that has passed. It's already passed. It's already an anachronism. It was true, by the way, for 200 or 250 years, but it ain't true today. And this conflict between the perception and the reality is very dangerous, absolutely in this nuclear-armed world. This whole approach is so reckless, so dangerous. And if I could say, the western world needs to open its eyes to reality. It does not run the show. That doesn't make it a loser. The United States has every bit of security any country in the world could dream of. In fact, the US is untouchable from a conventional, in a conventional sense. The only danger to the United States of America, the only security issue to the United States of America is nuclear war. And it seems to be the only path that the US is on right now, which is the most direct antagonism of the other major powers in the world in the crudest possible way.
Well, Jeffrey Sachs, uh, thanks so much. I know you're very busy there in Beijing and probably have a full day ahead of you. So, thank you for letting me. By the way, lots of meetings that I've been having uh all over the world, and there's a lot of concern all over the world, and concern by very responsible people and professional diplomats with long experience. People are not uh not finding this uh fun. Uh they're not finding this a game. They're not finding this uh uh a joke. They're finding it uh very uh dangerous and destabilizing. And we've we had better get a grip with mature adult behavior. So that's what I'm hoping someone in Europe can please come forward that way.
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