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by jacquesm
890 days ago
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Education, wealth and access to resources will never be divided fairly or be equally accessible to all. So there will always be a massive discrepancy between various countries and the way to look at those former powers is to see them has having a head start over the rest of the world. If they turn themselves into tourist attractions (Amsterdam, Venice, Paris and many others) that's a better outcome than that they become entrenched military powers or maintain their colonial ambitions. For Surat to rival any of those you'd have to transport it in time back to the 15th century and to make India a colonial power. That will never happen, because you don't get to be a player at that level by being nice: it takes having an unfair advantage and the willingness to exploit that advantage (military, trade, something else?). Amsterdam wouldn't be what it is without the 'golden age' (which for the countries that were plundered probably wasn't a golden age at all, but one of oppression and massive looting), Venice wouldn't be where it is today without a sizeable fraction of the monetary movement of the age flowing through its banks, not unlike Switzerland, NYC or London in more recent times. I don't think there will be any cities becoming 'major powers' ever again except maybe for SV and some in China if they manage to avoid financial collapse. |
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There are more opportunities than that. Technical change that doesn't accrue existing regions can shift the balance - for example maybe souther Texas during a potential "gold rush" phase of private space exploitation. Or maybe, finally a big earthquake hits the west coast and the resulting resettlement in other cities breaks the current positive feedback loop of tech in bay area resulting in new powerhouse regions. Or some of the developing countriesin Africa finally get their act together and become an economic and later technical and military powerhouse. Or some currently minor country has a research lab discover a major technology, or makes a smart investment (like Taiwan and semiconductors) that makes it a new power, if harnessed locally and not just distributed back to existing tech centers. Plenty of opportunities - though it is indeed true is more likely for existing power centers to continue to centralize their benefits of existing human capital including access to resources like funding or transport hubs of physical goods, proximity to customers or whatever.