"Global Decline of US Power" Giovanni Arrighi, David Harvey & Joel Andreas on Adam Smith in Beijing

2008, The American economy is in shambles, with a spiraling debt crisis, a vanishing industrial base, and a plummeting dollar. And, as the debacle of the occupation of Iraq continues to demonstrate, the US is finding it increasingly difficult to keep the rest of the world under its hegemonic thumb through military intervention. Giovanni Arrighi's new book, Adam Smith in Beijing, situates this global decline of US power within the context of a epochal shift in the world-system away from North American dominance and towards Asia. Is China the real winner of the "War on Terror"? Is it possible to see, in China's startling emergence as a preeminent economic power on the world stage, something other than neoliberal capitalism running rampant? What new possibilities and challenges are in store for struggles against imperialism and exploitation on a less and less US-centric globe? GIOVANNI ARRIGHI is professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University. His work investigates the historical interplay of economic and political hegemony in the capitalist world-system. His recent works include The Long Twentieth Century: Money, Power, and the Origins of Our Times and (with Beverly Silver) Chaos and Governance in the Modern World System. His current research focuses on trajectories of development across the global South. DAVID HARVEY is professor of Anthropology at the Graduate Center at CUNY, and the author of many books examining the links between capitalism, globalization, and the urban environment, including A Brief History of Neoliberalism, The New Imperialism, Paris: Capital of Modernity, and Social Justice in the City. He has also written some of the definitive works plotting a critical geography of Baltimore, including the essay "A View from Federal Hill" and the book Spaces of Hope. JOEL ANDREAS is professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University, where he has been investigating the changes in class relations in China from 1949 to the present. He's also the author of the bestselling comic-book essay Addicted To War. 2640 is a new project of Red Emma's Bookstore Coffeehouse, with the goal of creating an independent platform for political discussion, education art, and culture. It's located at 2640 St. Paul St. in Baltimore. Is US power in decline? What are we to make of the rise of China? Will a possible equalization of North-South relations herald a more brutal capitalism or a better world? Giovanni Arrighi, Joel Andreas, and David Harvey give their perspectives in this forum, for a discussion of Arrighi's 2007 book Adam Smith in Beijing (Verso). The event, filmed in Baltimore, MD, in March of 2008, was organized by the Red Emma's collective. Discussants: Giovanni Arrighi is professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University. His books include The Long Twentieth Century (1994), Chaos and Governance in the World System (w/ Beverly Silver, 1999), and Adam Smith in Beijing (2007). Joel Andreas is professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University. He is the author and cartoonist of Addicted to War: Why the US Can't Kick Militarism (2004). David Harvey is is professor of Anthropology at the Graduate Center at City University of New York. His many books include Spaces of Hope (2000), The New Imperialism (2003), A Brief History of Neoliberalism (2005), and Limits to Capital (new ed, 2007).