The United States and China in Power Transition - Strategic Studies ...

sures in the 1990s and beyond, given the changes of
national power in the information age and under conditions
of globalization (in fact, version 4.0 is already
available; it is updated to 2007). But for this analysis,
an argument can be made that the measures still hold
and provide us a good sense of the positional standing
and reversals of the great nations in the past.
Organski has it right that power transition is a long
process. For instance, it took Germany more than 70
years to catch up with Great Britain. The transition of
system leadership from Britain to the United States
also took more than half of a century. Looking at the
changes of great power standing in Figure 2-4, we can
say that the conditions of another power transition
have been taking shape over the last 20 to 30 years;
it is likely to take another 20 to 30 years to reach the
point where a new “pecking order” of great powers
becomes established. The specter of another power
transition is casting a long shadow over the American
dream of the Pax Americana.
Who Is the Contender?
If two or more second-ranked big nations rise at
the same time, how would a dominant nation identify
its challenger? For example, the United States and
Germany both expanded their national power in the
second half of the 19th century and surpassed Great
Britain at the turn of the 20th century. The U.S. rise
was even more spectacular (review Figure 2-3). Why
did Great Britain only single out Germany? 18 Today,
we are witnessing the rise of China, India, and Brazil.
The European Union (EU) is also becoming a formidable
actor on the world stage. In addition, one has to
take a resurgent Russia into account. Finally, a “nor-
17