If the reality comes anywhere close to matching the hype, then the speeding of Russia’s national decline and the revival of America’s ideological authority will be among the transformative effects
As an earlier post suggested, the dramatic rise in U.S. natural gas production is one large reason why fears about America’s strategic decline may well be misplaced. The press is awash with articles about how the domestic abundance of low-cost energy promises significant economic gains. Fortune magazine carries an essay on how “the coming energy renaissance” will revive the U.S. manufacturing sector, a theme that is echoed in a new Citigroup report. Tyler Cowen, the economist who in last year’s The Great Stagnation argued that the good times are over, now foresees a coming era of export-based prosperity resulting, in significant part, from lower energy prices. Philip K. Verleger, Jr., a noted energy expert, anticipates an investment boom that creates millions of jobs across the U.S. economy.
Some commentary has dealt in a glancing way about how energy self-sufficiency will lessen America’s fraught profile in the Middle East and how the possibility of the United States becoming a major gas exporter could transform world energy markets. But with some exceptions (see here and here), there has been little focus on how America’s pioneering of the shale gas revolution might reshape international politics and the global economy.
The future has a way of making fools of bold prognosticators, but perhaps at this point two tentative propositions can be advanced. Continue reading
Monsters Abroad 