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The End of the World Is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization
2019 was the last great year for the world economy.
For generations, everything has been getting faster, better, and cheaper. Finally, we reached the point that almost anything you could ever want could be sent to your home within days - even hours - of when you decided you wanted it.
America made that happen, but now America has lost interest in keeping it going.
Globe-spanning supply chains are only possible with the protection of the U.S. Navy. The American dollar underpins internationalized energy and financial markets. Complex, innovative industries were created to satisfy American consumers. American security policy forced warring nations to lay down their arms. Billions of people have been fed and educated as the American-led trade system spread across the globe.
All of this was artificial. All this was temporary. All this is ending.
In The End of the World is Just the Beginning, author and geopolitical strategist Peter Zeihan maps out the next world: a world where countries or regions will have no choice but to make their own goods, grow their own food, secure their own energy, fight their own battles, and do it all with populations that are both shrinking and aging.
The list of countries that make it all work is smaller than you think. Which means everything about our interconnected world - from how we manufacture products, to how we grow food, to how we keep the lights on, to how we shuttle stuff about, to how we pay for it all - is about to change.
A world ending. A world beginning. Zeihan brings readers along for an illuminating (and a bit terrifying) ride packed with foresight, wit, and his trademark irreverence.
For generations, everything has been getting faster, better, and cheaper. Finally, we reached the point that almost anything you could ever want could be sent to your home within days - even hours - of when you decided you wanted it.
America made that happen, but now America has lost interest in keeping it going.
Globe-spanning supply chains are only possible with the protection of the U.S. Navy. The American dollar underpins internationalized energy and financial markets. Complex, innovative industries were created to satisfy American consumers. American security policy forced warring nations to lay down their arms. Billions of people have been fed and educated as the American-led trade system spread across the globe.
All of this was artificial. All this was temporary. All this is ending.
In The End of the World is Just the Beginning, author and geopolitical strategist Peter Zeihan maps out the next world: a world where countries or regions will have no choice but to make their own goods, grow their own food, secure their own energy, fight their own battles, and do it all with populations that are both shrinking and aging.
The list of countries that make it all work is smaller than you think. Which means everything about our interconnected world - from how we manufacture products, to how we grow food, to how we keep the lights on, to how we shuttle stuff about, to how we pay for it all - is about to change.
A world ending. A world beginning. Zeihan brings readers along for an illuminating (and a bit terrifying) ride packed with foresight, wit, and his trademark irreverence.
512 pages, Hardcover
First published June 10, 2022
4974 people are currently reading
28776 people want to read
About the author
Peter Zeihan
8 books1,108 followersGeopolitical Strategist Peter Zeihan is a global energy, demographic and security expert.
Zeihan’s worldview marries the realities of geography and populations to a deep understanding of how global politics impact markets and economic trends, helping industry leaders navigate today’s complex mix of geopolitical risks and opportunities. With a keen eye toward what will drive tomorrow’s headlines, his irreverent approach transforms topics that are normally dense and heavy into accessible, relevant takeaways for audiences of all types.
In his career, Zeihan has ranged from working for the US State Department in Australia, to the DC think tank community, to helping develop the analytical models for Stratfor, one of the world’s premier private intelligence companies. Mr. Zeihan founded his own firm -- Zeihan on Geopolitics -- in 2012 in order to provide a select group of clients with direct, custom analytical products. Today those clients represent a vast array of sectors including energy majors, financial institutions, business associations, agricultural interests, universities and the U.S. military.
His freshman book, The Accidental Superpower, debuted in 2014. His sophomore project, The Absent Superpower, published in December 2016.
Find out more about Peter -- and your world -- at www.zeihan.com
Zeihan’s worldview marries the realities of geography and populations to a deep understanding of how global politics impact markets and economic trends, helping industry leaders navigate today’s complex mix of geopolitical risks and opportunities. With a keen eye toward what will drive tomorrow’s headlines, his irreverent approach transforms topics that are normally dense and heavy into accessible, relevant takeaways for audiences of all types.
In his career, Zeihan has ranged from working for the US State Department in Australia, to the DC think tank community, to helping develop the analytical models for Stratfor, one of the world’s premier private intelligence companies. Mr. Zeihan founded his own firm -- Zeihan on Geopolitics -- in 2012 in order to provide a select group of clients with direct, custom analytical products. Today those clients represent a vast array of sectors including energy majors, financial institutions, business associations, agricultural interests, universities and the U.S. military.
His freshman book, The Accidental Superpower, debuted in 2014. His sophomore project, The Absent Superpower, published in December 2016.
Find out more about Peter -- and your world -- at www.zeihan.com
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April 14, 2023
“The crux of the problem is that, geopolitically and demographically speaking, for most of the last seventy-five years, we have been living in that perfect moment. At the end of World War II, the Americans created history’s greatest military alliance to arrest, contain, and beat back the Soviet Union…What is often forgotten, however, is that this alliance was only half the plan. In order to cement their new coalition, the Americans also fostered an environment of global security so that any partner could go anywhere, anytime, interface with anyone, in any economic manner, participate in any supply chain and access any material input – all without needing a military escort. This butter side of the Americans’ guns-and-butter deal created what we today recognize as free trade. Globalization. Globalization brought development and industrialization to a wide swath of the planet for the first time, generating the mass consumption societies and the blizzard of trade and the juggernaut of technological progress we all find so familiar. And that reshaped global demographics. Mass development and industrialization extended life spans, while simultaneously encouraging urbanization. For decades that meant more and more workers and consumers, the people who give economies some serious go. One outcome among many was the fastest economic growth humanity has ever seen. Decades of it…But all things must pass. We now face a new change in condition…”
- Peter Zeihan, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization
This book is: Something.
It is irresistible, but exhausting; it is stimulating, yet also irritating. It’s hard to put down, though it lasts far too long. Like an intellectual reflex hammer, Peter Zeihan’s The End of the World Is Just the Beginning is designed first and foremost to elicit strong responses.
That, after all, is how Zeihan makes his living.
Epically scoped, confidently argued, dizzyingly digressional, The End of The World Is Just the Beginning is an apocalyptic outline given by a smirking prophet who – it must be added – does not seem at all as worried as he wants the rest of us to be.
Still, given the shockingly high number of specific predictions that Zeihan throws out, a “success” rate of only 1% would still mean some pretty grim news.
***
It’s hard to summarize The End of the World Is Just the Beginning because it is about a lot of things. One chapter is a deep inquiry into finance, from the earliest days of bartering to the age of peak fiat currency in which we now live, while another chapter is an oft-numbing trip along the periodic table, discussing the earth’s most valuable elements, what they’re used for, and where they can be found.
Simplifying dramatically, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning starts from the premise that the post-World War II, post-Bretton Woods economic system has proved to be a net benefit to most of humanity. This global system – or “the Order,” as Zeihan calls it – has increased life expectancies and raised standards of living in ways unmatched by the rest of recorded history.
According to Zeihan, those good times are over, and globalization is in retreat. Once it withdraws, there will be a whole lot of pain. Zeihan contends that both the unfortunate consequences and the potential silver linings can be foreseen by exploring the intersection of geography and demography.
***
What does this all mean, in layman’s terms? Well, in The End of the World Is Just the Beginning’s 476 pages of text, Zeihan gives you thousands of answers.
Much of this book’s buzz – or notoriety – comes from Zeihan’s stridently bearish views on China. While many see China – for better or worse – as perhaps the preeminent superpower of the 21st century, Zeihan thinks they’re going to flame out spectacularly. To support his position, he points to a coming population implosion (caused by the one-child policy, as well as intense urbanization), hyper-financing, and the fact that it is a net importer of just about everything, which will make things difficult if overseas transportation breaks down.
This claim is certainly a showstopper, and has succeeded in getting Zeihan on numerous podcasts. However, it is just one of several dozen assertions, some better articulated than others.
***
Structurally, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning is broken down into seven sections. The largest is the first, which literally begins by discussing the use of human excrement in agriculture, and eventually gets around to framing the issues that Zeihan will spend the balance of this volume discussing.
Sections two through seven cover transport, finance, energy, industrial materials, manufacturing, and agriculture. Rather than going through each, I’ll just give one example to illustrate Zeihan’s approach.
In the transportation chapter, Zeihan starts with a fun hook, asking the reader to imagine a modern grocery store with its 40,000 separate items. In particular, he focuses on fusion food, such as a sushi corndog, listing all the different ingredients that are needed, with the inference being that they come from all over the place.
Having given a concrete, graspable illustration, Zeihan moves forward by looking back, recapping the history of moving things from Point A to Point B. As he does so, he highlights innovations such as changes in ship design, and the all-important shipping container. His grand conclusion is that we have infinite things in our life because it’s now possible to move infinite bits and pieces across vast oceans. The pair of jeans you’re wearing, for instance, might have required the inputs from fifteen different countries.
Zeihan argues that this overseas shipping network has been made possible by the U.S. Navy, which protects shipping lanes, fends off pirates, and – unlike imperial navies in the past – doesn’t stop-and-board vessels to collect tariffs or impress seamen.
When – and for Zeihan, this is an unexamined given – this protection is no longer available, there will be massive repercussions that will wreak havoc on just-in-time inventory systems, raise prices, and make certain goods hard-to-impossible to get.
In closing this chapter – as he does with the others – Zeihan gives us the winners and losers, the countries best able to sustain their living standards, and the countries that face the biggest challenges. To the apparent annoyance of many, he believes that the United States – imbued with navigable rivers, and situated on an economically-integrated continent – will come out just fine.
***
The topics that Zeihan covers can be pretty heavy. You’ll learn a lot more about rare earth elements than you ever expected. Despite this, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning is incredibly readable.
Drawing on his experience as a consultant, Zeihan has an engaging, informal style. He tries very hard to be funny, and sometimes even succeeds. The humor is admittedly dark, and Zeihan can be quite glib when writing off vast sections of humanity as doomed. If you live in one of those nations that are on Zeihan’s uh-oh list, you will probably be offended. You’ll also be insulted if you believe in electric cars, free range chickens, and organic agriculture, which are all things that he takes a certain mendacious glee in savaging.
Zeihan doesn’t seem like a bad guy. In the videos I’ve watched for extra credit, he comes across as likeable. Even so, he is borderline smug, and has an overweening certainty that he wears like armor. It’s tough to formulate a response to him, because every statement is accompanied with a blizzard of statistics.
Unfortunately, none of those facts can be checked, as The End of the World Is Just the Beginning has no footnotes, endnotes, or bibliography. The only insight into Zeihan’s methodology is in the acknowledgements, in which he refers to numerous governmental databases, and thanks the members of his “team,” who apparently do a lot of the digging – and first drafts – for him.
***
The End of the World Is Just the Beginning definitely wears out its welcome. The frantic, breathless pace becomes tiring, while the repetitions start to grate.
Beyond that, Zeihan is often so convinced by his own logic that he fails to explore some of the implications of his conclusions, which can be contradictory. He also leaves lingering-yet-obvious questions unexplored. He believes, for example, that falling populations are a national death-knell, but does not integrate robotics or AI into his analysis. The national headlines blaring about the potential loss of millions of jobs clash with Zeihan’s judgment that there won’t be enough workers.
Hanging over everything is climate change.
Zeihan believes in it, though he seems to feel that there isn’t much to be done. He spends a lot of space shredding green tech and mocking carbon net zero and bemoaning the difficulty of storing wind and solar power. He may be right about the carbon footprint of EVs, or the unintended consequences of forcing countries off oil, thereby incentivizing even dirtier fossil fuels such as coal. Nevertheless, throwing up his hands on climate change sort of makes his own book superfluous.
In other words, the direst climate predictions are set to occur before Zeihan’s direst globalization predictions.
***
Things aren’t going all that great right now, as you’ve probably noticed. So, when I reached the last page, my anxiety level remained where it had been at the start: Extremely high.
For all Zeihan’s forecasts, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning somehow didn’t make me feel all that much worse than I already do. This is due to the knowledge that there’s no way everything is going to unfold as Zeihan says. He’s just one guy with one worldview. The value, here, is in finding things to look for, to concentrate on, in the years to come. The downside, obviously, is that it’s just depressing as hell.
- Peter Zeihan, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization
This book is: Something.
It is irresistible, but exhausting; it is stimulating, yet also irritating. It’s hard to put down, though it lasts far too long. Like an intellectual reflex hammer, Peter Zeihan’s The End of the World Is Just the Beginning is designed first and foremost to elicit strong responses.
That, after all, is how Zeihan makes his living.
Epically scoped, confidently argued, dizzyingly digressional, The End of The World Is Just the Beginning is an apocalyptic outline given by a smirking prophet who – it must be added – does not seem at all as worried as he wants the rest of us to be.
Still, given the shockingly high number of specific predictions that Zeihan throws out, a “success” rate of only 1% would still mean some pretty grim news.
***
It’s hard to summarize The End of the World Is Just the Beginning because it is about a lot of things. One chapter is a deep inquiry into finance, from the earliest days of bartering to the age of peak fiat currency in which we now live, while another chapter is an oft-numbing trip along the periodic table, discussing the earth’s most valuable elements, what they’re used for, and where they can be found.
Simplifying dramatically, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning starts from the premise that the post-World War II, post-Bretton Woods economic system has proved to be a net benefit to most of humanity. This global system – or “the Order,” as Zeihan calls it – has increased life expectancies and raised standards of living in ways unmatched by the rest of recorded history.
According to Zeihan, those good times are over, and globalization is in retreat. Once it withdraws, there will be a whole lot of pain. Zeihan contends that both the unfortunate consequences and the potential silver linings can be foreseen by exploring the intersection of geography and demography.
***
What does this all mean, in layman’s terms? Well, in The End of the World Is Just the Beginning’s 476 pages of text, Zeihan gives you thousands of answers.
Much of this book’s buzz – or notoriety – comes from Zeihan’s stridently bearish views on China. While many see China – for better or worse – as perhaps the preeminent superpower of the 21st century, Zeihan thinks they’re going to flame out spectacularly. To support his position, he points to a coming population implosion (caused by the one-child policy, as well as intense urbanization), hyper-financing, and the fact that it is a net importer of just about everything, which will make things difficult if overseas transportation breaks down.
This claim is certainly a showstopper, and has succeeded in getting Zeihan on numerous podcasts. However, it is just one of several dozen assertions, some better articulated than others.
***
Structurally, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning is broken down into seven sections. The largest is the first, which literally begins by discussing the use of human excrement in agriculture, and eventually gets around to framing the issues that Zeihan will spend the balance of this volume discussing.
Sections two through seven cover transport, finance, energy, industrial materials, manufacturing, and agriculture. Rather than going through each, I’ll just give one example to illustrate Zeihan’s approach.
In the transportation chapter, Zeihan starts with a fun hook, asking the reader to imagine a modern grocery store with its 40,000 separate items. In particular, he focuses on fusion food, such as a sushi corndog, listing all the different ingredients that are needed, with the inference being that they come from all over the place.
Having given a concrete, graspable illustration, Zeihan moves forward by looking back, recapping the history of moving things from Point A to Point B. As he does so, he highlights innovations such as changes in ship design, and the all-important shipping container. His grand conclusion is that we have infinite things in our life because it’s now possible to move infinite bits and pieces across vast oceans. The pair of jeans you’re wearing, for instance, might have required the inputs from fifteen different countries.
Zeihan argues that this overseas shipping network has been made possible by the U.S. Navy, which protects shipping lanes, fends off pirates, and – unlike imperial navies in the past – doesn’t stop-and-board vessels to collect tariffs or impress seamen.
When – and for Zeihan, this is an unexamined given – this protection is no longer available, there will be massive repercussions that will wreak havoc on just-in-time inventory systems, raise prices, and make certain goods hard-to-impossible to get.
In closing this chapter – as he does with the others – Zeihan gives us the winners and losers, the countries best able to sustain their living standards, and the countries that face the biggest challenges. To the apparent annoyance of many, he believes that the United States – imbued with navigable rivers, and situated on an economically-integrated continent – will come out just fine.
***
The topics that Zeihan covers can be pretty heavy. You’ll learn a lot more about rare earth elements than you ever expected. Despite this, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning is incredibly readable.
Drawing on his experience as a consultant, Zeihan has an engaging, informal style. He tries very hard to be funny, and sometimes even succeeds. The humor is admittedly dark, and Zeihan can be quite glib when writing off vast sections of humanity as doomed. If you live in one of those nations that are on Zeihan’s uh-oh list, you will probably be offended. You’ll also be insulted if you believe in electric cars, free range chickens, and organic agriculture, which are all things that he takes a certain mendacious glee in savaging.
Zeihan doesn’t seem like a bad guy. In the videos I’ve watched for extra credit, he comes across as likeable. Even so, he is borderline smug, and has an overweening certainty that he wears like armor. It’s tough to formulate a response to him, because every statement is accompanied with a blizzard of statistics.
Unfortunately, none of those facts can be checked, as The End of the World Is Just the Beginning has no footnotes, endnotes, or bibliography. The only insight into Zeihan’s methodology is in the acknowledgements, in which he refers to numerous governmental databases, and thanks the members of his “team,” who apparently do a lot of the digging – and first drafts – for him.
***
The End of the World Is Just the Beginning definitely wears out its welcome. The frantic, breathless pace becomes tiring, while the repetitions start to grate.
Beyond that, Zeihan is often so convinced by his own logic that he fails to explore some of the implications of his conclusions, which can be contradictory. He also leaves lingering-yet-obvious questions unexplored. He believes, for example, that falling populations are a national death-knell, but does not integrate robotics or AI into his analysis. The national headlines blaring about the potential loss of millions of jobs clash with Zeihan’s judgment that there won’t be enough workers.
Hanging over everything is climate change.
Zeihan believes in it, though he seems to feel that there isn’t much to be done. He spends a lot of space shredding green tech and mocking carbon net zero and bemoaning the difficulty of storing wind and solar power. He may be right about the carbon footprint of EVs, or the unintended consequences of forcing countries off oil, thereby incentivizing even dirtier fossil fuels such as coal. Nevertheless, throwing up his hands on climate change sort of makes his own book superfluous.
In other words, the direst climate predictions are set to occur before Zeihan’s direst globalization predictions.
***
Things aren’t going all that great right now, as you’ve probably noticed. So, when I reached the last page, my anxiety level remained where it had been at the start: Extremely high.
For all Zeihan’s forecasts, The End of the World Is Just the Beginning somehow didn’t make me feel all that much worse than I already do. This is due to the knowledge that there’s no way everything is going to unfold as Zeihan says. He’s just one guy with one worldview. The value, here, is in finding things to look for, to concentrate on, in the years to come. The downside, obviously, is that it’s just depressing as hell.
May 9, 2023
As a person, I like and even admire Peter Zeihan. But I'm an analyst. "Dear is Plato. Dearer still is truth." Zeihan is a good strategist, though his strategy is sometimes based on disinformation and thus is both opaque and sub-optimal. He's better than Mearsheimer who is also quite good. Neither is as good as Edward Luttwak. The stakes (life or death, victory or defeat) are high, so I am compelled to focus on their flaws. Zeihan and Mearsheimer ignore ideology: perhaps surprisingly, ideology is in fact a key driver of state relations, so much so that ideology, surprisingly, often drives states into sub-optimal strategies, usually due to factional capture. The irrational state power may be rational to the governing faction! This may be part of why authors like Zeihan and Mearsheimer discount ideology: it's sometimes irrational, yet often drives international relations.
Zeihan's other flaws are varieties of determinism, principally demographic determinism. Demography does not in fact drive state actions, but the perception of demography does. Literal nazis believed Germany needed living space "Lebensraum" because of demographic pressure, when in fact Germany was facing demographic decline. I can name no instances where states foreign policies have collapsed or even been severely distorted by demographic constraints, but can name cases where the perceptions of such supposed constraints did lead state's governing factions into foolish policies!
Similarly, apparently Zeihan is now predicting famines. Sorry, that's just not going to happen.
Zeihan believes the collapse of globalization will result in reduced trade, even in foodstuffs, leading to famines. When in fact globalization will continue apace and even intensify due to technology and self-interest. Trade is more productive and, contra Mearsheimer, does in fact make war less likely. Fear (of war) desire (for riches) and technological facts (cheap transport, near cost-free communication) are why globalization will continue. China and the USA are too deeply entwined to "decouple" "in-source" or focus only on "internal circulation".
Basically the ideologues and jurists (hi) who recognized the flaws of the former Westphalian system have set up a system which, despite occasional terrorism or coups d'etat is sustainable and peace-prone, unlike its predecessors. I detail all that in "Ideas in Conflict" which is also available as articles for free on my SSRN page.
Despite his flaws (ignoring ideology, erroneous demographic determinism) Zeihan on first glance appears right about most of the rest of his thinking. A deeper analysis (below in the comments) reveals some srious flaws. He definitely has ECONOMIC insights into markets, particularly energy markets. But as to geostrategy or state rivalry he's often mistaken, due to economism, determinism, and ignoring ideology. He's worth reading, but critically!
Zeihan's other flaws are varieties of determinism, principally demographic determinism. Demography does not in fact drive state actions, but the perception of demography does. Literal nazis believed Germany needed living space "Lebensraum" because of demographic pressure, when in fact Germany was facing demographic decline. I can name no instances where states foreign policies have collapsed or even been severely distorted by demographic constraints, but can name cases where the perceptions of such supposed constraints did lead state's governing factions into foolish policies!
Similarly, apparently Zeihan is now predicting famines. Sorry, that's just not going to happen.
Zeihan believes the collapse of globalization will result in reduced trade, even in foodstuffs, leading to famines. When in fact globalization will continue apace and even intensify due to technology and self-interest. Trade is more productive and, contra Mearsheimer, does in fact make war less likely. Fear (of war) desire (for riches) and technological facts (cheap transport, near cost-free communication) are why globalization will continue. China and the USA are too deeply entwined to "decouple" "in-source" or focus only on "internal circulation".
Basically the ideologues and jurists (hi) who recognized the flaws of the former Westphalian system have set up a system which, despite occasional terrorism or coups d'etat is sustainable and peace-prone, unlike its predecessors. I detail all that in "Ideas in Conflict" which is also available as articles for free on my SSRN page.
Despite his flaws (ignoring ideology, erroneous demographic determinism) Zeihan on first glance appears right about most of the rest of his thinking. A deeper analysis (below in the comments) reveals some srious flaws. He definitely has ECONOMIC insights into markets, particularly energy markets. But as to geostrategy or state rivalry he's often mistaken, due to economism, determinism, and ignoring ideology. He's worth reading, but critically!
August 28, 2022
The End of the World Is Just the Beginning is geopolitical strategist Peter Zeihan’s FUH-KING-HELL-AIR-EYE-US apocalyptical decry. Zeihan utilizes his expertise in the areas of demography, geography and history, and very detailed systemic analyses of global supply chain involving global transport, finance, energy, materials, manufacturing, and agriculture to argue (quite convincingly) that the world we’re currently living in, the world of affordable goods and services, brought to you via globalism, is about to end, and as such, we are about to experience something akin to mad max.
Except in America (north, central and south included), because were have sick as fuck geography, with natural defenses and mega (not MAGA) resources, and a young enough population to survive the twilight of the boomer generation.
If this sounds bullish on the future of American prosperity, Zeihan is exponentially more bearish on the future of China, who according to Zeihan, are about to completely shit the bed due to decades of one child social engineering that have left them without enough young people, and WAY WAY WAY too many old people. Zeihan predicts that China’s situation is so dang bad, that we’re probably looking at mass starvation and TOTAL social collapse within the next decade or sooner.
Zeihan also predicts that the US will no longer provide global military support for the world order that has fostered safe transit and global economic exchange for the past 3/4 century, and will instead, withdrawal in to NAFTA land, with central and South America providing the industrial base and North America providing high skilled technical “value add”.
Zeihan further predicts that if the US is no longer keeping the world safe for globalism, the rest of the planet with devolve into George Milleresque piracy and cannibalism 😵.
Regarding the environment, Zeihan (a self declared green) is completely skeptical about green energy.
He makes a RIDICULOUSLY compelling argument that we are deluded if we think green tech will even come close to meeting our energy needs any time soon (if ever).
Taken in aggregate, Zeihan’s predictions amount to some extremely tough times (end of days style) beginning now, and worsening rapidly (unless you live in the US, then you’re OK).
If none of this sounds even remotely funny.
Somehow Zeihan makes it FUH-KING-HELL-AIR-EYE-US.
I laughed out loud while reading this thing again and again.
Zeihan reports having presented to LITERALLY EVERYONE in government, on over 600 (and counting) occasions, and seems to have developed a HIGHLY engaging delivery style, ostensibly due in part to the LITERALLY AWFUL content of his messaging.
In fact, I think this book is the most entertaining non-fiction account of the apocalypse, past present or future, that I am aware of.
This book is an oddly perfect companion to the extremely optimistic The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity (DOE) by David Graeber. (Read my review of it here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...)
In DOE, Graeber asserts that we denizens of new ‘millennia late capitalism’ assume that neoliberal means of production and consumption are the natural order, and that no other way of being (e.g. humanistic socialism etc.) is sustainable due to the equally banal assumption that these ideologies “fail to account for human nature”.
Remember that ol’ chestnut?
Anyway…
Graeber asserts we humans have the ability to create and live productively in a wide diversity of social systems, and are able to create and inhabit ways of living that are humane and in accord with environmental imperatives of sustainability.
Smash these two books together, and something like a GEN-X zeitgeist emerges from the pulpy ectoplasm.
None (or all) of it may pan out (I guess we will have to wait and see).
But if nothing else.
Both of these books are funny, smart and FASCINATING.
Taken together, they read little like the book of revelations, only for big data, big think smart people.
So why 4/5 stars?
Zeihan seems to get a little over his snow skis on a few of his predictions.
If he’s right, then we are SO FUCKED.
And he might be right.
But something (can’t 100% identify what) seems a little off.
Taking Zeihan’s argument at face value, I’m not sure the US would (or even could) withdrawal from globalization quite as abruptly as Zeihan predicts, because everyone (including US) would go down with the ship.
Or at least it seems that way to me.
It seems like something between reciprocal altruism and mutually assured destruction would kick in at some point, and we will at least figure out how to work together, kinda sorta, while this ship of fools sinks (at least a little) slower than what Zeihan predicts.
I understand that I am COMPLETELY unqualified to weigh in on such matters. That being said, I think I need a little more convincing. Perhaps I am just in denial.
I suppose the immediate short-term will tell. As many of Zeihan’s predictions are set to occur starting now.
I’d say the most immediately useful, timely and worthwhile part of this book (at least for me anyway) is Zeihan’s analysis of the Russian invasion of the Ukraine.
If you’re like me, you find the popular explanation for the Ukrainian war (e.g. Vladimir Putin is a sociopathic megalomaniac) to be EXTREMELY unsatisfying.
Zeihan provides a WAY more plausible and WAY more realistic geopolitical and population demographic analysis of the situation. And (quite simply) it actually makes sense.
And (spoiler alert) according to Zeihan’s logic. The Ukraine is just the first of the former Soviet block countries that Russia will need to invade in order to secure their vulnerable European boarder. Think Belarus, Georgia and Lithuania and look at the map. And it will start to make sense strategically.
So…
Don’t let the 4/5 stars scare you away.
This book is FUH-KING great.
Except in America (north, central and south included), because were have sick as fuck geography, with natural defenses and mega (not MAGA) resources, and a young enough population to survive the twilight of the boomer generation.
If this sounds bullish on the future of American prosperity, Zeihan is exponentially more bearish on the future of China, who according to Zeihan, are about to completely shit the bed due to decades of one child social engineering that have left them without enough young people, and WAY WAY WAY too many old people. Zeihan predicts that China’s situation is so dang bad, that we’re probably looking at mass starvation and TOTAL social collapse within the next decade or sooner.
Zeihan also predicts that the US will no longer provide global military support for the world order that has fostered safe transit and global economic exchange for the past 3/4 century, and will instead, withdrawal in to NAFTA land, with central and South America providing the industrial base and North America providing high skilled technical “value add”.
Zeihan further predicts that if the US is no longer keeping the world safe for globalism, the rest of the planet with devolve into George Milleresque piracy and cannibalism 😵.
Regarding the environment, Zeihan (a self declared green) is completely skeptical about green energy.
He makes a RIDICULOUSLY compelling argument that we are deluded if we think green tech will even come close to meeting our energy needs any time soon (if ever).
Taken in aggregate, Zeihan’s predictions amount to some extremely tough times (end of days style) beginning now, and worsening rapidly (unless you live in the US, then you’re OK).
If none of this sounds even remotely funny.
Somehow Zeihan makes it FUH-KING-HELL-AIR-EYE-US.
I laughed out loud while reading this thing again and again.
Zeihan reports having presented to LITERALLY EVERYONE in government, on over 600 (and counting) occasions, and seems to have developed a HIGHLY engaging delivery style, ostensibly due in part to the LITERALLY AWFUL content of his messaging.
In fact, I think this book is the most entertaining non-fiction account of the apocalypse, past present or future, that I am aware of.
This book is an oddly perfect companion to the extremely optimistic The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity (DOE) by David Graeber. (Read my review of it here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...)
In DOE, Graeber asserts that we denizens of new ‘millennia late capitalism’ assume that neoliberal means of production and consumption are the natural order, and that no other way of being (e.g. humanistic socialism etc.) is sustainable due to the equally banal assumption that these ideologies “fail to account for human nature”.
Remember that ol’ chestnut?
Anyway…
Graeber asserts we humans have the ability to create and live productively in a wide diversity of social systems, and are able to create and inhabit ways of living that are humane and in accord with environmental imperatives of sustainability.
Smash these two books together, and something like a GEN-X zeitgeist emerges from the pulpy ectoplasm.
None (or all) of it may pan out (I guess we will have to wait and see).
But if nothing else.
Both of these books are funny, smart and FASCINATING.
Taken together, they read little like the book of revelations, only for big data, big think smart people.
So why 4/5 stars?
Zeihan seems to get a little over his snow skis on a few of his predictions.
If he’s right, then we are SO FUCKED.
And he might be right.
But something (can’t 100% identify what) seems a little off.
Taking Zeihan’s argument at face value, I’m not sure the US would (or even could) withdrawal from globalization quite as abruptly as Zeihan predicts, because everyone (including US) would go down with the ship.
Or at least it seems that way to me.
It seems like something between reciprocal altruism and mutually assured destruction would kick in at some point, and we will at least figure out how to work together, kinda sorta, while this ship of fools sinks (at least a little) slower than what Zeihan predicts.
I understand that I am COMPLETELY unqualified to weigh in on such matters. That being said, I think I need a little more convincing. Perhaps I am just in denial.
I suppose the immediate short-term will tell. As many of Zeihan’s predictions are set to occur starting now.
I’d say the most immediately useful, timely and worthwhile part of this book (at least for me anyway) is Zeihan’s analysis of the Russian invasion of the Ukraine.
If you’re like me, you find the popular explanation for the Ukrainian war (e.g. Vladimir Putin is a sociopathic megalomaniac) to be EXTREMELY unsatisfying.
Zeihan provides a WAY more plausible and WAY more realistic geopolitical and population demographic analysis of the situation. And (quite simply) it actually makes sense.
And (spoiler alert) according to Zeihan’s logic. The Ukraine is just the first of the former Soviet block countries that Russia will need to invade in order to secure their vulnerable European boarder. Think Belarus, Georgia and Lithuania and look at the map. And it will start to make sense strategically.
So…
Don’t let the 4/5 stars scare you away.
This book is FUH-KING great.
September 19, 2022
The End of the World reads like a political manifesto. Most of the book will resonate well if the reader is an American nationalist, particularly a MAGA-believing Trump supporter. Otherwise, a lot in the book would be so deeply offensive that most readers are unlikely to retain their objectivity enough to pick the good points in between.
It must be recorded that the author declares himself a democrat as well as an internationalist in the passing. He is definitely not a climate-damage denier. Some sections support the climate claims, although they too are used more to prove that those the author likes will gain and the others will perish, rather than for any other genuine purposes.
In summary, the author strongly believes that almost all non-Americans are people without resources, industry, innovativeness, and any good institutional structures. These folks - variously called lazy, without creativity, fractious, herd-like, but thankfully not identified as having wrong religions or skin colors - have benefited from America-sponsored, America-created globalization of the last few decades. American sacrifices - something he explicitly mentions - made it possible for the rest of the world to have decent economic existence. The rest of the world has grown as the US, as per the author, sacrificed some of its. The book's first conclusion is that this is coming to an end (although it often reads like he desires rather than predicts it).
To be clear, the author has a concise list of nations that he favors. Many are preferred because their populations are not falling, while others are because of positive relationships with the United States. His preference order starts with the favorites as France and Argentina, followed by Sweden, Japan, UK, Colombia, Canada, Mexico, Singapore, Germany, New Zealand, South Korea, India, and SE Asia/Australia as a region (I might have missed a couple). However, almost none of these are seen as able to survive independently but could be worthy protectorate candidates for America. The rest are so doomed that at a certain point, the author even predicts a billion or more (of course, from the places he dislikes, with the most intense dislike reserved for China) to perish.
The author can and does offend anyone who does not belong to his echo chamber (effectively people who believe in perpetual population growth, fossil fuels, Southern American values/beliefs/lifestyles, apart from the belief that no one except the US can truly innovate and grow). His tone on American Exceptionalism is designed to denigrate everyone else. The basic idea is to close the US economy because the US can not only survive easily without others but also do far better relying on its own resources and workers (particularly from the South, including Texas) with occasional help from Mexico and a handful of others. Such closing of the US will almost send the rest to doom because of their inherent inadequacies.
In terms of the content, the book is littered with errors, not just while demeaning every other economy's ability or promoting American supremacy/isolationism but also while making points on topics like demographics or the impracticality of green energy. There are multiple good observations on how little green energy has contributed, agricultural challenges, and changing demographics. Still, most points fail to make a good impression because of the quickly drawn and often-disconnected, extreme, biased conclusions.
With this book, Mr. Zeihan may have significantly boosted the chances of being invited for a senior government position when a nationalistic leader becomes the US president in the future. This work should not be ignored for its potential impact on policymaking despite all the flaws.
It must be recorded that the author declares himself a democrat as well as an internationalist in the passing. He is definitely not a climate-damage denier. Some sections support the climate claims, although they too are used more to prove that those the author likes will gain and the others will perish, rather than for any other genuine purposes.
In summary, the author strongly believes that almost all non-Americans are people without resources, industry, innovativeness, and any good institutional structures. These folks - variously called lazy, without creativity, fractious, herd-like, but thankfully not identified as having wrong religions or skin colors - have benefited from America-sponsored, America-created globalization of the last few decades. American sacrifices - something he explicitly mentions - made it possible for the rest of the world to have decent economic existence. The rest of the world has grown as the US, as per the author, sacrificed some of its. The book's first conclusion is that this is coming to an end (although it often reads like he desires rather than predicts it).
To be clear, the author has a concise list of nations that he favors. Many are preferred because their populations are not falling, while others are because of positive relationships with the United States. His preference order starts with the favorites as France and Argentina, followed by Sweden, Japan, UK, Colombia, Canada, Mexico, Singapore, Germany, New Zealand, South Korea, India, and SE Asia/Australia as a region (I might have missed a couple). However, almost none of these are seen as able to survive independently but could be worthy protectorate candidates for America. The rest are so doomed that at a certain point, the author even predicts a billion or more (of course, from the places he dislikes, with the most intense dislike reserved for China) to perish.
The author can and does offend anyone who does not belong to his echo chamber (effectively people who believe in perpetual population growth, fossil fuels, Southern American values/beliefs/lifestyles, apart from the belief that no one except the US can truly innovate and grow). His tone on American Exceptionalism is designed to denigrate everyone else. The basic idea is to close the US economy because the US can not only survive easily without others but also do far better relying on its own resources and workers (particularly from the South, including Texas) with occasional help from Mexico and a handful of others. Such closing of the US will almost send the rest to doom because of their inherent inadequacies.
In terms of the content, the book is littered with errors, not just while demeaning every other economy's ability or promoting American supremacy/isolationism but also while making points on topics like demographics or the impracticality of green energy. There are multiple good observations on how little green energy has contributed, agricultural challenges, and changing demographics. Still, most points fail to make a good impression because of the quickly drawn and often-disconnected, extreme, biased conclusions.
With this book, Mr. Zeihan may have significantly boosted the chances of being invited for a senior government position when a nationalistic leader becomes the US president in the future. This work should not be ignored for its potential impact on policymaking despite all the flaws.
July 24, 2022
An interesting book that I found difficult to take seriously. I applaud the author for making a number of verifiable predictions, however, I found the writing style unserious and flippant. The author's arguments revolve around the primacy of both demographics and geography, as such political systems and ideology do not play significant roles in the author's thesis. The author presents his arguments with detail and repetitiveness, however, what disappoints me is that the author is so evidently confident in his predictions that no counterargument and antithesis is considered.
Of interest are those surprising countries that will do well in this changing world order such as Argentina, Columbia, and Mexico. Overall a fascinating but limited Book.
Of interest are those surprising countries that will do well in this changing world order such as Argentina, Columbia, and Mexico. Overall a fascinating but limited Book.
January 17, 2023
This is book #4 by Geopolitical consultant Peter Zeihan (pronounced "Zion"), and his Magnum Opus. And boy is there a lot to unpack here. What makes Zeihan indispensable is his knowledge and approach that integrates the effects on nations of their geography, resources, demographics, and economics to explain their history, understand the current situation, and forecast what may happen next. As an example of why people like me follow him, in his 2016 book "The Absent Superpower" Zeihan devoted a chapter to how Russia would invade Ukraine and he explained why and for what aims. (The explanation is SO Zeihan, based on geography and demographics. Mainstream publishers thought that was so ridiculous, he had to self-publish that book.)
The sparest summary I can give is this: The global political and trade order that has existed since the end of World War II is going to end -- it only existed because of the Americans, and Americans have lost interest in enforcing it. The result will be a huge decline in the ability of all nations to conduct international trade (ie, globalism), which will have all sorts of deleterious effects on most of the world -- from lack of energy resources, to hunger, to big economic declines. The best cases will be nations that can source most important things themselves, or enforce tight trade alliances that can withstand foreign interference. On top of this, most nations are facing demographic decline (ageing and shrinking populations, the retiring of the baby boomers) which will only make things worse, with the adjunct of greatly reducing availability of capital and finance. Meanwhile climate change, though in some spots actually beneficial, will add to the confusion and challenges.
Note: Zeihan has come to get a lot of attention on social media, and seems to me that people tend to fall into two camps. 1) They uncritically believe everything he says and every prediction he makes, or 2) they are driven to witless hatred and think he's full of lies and nonsense. I would like to suggest that one can read and appreciate Zeihan's work, while recognizing that predicting the future is hard and he's obviously not going to get everything right. He's not Nostradamus. Furthermore, an analysis is not true or false; it's merely good or bad. If you think Zeihan has done a poor job of analyzing something, or misunderstood something, that does not make him a liar. It would be interesting to track a Zeihan scorecard over time to see what comes true and what doesn't and what falls somewhere in-between.
....…
Underlying this and all of his books is his framework: the world as we know it is the result of what he calls The Order -- that is, the world order that emerged from the 1944 Bretton Woods conference and the end of World War II the next year. The US guaranteed freedom of trade on the seas and guaranteed security in Europe in exchange for disallowing military adventurism. The US would open its markets to its fellow nations -- unilaterally, they need not open to the US -- to help their economies recover from the war. In an historic plot twist, the partners included the former enemies Germany, Japan, and Italy, as well as the allies.
With an iron-clad rule that anyone could acquire anything from anywhere -- all they had to do was pay for it -- and that they could sell what they wanted into the US market, The Order ended a myriad of potential military rivalries and also ended the Age of Imperialism. With the benefits provided by the US guarantees and the ability to trade freely, there was no longer a need to maintain a militaristic empire and huge navy to access markets and resources and labor abroad. You could access those markets all you want, no need to bring the gunboats and set up a colonial government.
NOT included in the deal was the USSR and its reluctant satellites. US-friendly nations had to side with the US against the Soviet bloc. And that was the point: the US guaranteed benefits to all in order to maintain a free world to face off the Soviet threat (Zeihan often refers to this as a bribe).
But the point of all this was NOT to maximize the benefits to the US -- on the contrary, it all came at great expense to the US, which bore great costs and suffered a loss of economic growth and dynamism to maintain the order. Zeihan: "Recent decades have not been the American CENTURY, they've been the American SACRIFICE."
Per Zeihan, The Order has begun to unravel, starting with 1) the death of the USSR and reinforced by 2) the advent of petroleum fracking. The Order was created to defend the world from a threat that no longer existed. That the Order has still more or less been enforced up to now is really just a matter of inertia and the need to maintain world trade in oil. But Zeihan is convinced the US is well on the way to abandoning the order and no longer suffering the cost and hassle of maintaining it. Among the evidence, he points out that the last real Internationalist President was the first George Bush (Bush-41) -- and he got run out of office.
And so that brings us to the point of this: what will the world look like when The Order no longer is in force?
With that question in mind, there are some huge points to understand. It cannot be emphasized enough: the world as we know it today is an anomaly and the product of The Order. The peace and prosperity that so many nations have been enjoying for 70 years is an anomaly. That is not the normal course of events. The peace that has obtained in Europe since 1945 did not result from Europeans becoming enlightened and peaceful. The peace was imposed ON them, externally, by the US. The enormous growth in globalization -- anomaly. The hyper growth of East Asia and China -- could only have happened thanks to The Order. Germany can export factory machinery to China without that cargo ship being pirated by the British Navy -- anomaly!
The world as we know it today -- everything from the EU to the rise of China, the abundance of capital, the fact that even a cheap product like blue jeans can be shuttled back and forth as an intermediate good among a half dozen countries each doing the next step in manufacturing -- is only the way it is because of The Order. So what happens when the order inevitably collapses, as Zeihan insists it is about to do? What happens when the US -- the only country even remotely powerful enough to pull this off -- becomes uninterested in global stability and no longer will make the effort? That's what he explores in abundant detail in this book.
As he takes on one topic after another and describes how the collapse of The Order will cause a world of problems, there's a recurring theme to most topics: the Big Loser will be China, and the Big Winner (or at least, fittest survivor) will be the USA.
For China, it cannot be overemphasized just how negative Zeihan is about its future. Conventional wisdom and pseudo-intellectuals like Ray Dalio blather about China being the next great Superpower (and a great place to invest). Zeihan is having none of it. Not only is China NOT the next superpower, it's almost certain that the Chinese nation as exists today will break apart, and its economic demand and supply will collapse, and China will cease to be a power in the world. Even without the end of globalism, the most aggressive demographic projections suggest China's population could fall by HALF by only 2050, Zeihan says.
(That seems a bit extreme to me, but without doubt now as of mid-2022 China's population has already peaked and is already shrinking -- based on China's own latest official stats. And that is NOT a trend that reverses. Ever. But if you Google it, you'd find most links on China population overstate it quite a bit. UN chronically overestimates and cannot pull back projections fast enough to keep up. The Worldometer site is right now overstating China population by at least 40 million and unaccountably continues to forecast growth -- it simply ignores China's own official numbers and instead relies on continued "elaboration" of obsolete UN projections from years ago, without correction.)
** Update on Jan 16, 2023: per CNBC, China's official stats agency just announced population DECLINED by nearly 1 million people in 2022 **
The book is absolutely rife with such phrases as "after the fall of China" and "in a world without China".
Now, Zeihan is not a Jingoistic USA #1 cheerleader. He doesn't even LIKE the future he sees. His predictions of relatively good outcomes for the US are based on his analysis of the indisputable advantages the US has thanks to those subjects he weaves into his analyses -- geography, resources, and demographics especially. An example of how geography matters that I like: The Texas Gulf coast alone has more potential natural seaport capacity than the entirety of Asia. Energy? The USA is the #1 producer of oil AND natural gas AND it's the best-situated advanced nation to make use of wind and solar energy -- whose potential by the way is quite limited for most other countries no matter how much they talk about it and invest in it. [Don't believe him? At this moment in October 2022 -- after their many years of bragging and preaching about wind and solar -- the news is full of Europeans panicking as they desperately hope to get though winter by stockpiling burnable wood pellets, firewood, horse manure, and trash.]
Hunger? US is the #1 producer and exporter of food. Resources? If the ultra pure silicon used to make chips becomes an item of contention, 95% of it comes from a mine in North Carolina. Or Demographic decline? US Millennials are a baby boom generation, and there's an outside chance that they'll PRODUCE a baby boom generation for the future.
Zeihan's depressing view is that all THIS is the kind of thing that will really matter in the near future and most places will be a lot worse off than the US. Things will be tough all over but the US and its NAFTA allies will be in pretty good shape (along with the USA's own advantages, the Canada/USA/Mexico bloc makes for about the most perfectly complementary international resource, labor, and consumer markets imaginable).
To finish the quote above: "Recent decades have not been the American Century, they've been the American Sacrifice. The FUTURE will be the American Century". But there are also other countries in promising situations and these he outlines too.
Note: Zeihan states that the final edit of the book occurred in February just before Russia invaded Ukraine. He was able to insert a few final-final comments one week into the war. I would say that current war-induced issues of food security and fertilizer supply certainly fit into Zeihan's predictions. As of this writing, Germany has just declared a natural gas crisis because Russia has cut gas supplies to it. Germany also has seized three LNG ships from Russia. (Or take this recent quote from the UK Daily Telegraph: "Olaf Scholz’s government faces the unenviable task of dialling back Germany’s dependence on both countries [Russia & China] and finding an alternative to globalisation.")
Meanwhile the money/food/fuel-starved Sri Lanka is suffering from the disastrous mistake of banning chemical fertilizers because of some hippie delusion, even before the supply of those became a current wartime casualty, and so has seen food production plummet by 50% or more. These are all the kind of food and resource scarcity, trade disruption, and competition issues Zeihan spends this book warning about. He probably thought we had more time.
The audio book was capably read by Zeihan himself, and almost perfectly filled up a 1400-mile road trip to South Texas to see SpaceX and Starbase.
The sparest summary I can give is this: The global political and trade order that has existed since the end of World War II is going to end -- it only existed because of the Americans, and Americans have lost interest in enforcing it. The result will be a huge decline in the ability of all nations to conduct international trade (ie, globalism), which will have all sorts of deleterious effects on most of the world -- from lack of energy resources, to hunger, to big economic declines. The best cases will be nations that can source most important things themselves, or enforce tight trade alliances that can withstand foreign interference. On top of this, most nations are facing demographic decline (ageing and shrinking populations, the retiring of the baby boomers) which will only make things worse, with the adjunct of greatly reducing availability of capital and finance. Meanwhile climate change, though in some spots actually beneficial, will add to the confusion and challenges.
Note: Zeihan has come to get a lot of attention on social media, and seems to me that people tend to fall into two camps. 1) They uncritically believe everything he says and every prediction he makes, or 2) they are driven to witless hatred and think he's full of lies and nonsense. I would like to suggest that one can read and appreciate Zeihan's work, while recognizing that predicting the future is hard and he's obviously not going to get everything right. He's not Nostradamus. Furthermore, an analysis is not true or false; it's merely good or bad. If you think Zeihan has done a poor job of analyzing something, or misunderstood something, that does not make him a liar. It would be interesting to track a Zeihan scorecard over time to see what comes true and what doesn't and what falls somewhere in-between.
....…
Underlying this and all of his books is his framework: the world as we know it is the result of what he calls The Order -- that is, the world order that emerged from the 1944 Bretton Woods conference and the end of World War II the next year. The US guaranteed freedom of trade on the seas and guaranteed security in Europe in exchange for disallowing military adventurism. The US would open its markets to its fellow nations -- unilaterally, they need not open to the US -- to help their economies recover from the war. In an historic plot twist, the partners included the former enemies Germany, Japan, and Italy, as well as the allies.
With an iron-clad rule that anyone could acquire anything from anywhere -- all they had to do was pay for it -- and that they could sell what they wanted into the US market, The Order ended a myriad of potential military rivalries and also ended the Age of Imperialism. With the benefits provided by the US guarantees and the ability to trade freely, there was no longer a need to maintain a militaristic empire and huge navy to access markets and resources and labor abroad. You could access those markets all you want, no need to bring the gunboats and set up a colonial government.
NOT included in the deal was the USSR and its reluctant satellites. US-friendly nations had to side with the US against the Soviet bloc. And that was the point: the US guaranteed benefits to all in order to maintain a free world to face off the Soviet threat (Zeihan often refers to this as a bribe).
But the point of all this was NOT to maximize the benefits to the US -- on the contrary, it all came at great expense to the US, which bore great costs and suffered a loss of economic growth and dynamism to maintain the order. Zeihan: "Recent decades have not been the American CENTURY, they've been the American SACRIFICE."
Per Zeihan, The Order has begun to unravel, starting with 1) the death of the USSR and reinforced by 2) the advent of petroleum fracking. The Order was created to defend the world from a threat that no longer existed. That the Order has still more or less been enforced up to now is really just a matter of inertia and the need to maintain world trade in oil. But Zeihan is convinced the US is well on the way to abandoning the order and no longer suffering the cost and hassle of maintaining it. Among the evidence, he points out that the last real Internationalist President was the first George Bush (Bush-41) -- and he got run out of office.
And so that brings us to the point of this: what will the world look like when The Order no longer is in force?
With that question in mind, there are some huge points to understand. It cannot be emphasized enough: the world as we know it today is an anomaly and the product of The Order. The peace and prosperity that so many nations have been enjoying for 70 years is an anomaly. That is not the normal course of events. The peace that has obtained in Europe since 1945 did not result from Europeans becoming enlightened and peaceful. The peace was imposed ON them, externally, by the US. The enormous growth in globalization -- anomaly. The hyper growth of East Asia and China -- could only have happened thanks to The Order. Germany can export factory machinery to China without that cargo ship being pirated by the British Navy -- anomaly!
The world as we know it today -- everything from the EU to the rise of China, the abundance of capital, the fact that even a cheap product like blue jeans can be shuttled back and forth as an intermediate good among a half dozen countries each doing the next step in manufacturing -- is only the way it is because of The Order. So what happens when the order inevitably collapses, as Zeihan insists it is about to do? What happens when the US -- the only country even remotely powerful enough to pull this off -- becomes uninterested in global stability and no longer will make the effort? That's what he explores in abundant detail in this book.
As he takes on one topic after another and describes how the collapse of The Order will cause a world of problems, there's a recurring theme to most topics: the Big Loser will be China, and the Big Winner (or at least, fittest survivor) will be the USA.
For China, it cannot be overemphasized just how negative Zeihan is about its future. Conventional wisdom and pseudo-intellectuals like Ray Dalio blather about China being the next great Superpower (and a great place to invest). Zeihan is having none of it. Not only is China NOT the next superpower, it's almost certain that the Chinese nation as exists today will break apart, and its economic demand and supply will collapse, and China will cease to be a power in the world. Even without the end of globalism, the most aggressive demographic projections suggest China's population could fall by HALF by only 2050, Zeihan says.
(That seems a bit extreme to me, but without doubt now as of mid-2022 China's population has already peaked and is already shrinking -- based on China's own latest official stats. And that is NOT a trend that reverses. Ever. But if you Google it, you'd find most links on China population overstate it quite a bit. UN chronically overestimates and cannot pull back projections fast enough to keep up. The Worldometer site is right now overstating China population by at least 40 million and unaccountably continues to forecast growth -- it simply ignores China's own official numbers and instead relies on continued "elaboration" of obsolete UN projections from years ago, without correction.)
** Update on Jan 16, 2023: per CNBC, China's official stats agency just announced population DECLINED by nearly 1 million people in 2022 **
The book is absolutely rife with such phrases as "after the fall of China" and "in a world without China".
Now, Zeihan is not a Jingoistic USA #1 cheerleader. He doesn't even LIKE the future he sees. His predictions of relatively good outcomes for the US are based on his analysis of the indisputable advantages the US has thanks to those subjects he weaves into his analyses -- geography, resources, and demographics especially. An example of how geography matters that I like: The Texas Gulf coast alone has more potential natural seaport capacity than the entirety of Asia. Energy? The USA is the #1 producer of oil AND natural gas AND it's the best-situated advanced nation to make use of wind and solar energy -- whose potential by the way is quite limited for most other countries no matter how much they talk about it and invest in it. [Don't believe him? At this moment in October 2022 -- after their many years of bragging and preaching about wind and solar -- the news is full of Europeans panicking as they desperately hope to get though winter by stockpiling burnable wood pellets, firewood, horse manure, and trash.]
Hunger? US is the #1 producer and exporter of food. Resources? If the ultra pure silicon used to make chips becomes an item of contention, 95% of it comes from a mine in North Carolina. Or Demographic decline? US Millennials are a baby boom generation, and there's an outside chance that they'll PRODUCE a baby boom generation for the future.
Zeihan's depressing view is that all THIS is the kind of thing that will really matter in the near future and most places will be a lot worse off than the US. Things will be tough all over but the US and its NAFTA allies will be in pretty good shape (along with the USA's own advantages, the Canada/USA/Mexico bloc makes for about the most perfectly complementary international resource, labor, and consumer markets imaginable).
To finish the quote above: "Recent decades have not been the American Century, they've been the American Sacrifice. The FUTURE will be the American Century". But there are also other countries in promising situations and these he outlines too.
Note: Zeihan states that the final edit of the book occurred in February just before Russia invaded Ukraine. He was able to insert a few final-final comments one week into the war. I would say that current war-induced issues of food security and fertilizer supply certainly fit into Zeihan's predictions. As of this writing, Germany has just declared a natural gas crisis because Russia has cut gas supplies to it. Germany also has seized three LNG ships from Russia. (Or take this recent quote from the UK Daily Telegraph: "Olaf Scholz’s government faces the unenviable task of dialling back Germany’s dependence on both countries [Russia & China] and finding an alternative to globalisation.")
Meanwhile the money/food/fuel-starved Sri Lanka is suffering from the disastrous mistake of banning chemical fertilizers because of some hippie delusion, even before the supply of those became a current wartime casualty, and so has seen food production plummet by 50% or more. These are all the kind of food and resource scarcity, trade disruption, and competition issues Zeihan spends this book warning about. He probably thought we had more time.
The audio book was capably read by Zeihan himself, and almost perfectly filled up a 1400-mile road trip to South Texas to see SpaceX and Starbase.
January 31, 2025
This book is easily accessible for individuals without a background in geopolitics. Zeihan's prose is essentially a transcription of the way he speaks--humour is scattered throughout; graphs and maps are ubiquitous; and the use of italics for emphasis is ever-present. However, the book is consequently almost 500 pages in length. In my opinion, at least a third of the content could have been edited out without losing the substance.
Zeihan argues that 2019 was the last great year for globalisation. The world is presently beginning to deglobalise, and this will have catastrophic consequences for many regions in the world. Zeihan stipulates that this is because America is beginning to withdraw from its pre-eminent position in the world and as a concomitant guarantor of global trading routes. Without America, there will be greater anarchy in global supply chains. This will necessitate the return to neo-colonialism so that great and middle powers may ensure ongoing access to materials that underpin energy, agricultural, manufacturing, and financial sectors.
This argument is unconvincing. As evinced by NATO support for Ukraine against Russia and the likely provision of military support to Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion, America is willing to use its military--especially its navy--to maintain the current global order that it created post-World War 2. America and other Western nations are reducing their supply-chain reliance on China and Russia, yet this does not portend an end to globalisation. Supply-chains are simply moving to other regions of the world that are more economically reliable and not potential adversaries in feasible military conflagrations.
If an America-China war over Taiwan were to break out, then Zeihan's deglobalisation argument may have some credence, especially if China won. A fundamentally new world order would be created with China as the Asian hegemon; America withdrawing and maintaining hegemony in North and South America; and European nations being forced to become militarily independent from America. This would underscore significant deglobalisation based on the collapse of secure trading routes. However, this hypothetical scenario does not underpin Zeihan's argument.
Zeihan further postulates that deglobalisation will be exacerbated as the populations of industrialised nations significantly decline through low birth rates. Having fewer people of working age supporting a large elderly population will lead to tremendous pressure on already over-financialised economies throughout the world. This is due to probable decreases in aggregate output from younger generations that will insufficiently assuage disproportionately high aggregate demand from retirees. This may lead to long-term regional economic stagnation or downturns. However, Zeihan is unclear in how demographic changes will contribute to deglobalisation. Economic slowdown, probably; a return to neo-colonial autarky, unlikely.
Large sections of the book are speculatory. Often geopolitical speculation is proven to be incorrect over time. The additional problem with Zeihan's speculatory postulations is that their underlying premises may not be accurate. Only time will tell. Disregarding this, however, Zeihan does provide a reasonable snapshot on how precarious the current international system is and the necessity for America to maintain its global primacy. Moreover, despite my disagreements, it was fun to read and does give the reader a lot to ponder regarding future global prosperity.
Zeihan argues that 2019 was the last great year for globalisation. The world is presently beginning to deglobalise, and this will have catastrophic consequences for many regions in the world. Zeihan stipulates that this is because America is beginning to withdraw from its pre-eminent position in the world and as a concomitant guarantor of global trading routes. Without America, there will be greater anarchy in global supply chains. This will necessitate the return to neo-colonialism so that great and middle powers may ensure ongoing access to materials that underpin energy, agricultural, manufacturing, and financial sectors.
This argument is unconvincing. As evinced by NATO support for Ukraine against Russia and the likely provision of military support to Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion, America is willing to use its military--especially its navy--to maintain the current global order that it created post-World War 2. America and other Western nations are reducing their supply-chain reliance on China and Russia, yet this does not portend an end to globalisation. Supply-chains are simply moving to other regions of the world that are more economically reliable and not potential adversaries in feasible military conflagrations.
If an America-China war over Taiwan were to break out, then Zeihan's deglobalisation argument may have some credence, especially if China won. A fundamentally new world order would be created with China as the Asian hegemon; America withdrawing and maintaining hegemony in North and South America; and European nations being forced to become militarily independent from America. This would underscore significant deglobalisation based on the collapse of secure trading routes. However, this hypothetical scenario does not underpin Zeihan's argument.
Zeihan further postulates that deglobalisation will be exacerbated as the populations of industrialised nations significantly decline through low birth rates. Having fewer people of working age supporting a large elderly population will lead to tremendous pressure on already over-financialised economies throughout the world. This is due to probable decreases in aggregate output from younger generations that will insufficiently assuage disproportionately high aggregate demand from retirees. This may lead to long-term regional economic stagnation or downturns. However, Zeihan is unclear in how demographic changes will contribute to deglobalisation. Economic slowdown, probably; a return to neo-colonial autarky, unlikely.
Large sections of the book are speculatory. Often geopolitical speculation is proven to be incorrect over time. The additional problem with Zeihan's speculatory postulations is that their underlying premises may not be accurate. Only time will tell. Disregarding this, however, Zeihan does provide a reasonable snapshot on how precarious the current international system is and the necessity for America to maintain its global primacy. Moreover, despite my disagreements, it was fun to read and does give the reader a lot to ponder regarding future global prosperity.
August 17, 2022
The Order is collapsing.
My first Zeihan read and it was phenomenal, thought-provoking, sobering and also terrifying. The crux of this book is that the American hegemonic global order of peaceful and protected commerce is coming to an end as the Americans lose interest in maintaining the Order. If you couple that with the abject demographic collapse of global drop in fertility rates, we’ll find ourselves witnessing the utter collapse of a globalized economy over the next 10 to 20 years. For Zeihan, it’s a certainty. For me it’s not a foregone conclusion. I’ll explain.
Geography is everything. Zeihan makes a compelling argument that America has the unique terrain that has given it advantages right from the beginning. Two coasts with numerous and easily navigable ports and an enormous amount of land mass for farming make America uniquely able to thrive on its own land. The US easily implemented industrialization without it being so disruptive as it was for the rest of the world. You then pair this advantage with the conditions before and after WWII, and it’s very clear why the US became the de facto world power. America entered WWII late in the game and had already supplied a ton of stuff to the allies and sucked up all their gold. By the end of WWII, the US was uniquely positioned to set up an economic order that made the dollar the receiving currency, backed by the majority of gold reserves. Incentivized to limit the Soviets, the US set up a global order where, rather than imperializing itself, it ensured peaceful global commerce at the cost of hegemonic and almost monolithic US power.
The ensuing Order ushered in more global growth, industrialization and mass urbanization than has ever occurred on the planet. The unprecedented peaceful commerce lifted billions from starvation and abject poverty (although the definition of poverty is highlyunderstated and still leaves swathes of people everywhere with terrible living conditions, a topic for another time.) This isn’t a value judgment about ideology. I don’t care if someone is a capitalist, a socialist, a communist, a corporate fascist—the fact is that a capitalized global order clearly took control which resulted in mass industrialization. To argue that a different ideology is superior in theory is really immaterial. Neoliberal capitalism IS the global order and it has resulted in relatively increased global prosperity over other attempted constructs that have fizzled like Soviet Communism. Those are the facts.
But flash forward to the 2020s and we now have two problems: unraveling of peaceful commerce and dropping fertility rates. Countries like China have accelerated industrialization at neck-breaking speeds. It’s the rate of change that is so remarkable. The thing is, most countries like China simply caught up with globalized economies and did it remarkably fast but they’ve done it using the same model that all other economically successful countries have used. China currently uses hyperfinance, flooding everything with capital and then suppressing their labor class to create tremendous surplus which it sinks into literally everything, including the US corporatocracy and bond market. The problem is you need young people everywhere to bolster your work force and to keep consumerism and loan markets humming along. But this is collapsing, literally everywhere. As consumerism collapses, all the rich Boomers are taking their money with them. I agree with Zeihan that it is for this very reason that the unprecedented growth since WWII is very likely over. It is something that we need to accept.
Global commerce is dependent on American strategic and tactical overwatch. Remove the American policing and long haul shipping collapses as well as every global trade market, which is like ALL of them. If you remove mass consumption due to demographic collapse, this entire system is over. The issue I take with Zeihan here, and where his entire argument rests, is that American withdrawal is inevitable. It’s not. All it would take is a policy change of a single American President, and half of Zeihan’s argument and predictions disintegrates. For Zeihan it is all a certainty, but it’s really not. I agree that globalized prosperity is on the decline and so is the United States and I do believe a new fractured world order is approaching but it may not be exactly as this book predicts. For Zeihan it is a fact that China will collapse over the next 10-20 years followed by massive global famine all while the US will be able to live off its own land while asserting only regional, not global, hegemonic control.
Two things bothered me about this book. First is Zeihan’s ridiculous claim that rather than the US asserting global dominance, the US has sacrificed itself to maintain this global order as some sort of altruism. This is the same distortion and misrepresentation you see when people try to valorize philanthropic billionaires. Billionaires, like the US, are playing the long game of appearing to sacrifice time and money as long as they stay at the head of the table. That’s not altruism, it’s just rebranded tyranny. The other thing that was a HUGE oversight is Zeihan literally never discusses the possible stabilizing forces of automation. I found this omission to be really weird. The guy is incredibly informed yet left out a crucial discussion that could upend the premise of the entire book? That’s deliberate. Also this book is very heavy on cultural and geographic determinism, which has its flaws.
Don’t get me wrong: I really liked this book and I think everyone should read it. Zeihan is smart, informed and is an amazing critical thinker. There is so much more in this book that I haven’t mentioned: climate change, the feasibility of green energy, specific supply chains, the future of agriculture and mining.
Overall, I highly, highly recommend that you read this book. Like, right now.
My first Zeihan read and it was phenomenal, thought-provoking, sobering and also terrifying. The crux of this book is that the American hegemonic global order of peaceful and protected commerce is coming to an end as the Americans lose interest in maintaining the Order. If you couple that with the abject demographic collapse of global drop in fertility rates, we’ll find ourselves witnessing the utter collapse of a globalized economy over the next 10 to 20 years. For Zeihan, it’s a certainty. For me it’s not a foregone conclusion. I’ll explain.
Geography is everything. Zeihan makes a compelling argument that America has the unique terrain that has given it advantages right from the beginning. Two coasts with numerous and easily navigable ports and an enormous amount of land mass for farming make America uniquely able to thrive on its own land. The US easily implemented industrialization without it being so disruptive as it was for the rest of the world. You then pair this advantage with the conditions before and after WWII, and it’s very clear why the US became the de facto world power. America entered WWII late in the game and had already supplied a ton of stuff to the allies and sucked up all their gold. By the end of WWII, the US was uniquely positioned to set up an economic order that made the dollar the receiving currency, backed by the majority of gold reserves. Incentivized to limit the Soviets, the US set up a global order where, rather than imperializing itself, it ensured peaceful global commerce at the cost of hegemonic and almost monolithic US power.
The ensuing Order ushered in more global growth, industrialization and mass urbanization than has ever occurred on the planet. The unprecedented peaceful commerce lifted billions from starvation and abject poverty (although the definition of poverty is highlyunderstated and still leaves swathes of people everywhere with terrible living conditions, a topic for another time.) This isn’t a value judgment about ideology. I don’t care if someone is a capitalist, a socialist, a communist, a corporate fascist—the fact is that a capitalized global order clearly took control which resulted in mass industrialization. To argue that a different ideology is superior in theory is really immaterial. Neoliberal capitalism IS the global order and it has resulted in relatively increased global prosperity over other attempted constructs that have fizzled like Soviet Communism. Those are the facts.
But flash forward to the 2020s and we now have two problems: unraveling of peaceful commerce and dropping fertility rates. Countries like China have accelerated industrialization at neck-breaking speeds. It’s the rate of change that is so remarkable. The thing is, most countries like China simply caught up with globalized economies and did it remarkably fast but they’ve done it using the same model that all other economically successful countries have used. China currently uses hyperfinance, flooding everything with capital and then suppressing their labor class to create tremendous surplus which it sinks into literally everything, including the US corporatocracy and bond market. The problem is you need young people everywhere to bolster your work force and to keep consumerism and loan markets humming along. But this is collapsing, literally everywhere. As consumerism collapses, all the rich Boomers are taking their money with them. I agree with Zeihan that it is for this very reason that the unprecedented growth since WWII is very likely over. It is something that we need to accept.
Global commerce is dependent on American strategic and tactical overwatch. Remove the American policing and long haul shipping collapses as well as every global trade market, which is like ALL of them. If you remove mass consumption due to demographic collapse, this entire system is over. The issue I take with Zeihan here, and where his entire argument rests, is that American withdrawal is inevitable. It’s not. All it would take is a policy change of a single American President, and half of Zeihan’s argument and predictions disintegrates. For Zeihan it is all a certainty, but it’s really not. I agree that globalized prosperity is on the decline and so is the United States and I do believe a new fractured world order is approaching but it may not be exactly as this book predicts. For Zeihan it is a fact that China will collapse over the next 10-20 years followed by massive global famine all while the US will be able to live off its own land while asserting only regional, not global, hegemonic control.
Two things bothered me about this book. First is Zeihan’s ridiculous claim that rather than the US asserting global dominance, the US has sacrificed itself to maintain this global order as some sort of altruism. This is the same distortion and misrepresentation you see when people try to valorize philanthropic billionaires. Billionaires, like the US, are playing the long game of appearing to sacrifice time and money as long as they stay at the head of the table. That’s not altruism, it’s just rebranded tyranny. The other thing that was a HUGE oversight is Zeihan literally never discusses the possible stabilizing forces of automation. I found this omission to be really weird. The guy is incredibly informed yet left out a crucial discussion that could upend the premise of the entire book? That’s deliberate. Also this book is very heavy on cultural and geographic determinism, which has its flaws.
Don’t get me wrong: I really liked this book and I think everyone should read it. Zeihan is smart, informed and is an amazing critical thinker. There is so much more in this book that I haven’t mentioned: climate change, the feasibility of green energy, specific supply chains, the future of agriculture and mining.
Overall, I highly, highly recommend that you read this book. Like, right now.
August 11, 2022
Peter Zeihan has become a popular man in recent months. He has taken up the profession of prediction, calculating through geography and demographics where the wider world will turn in the next thirty or forty years. Seen in private consultation, podcasts, roundtables and more, he has an engaging personality and an effective style of communicating information that would, under normal circumstances, put an audience to sleep in roughly six minutes flat. He is, of course, banking on the premise that these are not normal circumstances. I'd say that's a safe bet. In fact, this is precisely the stage of historic event when the oracle becomes our darling. And he has. And this is his thing.
Zeihan's been right about a couple of important matters. The Ukraine War. The American pull-out of troops, embassies, and leadership in global concerns. (This superpower isn't superpowering very much of anything anymore.) The rise of famine as a crisis. Germany's current energy woes. And, if these Build Back Better economic plans are any indication, he's also on-track with his forecast of North America's intent to become increasingly self-sufficient through investments in infrastructure and manufacturing - which means it's not going to need quite as much from overseas (aka: No more lingering under Damocles' Sword).
His most startling prediction is the implosion of China. At a time when most in positions of power are convinced this country is poised to take over the world, Zeihan grabs us by the shoulders and points us the other way. His demographic studies illustrate the evolving cost of the One Child Policy - which he asserts has decimated their workforce - and adds to this the failure of the ruling party to invest in the sort of self-sustaining practices and mutually-beneficial relationships it is shortly going to need. There is no saving China, he insists; the fall is a foregone conclusion. (And possibly the reason Taiwan is getting a little tense these days.)
Zeihan paints a fairly dire picture for nations who've come to take foreign investment and market accessibility for granted. In a world he foresees as fracturing, they are the ones most likely to take it on the chin. And while I agree with some of his critics who point out his lack of factoring in technological solutions and human ingenuity, the truth is he doesn't have to. The world as we know it may be running out of time, but Peter's got more than enough to spend watching, learning, deducing, and publishing book after book after bestselling book. As an oracle? It certainly doesn't suck to be him.
Zeihan's been right about a couple of important matters. The Ukraine War. The American pull-out of troops, embassies, and leadership in global concerns. (This superpower isn't superpowering very much of anything anymore.) The rise of famine as a crisis. Germany's current energy woes. And, if these Build Back Better economic plans are any indication, he's also on-track with his forecast of North America's intent to become increasingly self-sufficient through investments in infrastructure and manufacturing - which means it's not going to need quite as much from overseas (aka: No more lingering under Damocles' Sword).
His most startling prediction is the implosion of China. At a time when most in positions of power are convinced this country is poised to take over the world, Zeihan grabs us by the shoulders and points us the other way. His demographic studies illustrate the evolving cost of the One Child Policy - which he asserts has decimated their workforce - and adds to this the failure of the ruling party to invest in the sort of self-sustaining practices and mutually-beneficial relationships it is shortly going to need. There is no saving China, he insists; the fall is a foregone conclusion. (And possibly the reason Taiwan is getting a little tense these days.)
Zeihan paints a fairly dire picture for nations who've come to take foreign investment and market accessibility for granted. In a world he foresees as fracturing, they are the ones most likely to take it on the chin. And while I agree with some of his critics who point out his lack of factoring in technological solutions and human ingenuity, the truth is he doesn't have to. The world as we know it may be running out of time, but Peter's got more than enough to spend watching, learning, deducing, and publishing book after book after bestselling book. As an oracle? It certainly doesn't suck to be him.
April 19, 2023
I found this book to be both fascinating and terrifying. Peter Zeihan takes an unforgettable and humorous at times approach to demographic and globalization data sets. Not statistics, but hard data giving this book an immediate authority lacking in statistical analyses.
This geopolitical analysis is a prediction of the future world collapse that cannot be avoided due to the extreme interconnectedness of the world economy, transport systems, and regional products or globalization. Why will this collapse? The author gives numerous historical examples as well as examples from today of what will happen when the older population dies and there is no equal replacement population. Work doesn’t get done, products aren’t mined, converted assembled and shipped. The entire system will break down and collapse.
But reader take heart, as the author reminds us frequently of historical collapses such as the Late Bronze Age Collapse for similar circumstances. He also assures us there will be a resurgence of civilization down the road. There are four regions on earth that will feel the effects but won’t collapse completely.
All said, it is an interesting prediction (and scary) although life will go on but for the majority of the world, but in preindustrial conditions.
This geopolitical analysis is a prediction of the future world collapse that cannot be avoided due to the extreme interconnectedness of the world economy, transport systems, and regional products or globalization. Why will this collapse? The author gives numerous historical examples as well as examples from today of what will happen when the older population dies and there is no equal replacement population. Work doesn’t get done, products aren’t mined, converted assembled and shipped. The entire system will break down and collapse.
But reader take heart, as the author reminds us frequently of historical collapses such as the Late Bronze Age Collapse for similar circumstances. He also assures us there will be a resurgence of civilization down the road. There are four regions on earth that will feel the effects but won’t collapse completely.
All said, it is an interesting prediction (and scary) although life will go on but for the majority of the world, but in preindustrial conditions.
June 19, 2022
This book is heavily biased pro-america can do no wrong, and with massive blind spots ignoring even the possiblity of resource shortages in America.
The premise of the book is that the "World Order" created by America's Military Industrial Complex is the only thing that makes it possible for nations to be kind to one another. And than if USA leaves an area then the whole world will fall into ruin and disrepair as they will all tear each other to shreds and leave America alone.
The author is under the delusion that American oil supply is forever, and is completely unaware that American shale has pretty much dried up, and conventional passed peak decades ago. He was making projections saying things like "when they enter the workforce in the 2040's" the workforce? What workforce? What the f"ck is he talking about? Can he really be so utterly blind as to believe the current state of masn wage slavery will continue after the oil supply runs out? I donno, it just seems all rather ludicrous to me.
Anyways, this dude is some kind of pie in the sky dreamer super optimist.
I do admit it was a pretty well researched book for the parts it covered. Mostly just demographic collapse, difficult supply chain geography and some effects of climate change.
But he utterly ignored the energy crises, the soil crises, the resource shortages ad naseaum. Like his fantasy world has infinite resources -- othen than young people, so it's really rather worthless as a projection in the real world.
In does have some gems, but the amount of bias and blindness in this book is only worth archiving as an exomple of the extreme hubris that some Americans can fall prey to.
So I'm probably not gonna waste the paper.
The premise of the book is that the "World Order" created by America's Military Industrial Complex is the only thing that makes it possible for nations to be kind to one another. And than if USA leaves an area then the whole world will fall into ruin and disrepair as they will all tear each other to shreds and leave America alone.
The author is under the delusion that American oil supply is forever, and is completely unaware that American shale has pretty much dried up, and conventional passed peak decades ago. He was making projections saying things like "when they enter the workforce in the 2040's" the workforce? What workforce? What the f"ck is he talking about? Can he really be so utterly blind as to believe the current state of masn wage slavery will continue after the oil supply runs out? I donno, it just seems all rather ludicrous to me.
Anyways, this dude is some kind of pie in the sky dreamer super optimist.
I do admit it was a pretty well researched book for the parts it covered. Mostly just demographic collapse, difficult supply chain geography and some effects of climate change.
But he utterly ignored the energy crises, the soil crises, the resource shortages ad naseaum. Like his fantasy world has infinite resources -- othen than young people, so it's really rather worthless as a projection in the real world.
In does have some gems, but the amount of bias and blindness in this book is only worth archiving as an exomple of the extreme hubris that some Americans can fall prey to.
So I'm probably not gonna waste the paper.
June 13, 2022
A Realist Looks To The Future. I've read several books in the last few years covering the general real-world end of the world scenarios and/ or projections for the next few decades, and this text is refreshing in just how grounded and real Zeihan's approach is. There may in fact be squabbles about a particular point here or there, or even Zeihan's entire general premise, as the only other review on Goodreads at the time I write this points out, but for me the analysis was close enough to be at least one plausible scenario among many that *could* play out - unlike most others I've read in this field. Add in the fact that this isn't a dry academic look, but instead a somewhat humorous and even crass at times real, straightforward analysis... and you've got my attention. Note: If you're a reader that absolutely WILL NOT tolerate f-bombs, even the occasional one... eh, you're probably gonna wanna skip this one. ;) Instead, this reads more like you're sitting at the bar with a few drinks with an absolute expert in his field, and he is going over a very detailed look at what he thinks is coming over the next 10 - 30 years. As a text, it is thus quite remarkable. The *singular* weakness I found in the text that was star deduction worthy was a complete absence of a bibliography, and the frequent use of footnotes without actually noting even when they were happening was a touch irritating, but not additional star deduction worthy. Very much recommended.
May 13, 2023
4.5 Stars for The End of The World Is Just The Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization (audiobook) by Peter Zeihan read by the author.
The amount of research that the author has done on this subject is staggering. There is so many details to consider from so many different countries. The picture that Peter Zeihan paints for our future is rather bleak for much of the world. He makes it seem like North American will have easiest path through this transition. And much of this transition is inevitable due to the global shrinking workforce but this is going to happen over the next decade or two. I think that I’d will feel more concerned if I hadn’t experienced the pandemic. I worked straight through and dealt with the shortages and supply chain issues and we pulled together and got through it.
The amount of research that the author has done on this subject is staggering. There is so many details to consider from so many different countries. The picture that Peter Zeihan paints for our future is rather bleak for much of the world. He makes it seem like North American will have easiest path through this transition. And much of this transition is inevitable due to the global shrinking workforce but this is going to happen over the next decade or two. I think that I’d will feel more concerned if I hadn’t experienced the pandemic. I worked straight through and dealt with the shortages and supply chain issues and we pulled together and got through it.
August 24, 2022
This is a terrible book that feels like not only was no editor involved but I'm not sure the author himself ever reread and rewrote any of it. It feels more like a continuous flow of consciousness brain dump than, you know, a book.
First the small stuff: for some reason the book decides to start at the beginning of human history, through the sedentary farming revolution, irrigation, wind power, the industrial revolution, British importing cotton from India in the 1700s....it all honestly has nothing to do with anything. At least not whatever this book is about. You can easily skip the first 15-20% of the book while he's blathering on about this stuff.
Also the whole thing is somewhat bizarrely breezy and lightweight. In a passage on the fall of the Berlin Wall there's an endnote helpfully telling the reader that some of the parades celebrating the fall of the wall were good parades. Literally, this is the section: "Across the American alliance network, there were celebrations. Parties. Parades.*" And the endnote for parades reads: "Good ones!".
Or the section on how waterwheels freed up surplus labor:
What's the endnote say? "Yes, this is all very Civilization by Sid Meier. Dude did his research."
Also note that this entire section has nothing concrete. No references, no dates, no figures. It is just endless riffing.
It is a very strange and off putting start to a book.
Meanwhile, the reader is trying to figure out what this book is actually about. The author doesn't bother telling you his thesis. I mean, sure, I read the back of the book so I know what it is supposed to be about. But you definitely don't get that from the book itself. You're reading this lightweight version of Sapiens wondering WTF this book is even about.
Later on, Zeihan gets better but not much. In the section "The Last Bits of More" it feels like Zeihan gave up actually writing a book and just dumped his notes in bullet point format, with bullet points like "America has nukes. Thousands of them. In a rock-paper-scissors-lizard-Spock-nuke contest, nukes win every single time."
And, again, not sources or references for anything. "In terms of usable land per person, the United States could probably support a population double its current 330 million before feeling crowded" Oh yeah? "the United States has lower internal transport costs than anyone else" Proof? I mean, it's not that I even disbelieve him. I just don't care for books that throw out claim after claim after claim like this and give the reader nothing except to take the author's word for....everything.
Zeihan is obviously smart and well-read. I assume he's not just making up all these things and really does have references that he just can't be bothered to put in. I would say this book needs a better editor but I think even that wouldn't be enough. I think Zeihan needs a co-author who could take this meandering braindump and craft it into something readable.
First the small stuff: for some reason the book decides to start at the beginning of human history, through the sedentary farming revolution, irrigation, wind power, the industrial revolution, British importing cotton from India in the 1700s....it all honestly has nothing to do with anything. At least not whatever this book is about. You can easily skip the first 15-20% of the book while he's blathering on about this stuff.
Also the whole thing is somewhat bizarrely breezy and lightweight. In a passage on the fall of the Berlin Wall there's an endnote helpfully telling the reader that some of the parades celebrating the fall of the wall were good parades. Literally, this is the section: "Across the American alliance network, there were celebrations. Parties. Parades.*" And the endnote for parades reads: "Good ones!".
Or the section on how waterwheels freed up surplus labor:
That too freed up a bit of labor, and we had inadvertently come up with something for them to do: manage the food surpluses. Bam! Now we have pottery and numbers. Now we need some way to store our urns and keep track of the math. Bam! Now we have basic engineering and writing. Now we need a way to distribute our stored food. Bam! Roads. All our stuff needed to be kept, managed, and guarded in a centralized location, while all our skills needed to be passed on to future generations. Bam! Urbanization and education.*
What's the endnote say? "Yes, this is all very Civilization by Sid Meier. Dude did his research."
Also note that this entire section has nothing concrete. No references, no dates, no figures. It is just endless riffing.
It is a very strange and off putting start to a book.
Meanwhile, the reader is trying to figure out what this book is actually about. The author doesn't bother telling you his thesis. I mean, sure, I read the back of the book so I know what it is supposed to be about. But you definitely don't get that from the book itself. You're reading this lightweight version of Sapiens wondering WTF this book is even about.
Later on, Zeihan gets better but not much. In the section "The Last Bits of More" it feels like Zeihan gave up actually writing a book and just dumped his notes in bullet point format, with bullet points like "America has nukes. Thousands of them. In a rock-paper-scissors-lizard-Spock-nuke contest, nukes win every single time."
And, again, not sources or references for anything. "In terms of usable land per person, the United States could probably support a population double its current 330 million before feeling crowded" Oh yeah? "the United States has lower internal transport costs than anyone else" Proof? I mean, it's not that I even disbelieve him. I just don't care for books that throw out claim after claim after claim like this and give the reader nothing except to take the author's word for....everything.
Zeihan is obviously smart and well-read. I assume he's not just making up all these things and really does have references that he just can't be bothered to put in. I would say this book needs a better editor but I think even that wouldn't be enough. I think Zeihan needs a co-author who could take this meandering braindump and craft it into something readable.
June 16, 2022
Whether you agree with his thoughts or not, this book is a MUST READ!
I have read his prior three books. I enjoyed them more. This one has a little too much of Peter's political views.
Peter Zeihan is brilliant. His interesting way of exploring why things happen in the world is fascinating. Maybe I am naïve, but while I believe his writing to be, in many ways brilliant, he is wrong in some areas. He believes that ideology is a minor insignificant factor. He believes that all politicians are the same and are not all that relevant. He also has a habit of making dismissive comments about people in a certain political party but not so much in the other party...
Bottom line, he is a brilliant geopolitical researcher but a political dummy.
His description explaining the American Rust Belt going for Trump was as solid as his COVID section, in other words garbage. Trump was never anti-immigrant, he was anti illegal. That is not a minor point. Peter is a lefty green and it shows. While his writing is interesting, you have to understand that he is far from perfect.
I believe that Individuals CAN make a difference and DO make a difference.
His COVID section was putrid. While I do not disagree with his conclusions, his lack of intellectual vigor was obvious. I will admit that the subject is a political hot potato and he may just be avoiding what he perceives as unnecessary political arguments.
While I agree that time would have been useful, and COVID did cost world leaders time, does ANYONE believe that the current world leaders would have done a damned thing that was useful? COVID policy caused many problems, but a lack of preparation time for the world community really isn't one of them. Note that he is the one who basically says that no politicians really make a difference then later complains that they were robbed of planning time? Might want to put a little more thought into that one...
He mentions that Americans are not from America... I was born here and have NO loyalties to any other countries. Yes, I am from here. If you want to say that this land was once held by others, I would ask how far back you want to go? I would ask if this land really belongs to the dinosaurs? If you want to just go back to the "native Americans", which tribe or tribes are you going to pick? By the way, how do you think they got the land originally?
During his lecture on the fact that current "isms" are not covering the future, I realized that one could logically argue that his model is no longer valid. Changes in how the world works WILL change the values of various inputs. If that is the case, and I believe it is, this should be his last book...
Peter is a bit negative. Will things get ugly? Yes. Will that same ugliness create opportunities for advancements and a wondrous future? Maybe, maybe not. I believe his conclusions tend towards being correct but he is missing the dynamic creativity that sometimes happens when the chips are down. There is a LOT of room in the world for innovation, creativity, and experimentation.
Maybe an all new incredible weapons system may come online. Maybe, instead of an expensive navy, one only needs a high-tech satellite network to guard most merchant shipping? If that one thing happened, it would be a game changer.
Maybe some billionaire will form a high tech mercenary group to escort shipments? A great way to make money and make a difference.
Whatever happens, I am pretty sure humanity will survive. Peter is a big fan of globalism, I am not. The juice isn't worth the squeeze. Globalism has offered the world exposure to education, diversity, and exposed many injustices as well as cultural triumphs. It has also entangled the United States in a no-win monetary scheme and forced us to fight wars that are not our own. Let the world take care of itself for a while.
While he is a Green, he covered green energy fairly and in detail. His descriptions of comparative cost and performance were right on target. His section on global warming could easily have been skipped.
While my review may sound critical, that does NOT mean that the book is bad. It just means that Peter forced me to think and I went in different directions than he did.
Buy the book. Read the book. Form your own opinion.
I have read his prior three books. I enjoyed them more. This one has a little too much of Peter's political views.
Peter Zeihan is brilliant. His interesting way of exploring why things happen in the world is fascinating. Maybe I am naïve, but while I believe his writing to be, in many ways brilliant, he is wrong in some areas. He believes that ideology is a minor insignificant factor. He believes that all politicians are the same and are not all that relevant. He also has a habit of making dismissive comments about people in a certain political party but not so much in the other party...
Bottom line, he is a brilliant geopolitical researcher but a political dummy.
His description explaining the American Rust Belt going for Trump was as solid as his COVID section, in other words garbage. Trump was never anti-immigrant, he was anti illegal. That is not a minor point. Peter is a lefty green and it shows. While his writing is interesting, you have to understand that he is far from perfect.
I believe that Individuals CAN make a difference and DO make a difference.
His COVID section was putrid. While I do not disagree with his conclusions, his lack of intellectual vigor was obvious. I will admit that the subject is a political hot potato and he may just be avoiding what he perceives as unnecessary political arguments.
While I agree that time would have been useful, and COVID did cost world leaders time, does ANYONE believe that the current world leaders would have done a damned thing that was useful? COVID policy caused many problems, but a lack of preparation time for the world community really isn't one of them. Note that he is the one who basically says that no politicians really make a difference then later complains that they were robbed of planning time? Might want to put a little more thought into that one...
He mentions that Americans are not from America... I was born here and have NO loyalties to any other countries. Yes, I am from here. If you want to say that this land was once held by others, I would ask how far back you want to go? I would ask if this land really belongs to the dinosaurs? If you want to just go back to the "native Americans", which tribe or tribes are you going to pick? By the way, how do you think they got the land originally?
During his lecture on the fact that current "isms" are not covering the future, I realized that one could logically argue that his model is no longer valid. Changes in how the world works WILL change the values of various inputs. If that is the case, and I believe it is, this should be his last book...
Peter is a bit negative. Will things get ugly? Yes. Will that same ugliness create opportunities for advancements and a wondrous future? Maybe, maybe not. I believe his conclusions tend towards being correct but he is missing the dynamic creativity that sometimes happens when the chips are down. There is a LOT of room in the world for innovation, creativity, and experimentation.
Maybe an all new incredible weapons system may come online. Maybe, instead of an expensive navy, one only needs a high-tech satellite network to guard most merchant shipping? If that one thing happened, it would be a game changer.
Maybe some billionaire will form a high tech mercenary group to escort shipments? A great way to make money and make a difference.
Whatever happens, I am pretty sure humanity will survive. Peter is a big fan of globalism, I am not. The juice isn't worth the squeeze. Globalism has offered the world exposure to education, diversity, and exposed many injustices as well as cultural triumphs. It has also entangled the United States in a no-win monetary scheme and forced us to fight wars that are not our own. Let the world take care of itself for a while.
While he is a Green, he covered green energy fairly and in detail. His descriptions of comparative cost and performance were right on target. His section on global warming could easily have been skipped.
While my review may sound critical, that does NOT mean that the book is bad. It just means that Peter forced me to think and I went in different directions than he did.
Buy the book. Read the book. Form your own opinion.
June 20, 2022
This guy.
I have read his 3 books in a month since I've heard the recommendation from David Sacks in The All In Podcast. A year later i found myself waiting for a premiere of his new book, he published ~100 days after Russia invaded Ukraine, at the beginning of Polish long weekend. Talk about timing.
Everything that constitutes modern life relies on what we know as globalisation with roots in Bretton Woods. Globalisation is made of cheap and reliable inputs like oil, natgas, wheat, avocado, wine and bourbon, soy, cotton and corn. If you start to fuck around with reliability or price of those - you get shortages, inflation, breaking supply chains and in more persistent cases deindustrialisation, political breakdown and famine Venezuela and Zimwabwe style.
Rulesare enforced by US aircraft carriers. If the US decides to not enforce them anymore (by choosing more and more isolationist and populist politicians) shit gets tough real fast for almost everyone besides americans. Zeihan paints the picture on how tough exackly.
Not a fun book to read.
I have read his 3 books in a month since I've heard the recommendation from David Sacks in The All In Podcast. A year later i found myself waiting for a premiere of his new book, he published ~100 days after Russia invaded Ukraine, at the beginning of Polish long weekend. Talk about timing.
Everything that constitutes modern life relies on what we know as globalisation with roots in Bretton Woods. Globalisation is made of cheap and reliable inputs like oil, natgas, wheat, avocado, wine and bourbon, soy, cotton and corn. If you start to fuck around with reliability or price of those - you get shortages, inflation, breaking supply chains and in more persistent cases deindustrialisation, political breakdown and famine Venezuela and Zimwabwe style.
Rulesare enforced by US aircraft carriers. If the US decides to not enforce them anymore (by choosing more and more isolationist and populist politicians) shit gets tough real fast for almost everyone besides americans. Zeihan paints the picture on how tough exackly.
Not a fun book to read.
July 8, 2022
Where to begin? Full of American hubris and triumphalism; utterly silent on the multiple, complex social (mental health, opioids, social isolation and atomization, income inequality, faltering democracy, etc.) and ecosystem (soil and freshwater loss, the sixth mass extinction, microplastics, all exacerbated by climate change) crises; dismissive of any approach that doesn't align with market fundamentalism; takes an amoral /chillingly pragmatic view of the role of slavery and genocide and their imoacts on Black and Indigenous Americans (not so much as an "oh well"); operates from a view of the economy (the only important thing) being utterly disconnected from the ecosystem upon which it owes its existence; fails to acknowledge that the economic gains of the last 200 years came at the cost of plundering our natural capital and treating the earth like an infinite waste dump. This is what passes as wisdom? Jesus f###ing Christ.
September 18, 2022
Zeihan's thesis is baked into the subtitle: globalization is falling apart. Bringing it home for anyone with retirement savings, the inside jacket claims that "2019 was the last great year for the economy." The book chronicles why the last ~30 years were basically the best ever and how we got to that state, and the subsequent world of pain that will be felt on global transport, finance, energy, energy, industrial minerals, manufacturing, and agriculture.
This is the third Zeihan book I've read (The Accidental Superpower / my review, and Disunited Nations / my review) and there's a very similar feel to the previous ones:
1. Fawn over navigable waterways and how much sweet, sweet capital they generate.
2. Speedrun through WWII, the Bretton Woods agreement, and how the US Navy is literally Team America: World Police for the oceans, enabling globalization.
3. Primer on demography charts (example)
4. Talk about how demographic collapse in basically all but a new nations will cause modern globalization to fall apart.
5. Peer into the hazy crystal ball of the future and make predictions (this is most of the book).
I'm being a bit tongue-in-cheek. This might be Zeihan's most comprehensive book yet and his most persuasive (certainly COVID-19 disruptions, Russia's war in Ukraine, and the Euro energy crisis help his arguments). There's a ton of interesting information and random facts (which will blow up the length of this review), insight into geopolitics (something I'm still learning about), and some highly logical conclusions: if this fails, then that fails.
I need to talk about a couple challenges readers will face, which also make reviewing and summarizing the book difficult.
1. Zeihan writes in a tone that's snarky or goofy, depending on your ambient level of cynicism. Lots of jokey footnotes. This may or may not drive you bananas.
2. This book is LONG: 481 pages...
3. ... and that's not including references. Which is my next complaint: there are no references. Charts are labelled with data sources, but nothing in the text can be looked up.
4. There's a lot of bulleted lists that disrupt the flow of the "narrative". Don't think grocery-list bullets, think each bullet is a half-page paragraph.
I find Zeihan's overall thesis of a global collapse in trade and cooperation very difficult to swallow. Maybe it's just me as a sheltered Millennial growing up in a time of ultimate global prosperity, but I find global state-sponsored piracy unlikely. Maybe it's true we've been living in a sheltered bubble for the last ~80 years and all good things have to end. But part of me doesn't understand why nation-states wouldn't come to a collective realization that continued cooperation is largely in everyone's best interests. Call me naive.
Zeihan's perspective on energy is interesting: reducing fossil fuel consumption (for much of the world) not by environmentally-driven choice, but my lack of supply in a deglobalized and chaotic world. Like Smil (who he recognizes in the Acknowledgements section) and Epstein and Schellenberger, Zeihan recognizes the value and irreplaceability of many qualities of fossil fuels, but in my opinion lacks imagination (and/or is inconsistent, and/or it's an editing problem) around some of the alternatives. Solar and wind are decried for their lack of dispatchability, then a few pages later wind and solar are suggested as an oil substitute in the US. Hmm.
Zeihan actually responded to a tweet of mine (which was cool!) saying that nuclear should be part of the solution, but that they "take too long to build in most places, making them broadly infeasible". This seems to contradict a narrative in the book about how humans will invest 10s or 100s of billions of dollars chasing massive fossil fuel deposits that take a decade or more from planning to first exploitation. One of the more interesting rebuttals I've heard to the "too long to build" arguments for nuclear is the "too short of a lifetime" for wind/solar. Given that most wind/solar plants have a 25-year service life, all of the wind and solar that currently exists today, and all that will be built in the next three years, won't exist in 2050 when we're "supposed to" reach net zero. Furthermore: Zeihan doesn't mention that wind/solar manufacturing is almost totally dependent on offshore East Asian economies which he clearly believes will collapse. Given all of that: what's the best type of electrical energy for regions to invest in?
Overall: Fascinating as always, but all my past criticisms/challenges around prediction books hold.
Interesting bits and random facts... I used a record 4 stacks of page tabs on this one:
Check out the author's maps from the book: zeihan.com/end-of-the-world-maps/
p1: "Instead of cheap and faster and better, we're rapidly transitioning to a world that is pricier and worse and slower."
p22: Great point about how electricity and energy "granted women the possibility of a life not utterly committed to garden-, house-, and child-care."
p60: On the inevitability of demographic collapse: "The world's demographic structure passed the point of no return twenty to forty years ago. The 2020s are when it all breaks apart."
p66: On the impacts of demographic collapse and de-globalization: fewer interactions --> reduced access (materials/markets) --> reduced income --> fewer economies of scale --> less labour specialization --> reduced interaction (viscous cycle). Shortages mean everyone looks after themselves. Everyone becomes less efficient, productive. Compounding problem. Specialization declines (impacts on food, technology, energy?)
p81: Russia's decline as a nation-state is a best-case outcome for countries in a deglobalizing world, because at least they have ample land, food capacity, resources, plus a nuclear arsenal of course...
p88: "The globalization game is not simply ending. It is already over. Most countries will never return to the degree of stability of growth they experienced in 2019."
p93: The huge Boomer retiring basically right now means the world is going to be starved of their huge amount of capital (retirement savings invested). Bonus: skilled labour shortage, labour inflation for years to come.
p98: "Most countries are nation-states: their governments exist to serve the interests of a specific ethnicity (the nation) in a specific territory (the state)." New idea to me. Consider France, Japan, China vs. Canada, Brazil, Switzerland, United States. Unitary governments vs. confederal/federal governments. The ability for new immigrants to define and integrate themselves into a national identity will be a useful feature in the future. E.g. Anyone can be "Canadian".
p104: America not facing the same demographic collapse as the rest of the world. Yay America!
p131: "Between 2000 and 2020, moving a container across the Atlantic or Pacific averaged out to about $700 per container... transport has become so rote that in 2019 the Chinese recycling industry had to place restrictions on the import of low-quality recycled trash."
p139: On impact of supply chain disruptions: "It takes 30,000 pieces of build a car. If you only have 29,999 pieces, you have an ambitiously sized paperweight."
p149: "The defining characteristic of the new era is that we will no longer all be on the same side." - and if the US is no longer policing the oceans, will large shipping containers and haulage become fair targets? Could countries start seizing energy or food shipments? Hmm...
p175: During and after WWII, Americans were happy to supply Allies with whatever they needed, so long as they were paid in gold... vacuumed up all of Europe's gold wealth in the process. Result was that Europe could never back a currency to compete with the US dollar.
p185: "China regularly prints currency at more than double the rate of the United States, sometimes at five times the U.S. rate."
p188: "For reasons that only made sense at the time, in the 1990s and early 2000s it became Europe's conventional wisdom that everyone in Europe should be able to borrow at terms that previously had only been offered to the most scrupulous of Europeans." Great section about how Spain, Italy, Greece, and more borrowed like high school kids who don't understand credit cards, and somehow this was a good idea. "Greece hosted an Olympics entirely on credit."
p189: "The entire European system is now doing little more than going through the motions until the common currency inevitably shatters."
p210: this graph of % increases in total private credit, by country. Seems bad.
p212: "Expect to hear a lot about capital flight and capital controls."
p231: Globalization and the fall of the USSR meant that all of a sudden, there was a single global price for oil, compared to historical in-country markets. "With the Cold War's end, the Americans may have wanted to take a less active role in global affairs, they may have wanted to disengage, but a single global oil price meant that doing so would risk instability, supply shortages, and oil prices so high as to wreck the American economy. The Americans had become economically trapped in their own outdated security policy."
p241: A great explanation on how hydraulic fracturing actually works. Plus, "at the dawn of the shale era in 2005, these horizontal wells were only 600 feet long per drilling platform and only prduced a few dozen barrels of oil per day. As of 2022, many of the newer laterals are in eccess of two miles, with many of the wells sporting a veritable tree of brances of sub-laterials in excess of a mile long each, all connected to the same vertical pipe... common to have individual wells kick out in excess of 5,000 barrels of oil a day - a figure that puts individual American shale wells on par with some of the most prolific oil wells in Iraq and Saudi Arabia."
p260: Fascinating insight about how Russia is the world's largest natural gas exporter because of legacy infrastructure that distributed gas to all of the now-former Soviet states. Helps frame and understand current EU dependence on Russian gas.
p262: Natural gas is insanely cheap in the US because it's a by-product of shale oil wells. (similar to Western Canada, a good chunk of gas in AB/SK is a byproduct of oil production)
p264: This powerful chart illustrates our dependence on oil. 58% of total consumption is for transport. Just 4.1% goes to electricity. For me this chart is key in understanding future challenges of electricty supply due to increased demand for electrification. If cars consume 21% of the world's oil and we electrify them all, that's a huge amount of energy that needs to be supplied from (ideally) non-fossil sources. Nuclear anyone?
p268: "Fossil fules are so concentrated that they're literally 'energy' in physical form. In contrast, all greentechs require space/.
p269: Zeihan is not a nuke bro. Says that nuclear is infeasible due to its image. "If only solar and wind are doing the lifting, they would need a ninefold buildout to fully displace fossil fuels." Later this page, talking about electrifying the transportation sector: "Again, hydro and nuclear couldn't help, so that ninefold increase in wind and solar is now a twenty-fold increase." And later: "We need to green the grid before we expand it... pace is painfully slow... solar has only increased to 1.5 perfecnt of total energy use."
p271: "Greentech today is so unreliable in most locations that those localities that do attempt greentech have no choice but to maintain a full conventional system for their total peak demand - at full cost."
p273: On battery storage: "The state as a whole has but enough total storage - not battery storage, but total [energy] storage - but one minute of power."
p274: On risks of expensive renewables (due to required redundancy): "There is nothing wrong with financing twenty-five years of [greentech] power bills up front when cpaital is cheap. But in the capital-poor world... all such up-front investments degreade from an easy carry to unsatisfactorily risky and expensive. In that world, the far lower installation costs of convential systems make a great deal more sense."
p286: The EU is the descendent of the post-WWII European Coal and Steel Community.
p289: On available critical minerals in a de-globalized world: "One product that does exist in most places is low-quality coal."
p291: China imports more iron ore than the rest of the world combined, times three.
p294: China absorbs two-thirds of all internationally traded bauxite, and smelts three-fifths of all aluminum. This chapter on minerals is interesting for understanding China's role as a middle player: take raw materials, dump labour and energy into making refined products like steel and aluminum, and dump those onto the global markets. Capital constraints, demographic collapse, and de-globalization put China's role as a middle-level refiner at big risk (says Zeihan).
p297: "As of 2022, cobalt is the only sufficiently energy-dense metal that even hints we might be able to use rechargable batteries to tech out way out of our climate challenges... annual cobalt metal demand [I think he means supply] between 2022 and 2025 alone needs to double to 220,000 tons simply to keep pace with Green aspirations. That won't happen." Because cobalt refining is buried in China's hyperfinanced economy. Nearly all cobalt refining happens in the PRC, with Canada a distant second.
p300: 80% of lithium processing also happens in China.
p300: Carbon "break-even" point of a Tesla is 55,000 miles driven (given increased refining, mining, metals, etc. inputs, vs. an internal combusion engine car). Zeihan: this may over-state their green-friendliness because EVs typically charge at night when there's no solar on the grid.
p307: 3/4 of the world's platinum group metalS (PGMs) come from South Africa, where the majority comes from a single rock formation called the Bushveld Igneous Complex.
p314: 80% of the world's high-quality quartz (input to electronics-grade semiconductors) comes from a single mine in North Carolina.
p315: "In a post-Order world, uranium is likely to become more popular as a power fuel". Finally, Zeihan! "Uranium is the only electricity input that could be theorhetically flown to its end user" (because of that sweet, sweet energy density).
p323: "The supply chain agony of 2021 was primarily about whiplashing demand. Deglobalization will instead beqat us about the head and shoulders with instability in supply."
p324: While I'm not in love with Zeihan's goofy/snarky writing tone, I ABSOLUTELY LOVE his use of "phbbbbt" on p324 as a horse-lips noise paired with an ellipsis to denote thinking out loud. Lol.
p352: China's birth rate is now one of the lowest in the world, but Shanghai and Beijing have the lowest birth rates in the world.
p358: "Germany cannot maintain its position as a wealthy and free nation without the Americans, but Germany also cannot maintain its position as a modern industrialized nation without Russia" (for minerals, resources, manufacturing, exports, etc.) Ukraine war adding to complexity.
p362: "The United States and Mexico have among the world's best greentech [energy] options. Wind on the Great Plains, solar in the Southwest."
p367: "Only North America sports a demographic profile that doesn't have to immediately adapt to a fundamentally new - and fundamentally unknown - financial reality. And so massive manufacturing reshoring to the American system is already in progress" Yay us!
p374: Prediction that most refining and manufacturing capability in China and much of East Asia will become stranded assets due to deglobalization.
p375: "Reducing economies of scale reduces the opportunities for automation. Applying new technology to any manufacturing system adds cost, and automation is no exception. It will still happen, but only in targeted applications such as textiles and advanced semiconductors. Such automated applications are already cheaper than human labour". Super interesting as an automation guy!
p378: Automotive is the single biggest piece of international trade. In China, vehicle sales peaked in 2018. In Europe they peaked decades ago. As someone who hates driving cars except when absolutely required, I would love to see people adopt bikes and mass transit, however further decline in automotive would obviously have big impacts on a global manufacturing workforce and supply chain.
p381: In 2019, burning wood accounted for 2.3% of the EU's electricity supply. Also: "If people cannot source golbally traded energy products like natural gas and diesel, they will have a choice between not having heat for cooking or staying warm... or burning wood. The scale of the devastation - in terms of carbon emissions, land cover, biodiversity, smog, water quality, and safety - caused by half the woreld's population reverting to wood burning is difficult to wrap the mind around." Hence the case for massive increases in cheap, long-term, zero-carbon energy... but Zeihan thinks nuclear's PR is too bad.
p393: Ancient (now hipster) grains like farro, imllet, amaranth, teff are less common because they typically require more land, water, or labour (or all three) than ubiquitous wheat.
p398: An apple can last more than a year in a blacked-out, near-freezing industrial warehouse with all the oxygen sucked out.
p406: On fertilizer and crop inputs: "While 'only' 20-25 percent of grains and soy are transported internationally, some 80 percent of the inputs are."
p409: Chinese soil and water quality is so low that Chinese farmers generally use more fertilizer per calorie produced than anoy other country, 5x in the case of nitrogen.
p411: Most plants are 0.5-2% potassium by weight at harvest, hence the need for potassium fertilizer. Yay potash!
p415, footnote: "You can have organic foods or environmentally friendly foods. You cannot have both."
(continued in comment)
This is the third Zeihan book I've read (The Accidental Superpower / my review, and Disunited Nations / my review) and there's a very similar feel to the previous ones:
1. Fawn over navigable waterways and how much sweet, sweet capital they generate.
2. Speedrun through WWII, the Bretton Woods agreement, and how the US Navy is literally Team America: World Police for the oceans, enabling globalization.
3. Primer on demography charts (example)
4. Talk about how demographic collapse in basically all but a new nations will cause modern globalization to fall apart.
5. Peer into the hazy crystal ball of the future and make predictions (this is most of the book).
I'm being a bit tongue-in-cheek. This might be Zeihan's most comprehensive book yet and his most persuasive (certainly COVID-19 disruptions, Russia's war in Ukraine, and the Euro energy crisis help his arguments). There's a ton of interesting information and random facts (which will blow up the length of this review), insight into geopolitics (something I'm still learning about), and some highly logical conclusions: if this fails, then that fails.
I need to talk about a couple challenges readers will face, which also make reviewing and summarizing the book difficult.
1. Zeihan writes in a tone that's snarky or goofy, depending on your ambient level of cynicism. Lots of jokey footnotes. This may or may not drive you bananas.
2. This book is LONG: 481 pages...
3. ... and that's not including references. Which is my next complaint: there are no references. Charts are labelled with data sources, but nothing in the text can be looked up.
4. There's a lot of bulleted lists that disrupt the flow of the "narrative". Don't think grocery-list bullets, think each bullet is a half-page paragraph.
I find Zeihan's overall thesis of a global collapse in trade and cooperation very difficult to swallow. Maybe it's just me as a sheltered Millennial growing up in a time of ultimate global prosperity, but I find global state-sponsored piracy unlikely. Maybe it's true we've been living in a sheltered bubble for the last ~80 years and all good things have to end. But part of me doesn't understand why nation-states wouldn't come to a collective realization that continued cooperation is largely in everyone's best interests. Call me naive.
Zeihan's perspective on energy is interesting: reducing fossil fuel consumption (for much of the world) not by environmentally-driven choice, but my lack of supply in a deglobalized and chaotic world. Like Smil (who he recognizes in the Acknowledgements section) and Epstein and Schellenberger, Zeihan recognizes the value and irreplaceability of many qualities of fossil fuels, but in my opinion lacks imagination (and/or is inconsistent, and/or it's an editing problem) around some of the alternatives. Solar and wind are decried for their lack of dispatchability, then a few pages later wind and solar are suggested as an oil substitute in the US. Hmm.
Zeihan actually responded to a tweet of mine (which was cool!) saying that nuclear should be part of the solution, but that they "take too long to build in most places, making them broadly infeasible". This seems to contradict a narrative in the book about how humans will invest 10s or 100s of billions of dollars chasing massive fossil fuel deposits that take a decade or more from planning to first exploitation. One of the more interesting rebuttals I've heard to the "too long to build" arguments for nuclear is the "too short of a lifetime" for wind/solar. Given that most wind/solar plants have a 25-year service life, all of the wind and solar that currently exists today, and all that will be built in the next three years, won't exist in 2050 when we're "supposed to" reach net zero. Furthermore: Zeihan doesn't mention that wind/solar manufacturing is almost totally dependent on offshore East Asian economies which he clearly believes will collapse. Given all of that: what's the best type of electrical energy for regions to invest in?
Overall: Fascinating as always, but all my past criticisms/challenges around prediction books hold.
Interesting bits and random facts... I used a record 4 stacks of page tabs on this one:
Check out the author's maps from the book: zeihan.com/end-of-the-world-maps/
p1: "Instead of cheap and faster and better, we're rapidly transitioning to a world that is pricier and worse and slower."
p22: Great point about how electricity and energy "granted women the possibility of a life not utterly committed to garden-, house-, and child-care."
p60: On the inevitability of demographic collapse: "The world's demographic structure passed the point of no return twenty to forty years ago. The 2020s are when it all breaks apart."
p66: On the impacts of demographic collapse and de-globalization: fewer interactions --> reduced access (materials/markets) --> reduced income --> fewer economies of scale --> less labour specialization --> reduced interaction (viscous cycle). Shortages mean everyone looks after themselves. Everyone becomes less efficient, productive. Compounding problem. Specialization declines (impacts on food, technology, energy?)
p81: Russia's decline as a nation-state is a best-case outcome for countries in a deglobalizing world, because at least they have ample land, food capacity, resources, plus a nuclear arsenal of course...
p88: "The globalization game is not simply ending. It is already over. Most countries will never return to the degree of stability of growth they experienced in 2019."
p93: The huge Boomer retiring basically right now means the world is going to be starved of their huge amount of capital (retirement savings invested). Bonus: skilled labour shortage, labour inflation for years to come.
p98: "Most countries are nation-states: their governments exist to serve the interests of a specific ethnicity (the nation) in a specific territory (the state)." New idea to me. Consider France, Japan, China vs. Canada, Brazil, Switzerland, United States. Unitary governments vs. confederal/federal governments. The ability for new immigrants to define and integrate themselves into a national identity will be a useful feature in the future. E.g. Anyone can be "Canadian".
p104: America not facing the same demographic collapse as the rest of the world. Yay America!
p131: "Between 2000 and 2020, moving a container across the Atlantic or Pacific averaged out to about $700 per container... transport has become so rote that in 2019 the Chinese recycling industry had to place restrictions on the import of low-quality recycled trash."
p139: On impact of supply chain disruptions: "It takes 30,000 pieces of build a car. If you only have 29,999 pieces, you have an ambitiously sized paperweight."
p149: "The defining characteristic of the new era is that we will no longer all be on the same side." - and if the US is no longer policing the oceans, will large shipping containers and haulage become fair targets? Could countries start seizing energy or food shipments? Hmm...
p175: During and after WWII, Americans were happy to supply Allies with whatever they needed, so long as they were paid in gold... vacuumed up all of Europe's gold wealth in the process. Result was that Europe could never back a currency to compete with the US dollar.
p185: "China regularly prints currency at more than double the rate of the United States, sometimes at five times the U.S. rate."
p188: "For reasons that only made sense at the time, in the 1990s and early 2000s it became Europe's conventional wisdom that everyone in Europe should be able to borrow at terms that previously had only been offered to the most scrupulous of Europeans." Great section about how Spain, Italy, Greece, and more borrowed like high school kids who don't understand credit cards, and somehow this was a good idea. "Greece hosted an Olympics entirely on credit."
p189: "The entire European system is now doing little more than going through the motions until the common currency inevitably shatters."
p210: this graph of % increases in total private credit, by country. Seems bad.
p212: "Expect to hear a lot about capital flight and capital controls."
p231: Globalization and the fall of the USSR meant that all of a sudden, there was a single global price for oil, compared to historical in-country markets. "With the Cold War's end, the Americans may have wanted to take a less active role in global affairs, they may have wanted to disengage, but a single global oil price meant that doing so would risk instability, supply shortages, and oil prices so high as to wreck the American economy. The Americans had become economically trapped in their own outdated security policy."
p241: A great explanation on how hydraulic fracturing actually works. Plus, "at the dawn of the shale era in 2005, these horizontal wells were only 600 feet long per drilling platform and only prduced a few dozen barrels of oil per day. As of 2022, many of the newer laterals are in eccess of two miles, with many of the wells sporting a veritable tree of brances of sub-laterials in excess of a mile long each, all connected to the same vertical pipe... common to have individual wells kick out in excess of 5,000 barrels of oil a day - a figure that puts individual American shale wells on par with some of the most prolific oil wells in Iraq and Saudi Arabia."
p260: Fascinating insight about how Russia is the world's largest natural gas exporter because of legacy infrastructure that distributed gas to all of the now-former Soviet states. Helps frame and understand current EU dependence on Russian gas.
p262: Natural gas is insanely cheap in the US because it's a by-product of shale oil wells. (similar to Western Canada, a good chunk of gas in AB/SK is a byproduct of oil production)
p264: This powerful chart illustrates our dependence on oil. 58% of total consumption is for transport. Just 4.1% goes to electricity. For me this chart is key in understanding future challenges of electricty supply due to increased demand for electrification. If cars consume 21% of the world's oil and we electrify them all, that's a huge amount of energy that needs to be supplied from (ideally) non-fossil sources. Nuclear anyone?
p268: "Fossil fules are so concentrated that they're literally 'energy' in physical form. In contrast, all greentechs require space/.
p269: Zeihan is not a nuke bro. Says that nuclear is infeasible due to its image. "If only solar and wind are doing the lifting, they would need a ninefold buildout to fully displace fossil fuels." Later this page, talking about electrifying the transportation sector: "Again, hydro and nuclear couldn't help, so that ninefold increase in wind and solar is now a twenty-fold increase." And later: "We need to green the grid before we expand it... pace is painfully slow... solar has only increased to 1.5 perfecnt of total energy use."
p271: "Greentech today is so unreliable in most locations that those localities that do attempt greentech have no choice but to maintain a full conventional system for their total peak demand - at full cost."
p273: On battery storage: "The state as a whole has but enough total storage - not battery storage, but total [energy] storage - but one minute of power."
p274: On risks of expensive renewables (due to required redundancy): "There is nothing wrong with financing twenty-five years of [greentech] power bills up front when cpaital is cheap. But in the capital-poor world... all such up-front investments degreade from an easy carry to unsatisfactorily risky and expensive. In that world, the far lower installation costs of convential systems make a great deal more sense."
p286: The EU is the descendent of the post-WWII European Coal and Steel Community.
p289: On available critical minerals in a de-globalized world: "One product that does exist in most places is low-quality coal."
p291: China imports more iron ore than the rest of the world combined, times three.
p294: China absorbs two-thirds of all internationally traded bauxite, and smelts three-fifths of all aluminum. This chapter on minerals is interesting for understanding China's role as a middle player: take raw materials, dump labour and energy into making refined products like steel and aluminum, and dump those onto the global markets. Capital constraints, demographic collapse, and de-globalization put China's role as a middle-level refiner at big risk (says Zeihan).
p297: "As of 2022, cobalt is the only sufficiently energy-dense metal that even hints we might be able to use rechargable batteries to tech out way out of our climate challenges... annual cobalt metal demand [I think he means supply] between 2022 and 2025 alone needs to double to 220,000 tons simply to keep pace with Green aspirations. That won't happen." Because cobalt refining is buried in China's hyperfinanced economy. Nearly all cobalt refining happens in the PRC, with Canada a distant second.
p300: 80% of lithium processing also happens in China.
p300: Carbon "break-even" point of a Tesla is 55,000 miles driven (given increased refining, mining, metals, etc. inputs, vs. an internal combusion engine car). Zeihan: this may over-state their green-friendliness because EVs typically charge at night when there's no solar on the grid.
p307: 3/4 of the world's platinum group metalS (PGMs) come from South Africa, where the majority comes from a single rock formation called the Bushveld Igneous Complex.
p314: 80% of the world's high-quality quartz (input to electronics-grade semiconductors) comes from a single mine in North Carolina.
p315: "In a post-Order world, uranium is likely to become more popular as a power fuel". Finally, Zeihan! "Uranium is the only electricity input that could be theorhetically flown to its end user" (because of that sweet, sweet energy density).
p323: "The supply chain agony of 2021 was primarily about whiplashing demand. Deglobalization will instead beqat us about the head and shoulders with instability in supply."
p324: While I'm not in love with Zeihan's goofy/snarky writing tone, I ABSOLUTELY LOVE his use of "phbbbbt" on p324 as a horse-lips noise paired with an ellipsis to denote thinking out loud. Lol.
p352: China's birth rate is now one of the lowest in the world, but Shanghai and Beijing have the lowest birth rates in the world.
p358: "Germany cannot maintain its position as a wealthy and free nation without the Americans, but Germany also cannot maintain its position as a modern industrialized nation without Russia" (for minerals, resources, manufacturing, exports, etc.) Ukraine war adding to complexity.
p362: "The United States and Mexico have among the world's best greentech [energy] options. Wind on the Great Plains, solar in the Southwest."
p367: "Only North America sports a demographic profile that doesn't have to immediately adapt to a fundamentally new - and fundamentally unknown - financial reality. And so massive manufacturing reshoring to the American system is already in progress" Yay us!
p374: Prediction that most refining and manufacturing capability in China and much of East Asia will become stranded assets due to deglobalization.
p375: "Reducing economies of scale reduces the opportunities for automation. Applying new technology to any manufacturing system adds cost, and automation is no exception. It will still happen, but only in targeted applications such as textiles and advanced semiconductors. Such automated applications are already cheaper than human labour". Super interesting as an automation guy!
p378: Automotive is the single biggest piece of international trade. In China, vehicle sales peaked in 2018. In Europe they peaked decades ago. As someone who hates driving cars except when absolutely required, I would love to see people adopt bikes and mass transit, however further decline in automotive would obviously have big impacts on a global manufacturing workforce and supply chain.
p381: In 2019, burning wood accounted for 2.3% of the EU's electricity supply. Also: "If people cannot source golbally traded energy products like natural gas and diesel, they will have a choice between not having heat for cooking or staying warm... or burning wood. The scale of the devastation - in terms of carbon emissions, land cover, biodiversity, smog, water quality, and safety - caused by half the woreld's population reverting to wood burning is difficult to wrap the mind around." Hence the case for massive increases in cheap, long-term, zero-carbon energy... but Zeihan thinks nuclear's PR is too bad.
p393: Ancient (now hipster) grains like farro, imllet, amaranth, teff are less common because they typically require more land, water, or labour (or all three) than ubiquitous wheat.
p398: An apple can last more than a year in a blacked-out, near-freezing industrial warehouse with all the oxygen sucked out.
p406: On fertilizer and crop inputs: "While 'only' 20-25 percent of grains and soy are transported internationally, some 80 percent of the inputs are."
p409: Chinese soil and water quality is so low that Chinese farmers generally use more fertilizer per calorie produced than anoy other country, 5x in the case of nitrogen.
p411: Most plants are 0.5-2% potassium by weight at harvest, hence the need for potassium fertilizer. Yay potash!
p415, footnote: "You can have organic foods or environmentally friendly foods. You cannot have both."
(continued in comment)
August 20, 2022
Best science fiction I've read since "The Three Body Problem."
This seems like an intelligent guess at where the world is headed. I don’t think Peter has a crystal ball any more than the rest of us, but he’s well read, thinks through his work while pulling together a lot of different themes and threads. What results is a pretty thoughtful mosaic of what might happen over the next few decades.
Definitely worth a read. I think the biggest challenge is calibrating how much to believe different parts based upon your own knowledge and experiences. But that’s always the challenge with these books.
This seems like an intelligent guess at where the world is headed. I don’t think Peter has a crystal ball any more than the rest of us, but he’s well read, thinks through his work while pulling together a lot of different themes and threads. What results is a pretty thoughtful mosaic of what might happen over the next few decades.
Definitely worth a read. I think the biggest challenge is calibrating how much to believe different parts based upon your own knowledge and experiences. But that’s always the challenge with these books.
Read
November 25, 2022No rating because DNF. The basic thesis, that recent decades have been, economically, the way they are because of America's willingness to spend $$$ on a navy big enough to make international shipping safe to use on a major scale, is probably true. The initial 30 pages were full of too much vague assertion, not enough data-backed proof, of the points in question. I may circle back some day; maybe the later chapters get better, but for now I'm moving on to other books.
April 1, 2025
The End of the World is Just … a TED Talk
*****
April 1, 2025 Update:
The precipitous actions of the second Trump administration to overturn the world trading system require that I revise the last paragraph of this review. This is my addendum:
It turns out that this book was a blueprint for the second Trump administration, in both tone (snarky, self-assured, disrespectful and immature) and direction. As an American from the Rust Belt, I don’t necessarily disagree with the direction on trade (except for Canada, which has always been a decent trading partner, no?), but I do think the method is about as bad as it could possibly be. You cannot change the world economy overnight, and the attempt will result in a lot of economic hardship for a lot of people, including the very people you are purporting to help. And they did not vote for this, so there is also that.
It reminds me of the scene in “Shrek”, where Lord Farquaad announces: “Some of you may die, but that is a sacrifice I am willing to make.”
*****
Initially: I regret having paid actual money for this book.
From the cover flap, the author grins out at the reader, adorned in a black shirt and a cobalt blue tie, a self-appointed consultant, a stereotypical guy’s guy that blue-chip firms just love to throw money at.
And he does not fail to ‘talk the talk’, boiling down complicated issues into edgy sound bites, with snarky asides for just about everything (including a cheap shot at sauerkraut. Really.) and nary a fact-checker in site. Even to someone with only general knowledge such as myself, the level of error was radioactive.
E.g., He groups Japan with the “capitalist” countries that include the US and UK, rather than the “socialist” countries of Europe. No. He seems to think that the Japanese navy is capable of protecting the sea lanes in the Pacific and will take charge if challenged. Doubtful. He claims that the Boomers “crafted the American welfare state” when I am damn sure it was the generation of the Great Depression era. He blames ‘Boomers’ for saturating the labor market and pushing down wages. No. It was a combination of more machine assembly, company management closing and down-sizing of factories, and moving them overseas or to low-wage states, because they could no longer compete on price with imported goods. I remember, because, unlike this guy, I lived through it. So, wrong and SLOPPY. The above is just a sample.
Along the error-strewn way, Sherlock reaches some obvious conclusions, such as: “no longer do the goods consumed in a place by a people reflect the goods produced in a place by a people.” Or, from his self-appointed perch as a political economic Nostradamus, screams gloom and doom: “I do not see a path forward in which the core of the European socialist-democratic model can survive.”
Which is not to say he does not have a point to make (in here, somewhere …), but it is a point which should be obvious to anyone who has been paying any sort of attention over the last two decades. And that is, globalization has run into some serious problems, of its own making and otherwise, and there is a painful adjustment underway.
But this could have been taken care of in a much shorter and smarter book, rather than a smarmy, error-laden, door stopper such as this.
However, perhaps this snarky third-grade-level book is just what it takes to get American oligarchs to realize that if they continue on with business as usual then this whole thing is going to go sliding off the rails.
Last words: I still regret paying money for this book. The FT has failed me again.
Throughout the author uses a full-on application of the Chicago School of Economics theory of humanity. But the problem with using profit as the sole motivating factor of humanity is that you get statements like: “When much of the economic rationale for having children evaporates, people do what comes naturally: they have fewer of them.” Or: “Argentina’s socialist-cum-fascist industrial policy will work much better.”
The author’s entire analysis of crisis rests on the assumptions of (1) the future collapse in the global trading system as the US backs away from supporting it, and (2) the future collapse of China as an economic power, based on its demographic collapse. The causes are not well explained, but in any case, these things (global trade/demographics) don’t just one day ‘collapse.’ They trend in a certain direction for many years with people making gradual adjustments until, eventually, everything is different than it was years before. “Collapse’ implies a sudden change, but that is not how these things go.
*****
April 1, 2025 Update:
The precipitous actions of the second Trump administration to overturn the world trading system require that I revise the last paragraph of this review. This is my addendum:
It turns out that this book was a blueprint for the second Trump administration, in both tone (snarky, self-assured, disrespectful and immature) and direction. As an American from the Rust Belt, I don’t necessarily disagree with the direction on trade (except for Canada, which has always been a decent trading partner, no?), but I do think the method is about as bad as it could possibly be. You cannot change the world economy overnight, and the attempt will result in a lot of economic hardship for a lot of people, including the very people you are purporting to help. And they did not vote for this, so there is also that.
It reminds me of the scene in “Shrek”, where Lord Farquaad announces: “Some of you may die, but that is a sacrifice I am willing to make.”
*****
Initially: I regret having paid actual money for this book.
From the cover flap, the author grins out at the reader, adorned in a black shirt and a cobalt blue tie, a self-appointed consultant, a stereotypical guy’s guy that blue-chip firms just love to throw money at.
And he does not fail to ‘talk the talk’, boiling down complicated issues into edgy sound bites, with snarky asides for just about everything (including a cheap shot at sauerkraut. Really.) and nary a fact-checker in site. Even to someone with only general knowledge such as myself, the level of error was radioactive.
E.g., He groups Japan with the “capitalist” countries that include the US and UK, rather than the “socialist” countries of Europe. No. He seems to think that the Japanese navy is capable of protecting the sea lanes in the Pacific and will take charge if challenged. Doubtful. He claims that the Boomers “crafted the American welfare state” when I am damn sure it was the generation of the Great Depression era. He blames ‘Boomers’ for saturating the labor market and pushing down wages. No. It was a combination of more machine assembly, company management closing and down-sizing of factories, and moving them overseas or to low-wage states, because they could no longer compete on price with imported goods. I remember, because, unlike this guy, I lived through it. So, wrong and SLOPPY. The above is just a sample.
Along the error-strewn way, Sherlock reaches some obvious conclusions, such as: “no longer do the goods consumed in a place by a people reflect the goods produced in a place by a people.” Or, from his self-appointed perch as a political economic Nostradamus, screams gloom and doom: “I do not see a path forward in which the core of the European socialist-democratic model can survive.”
Which is not to say he does not have a point to make (in here, somewhere …), but it is a point which should be obvious to anyone who has been paying any sort of attention over the last two decades. And that is, globalization has run into some serious problems, of its own making and otherwise, and there is a painful adjustment underway.
But this could have been taken care of in a much shorter and smarter book, rather than a smarmy, error-laden, door stopper such as this.
However, perhaps this snarky third-grade-level book is just what it takes to get American oligarchs to realize that if they continue on with business as usual then this whole thing is going to go sliding off the rails.
Last words: I still regret paying money for this book. The FT has failed me again.
Throughout the author uses a full-on application of the Chicago School of Economics theory of humanity. But the problem with using profit as the sole motivating factor of humanity is that you get statements like: “When much of the economic rationale for having children evaporates, people do what comes naturally: they have fewer of them.” Or: “Argentina’s socialist-cum-fascist industrial policy will work much better.”
The author’s entire analysis of crisis rests on the assumptions of (1) the future collapse in the global trading system as the US backs away from supporting it, and (2) the future collapse of China as an economic power, based on its demographic collapse. The causes are not well explained, but in any case, these things (global trade/demographics) don’t just one day ‘collapse.’ They trend in a certain direction for many years with people making gradual adjustments until, eventually, everything is different than it was years before. “Collapse’ implies a sudden change, but that is not how these things go.
November 10, 2023
In his book, "The End of the World is Just the Beginning," Peter Zeihan provocatively asserts that the U.S.-led global order, born in the post-Cold War era with a core focus on globalization, stands on the brink of imminent collapse. His central argument pivots around several pivotal claims.
First and foremost, Zeihan contends that the current global order deviates from the norm and is fundamentally unsustainable. Its existence was made feasible by the United States, the solitary superpower, which, through its dominance, secured global peace and stifled geopolitical competition. Zeihan characterizes this epoch as "the most distorted moment in human history" and argues that its perpetuation is untenable. While some might consider this an exaggeration, particularly in light of past empires like Rome and the UK, Zeihan rightly underscores the crucial role of geopolitical tools, especially a formidable navy, in establishing and maintaining freedom of the seas. The need for a powerful navy was indispensable for island states like the UK during the 19th century, but the U.S., with its vast internal resources and market, is less reliant on external inputs.
Secondly, the thriving of globalization, which was significantly facilitated by American military expenditure and the voluntary de-industrialization of the U.S. heartland (voluntary for shareholders, not workers), has exerted substantial pressure on the American middle class and is poised for a necessary correction. The colossal costs associated with sustaining this system, particularly in the face of China's ascendancy, indicate an impending shift. It's worth noting that Zeihan's analysis doesn't fully investigate the social cost to the middle class resulting from the extensive outsourcing of manufacturing, which has generated a lasting resentment and fueled movements such as the MAGA takeover of the Republican Party.
Thirdly, Zeihan highlights the demographic ramifications of globalization. The processes underpinning the rise of billions from poverty, such as industrialization, urbanization, and women's rights, have led to plummeting birth rates below replacement levels in many countries. Zeihan forewarns of a "post-industrial demographic collapse," asserting that several countries have already passed the point of no return concerning population shrinkage.
Now, the question arises: How does Zeihan envisage the world once the current global order crumbles? His predictions carry profound implications. One significant casualty will be long-haul transportation. Zeihan argues that, without the U.S.'s dominance in maintaining maritime security, the global shipping industry will lose its flawless safety record. This would result in increased transportation costs, disruptions in supply chains, and a shift toward self-sufficiency in many countries. Furthermore, with the weakening of global policing, the world may revert to a state of 'jungle rule,' with regional hegemons vying for resources and territories, potentially leading to more conflicts similar to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Zeihan posits that the U.S. and its neighboring countries, blessed with abundant natural resources and formidable militaries, are well-prepared to navigate this turbulent transition. Conversely, Europe's future seems less secure, as the legacy powers lose their colonial advantages. As per Zeihan's predictions, China stands as a significant loser, grappling with demographic challenges, the imperative to restructure its economic model, and resource scarcity. In his view, the Chinese navy lacks the capability for long-range power projection.
Nonetheless, it's prudent to examine potential flaws in Peter Zeihan's model. Let's break it down:
Underestimating Climate Change:
Zeihan's analysis may not fully account for the impact of climate change, which can have far-reaching consequences. These include alterations in resource availability and an increased frequency of severe natural disasters, potentially disrupting global economic systems and shifting geopolitical landscapes. Recognizing climate change as a significant factor in shaping the future is essential.
Authoritarian Regimes and Their Impact on Productivity and Quality of Life:
Authoritarian regimes can indeed stifle individual freedoms and creativity, potentially affecting a nation's long-term prospects. This can lead to issues like brain drain, reduced innovation, and social unrest. It's essential to consider the socio-political dynamics when assessing a country's future trajectory. For instance, if Donald Trump were to win the 2024 election, he might institute a regime that is supportive of dictatorships and restricts freedoms, which could adversely impact American creativity. The U.S. has never been a fully functioning democracy, and elements of fascism and white supremacy have been persistent features of the country's history, leading to classes of citizens being deprived of their rights.
Role of the U.S. as Defender of the Freedom of the Seas:
Zeihan's prediction that the U.S. might relinquish its role as a defender of freedom of the seas is valid, particularly if Trump were to be re-elected. The U.S. has long maintained a strong naval presence to ensure open sea lanes for trade, but if it's perceived as an expense with no personal benefit, it could lead to a shift in strategic priorities.
Naval Capabilities and Geopolitical Dynamics:
Assessing the capabilities of navies, such as those of the U.S., China, and Japan, is a complex task influenced by various factors, including technological advancements, strategic positioning, and regional dynamics. In this regard, Zeihan's assessments might overestimate Japanese capabilities while not fully considering China's lack of maritime tradition and combat experience. It's also crucial to recognize the significance of full-size attack aircraft carriers in projecting power during maritime engagements, a lesson the UK learned during the Falklands War.
Geographic Advantages of North America:
Zeihan's emphasis on North America's geographic advantages aligns with historical evidence and supports the continent's economic development and geopolitical significance. Many economic historians acknowledge that these geographic advantages have played a central role in shaping what has been called American exceptionalism.
In the final analysis, while Zeihan sees China as the biggest loser and Ray Dalio, using a different model, believes that China is the next dominant superpower, there are signs of decadence in the U.S., and concerns about China's unsustainable debt levels and its police state facing an impending demographic crisis. These factors suggest that both so-called superpowers may be more fragile than they appear.
The purpose of such a book is to engage readers and decision makers with risk management issues and the necessity to make strategic choices without delay and from that perspective I think that Zeihan has achieved his goal.
First and foremost, Zeihan contends that the current global order deviates from the norm and is fundamentally unsustainable. Its existence was made feasible by the United States, the solitary superpower, which, through its dominance, secured global peace and stifled geopolitical competition. Zeihan characterizes this epoch as "the most distorted moment in human history" and argues that its perpetuation is untenable. While some might consider this an exaggeration, particularly in light of past empires like Rome and the UK, Zeihan rightly underscores the crucial role of geopolitical tools, especially a formidable navy, in establishing and maintaining freedom of the seas. The need for a powerful navy was indispensable for island states like the UK during the 19th century, but the U.S., with its vast internal resources and market, is less reliant on external inputs.
Secondly, the thriving of globalization, which was significantly facilitated by American military expenditure and the voluntary de-industrialization of the U.S. heartland (voluntary for shareholders, not workers), has exerted substantial pressure on the American middle class and is poised for a necessary correction. The colossal costs associated with sustaining this system, particularly in the face of China's ascendancy, indicate an impending shift. It's worth noting that Zeihan's analysis doesn't fully investigate the social cost to the middle class resulting from the extensive outsourcing of manufacturing, which has generated a lasting resentment and fueled movements such as the MAGA takeover of the Republican Party.
Thirdly, Zeihan highlights the demographic ramifications of globalization. The processes underpinning the rise of billions from poverty, such as industrialization, urbanization, and women's rights, have led to plummeting birth rates below replacement levels in many countries. Zeihan forewarns of a "post-industrial demographic collapse," asserting that several countries have already passed the point of no return concerning population shrinkage.
Now, the question arises: How does Zeihan envisage the world once the current global order crumbles? His predictions carry profound implications. One significant casualty will be long-haul transportation. Zeihan argues that, without the U.S.'s dominance in maintaining maritime security, the global shipping industry will lose its flawless safety record. This would result in increased transportation costs, disruptions in supply chains, and a shift toward self-sufficiency in many countries. Furthermore, with the weakening of global policing, the world may revert to a state of 'jungle rule,' with regional hegemons vying for resources and territories, potentially leading to more conflicts similar to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Zeihan posits that the U.S. and its neighboring countries, blessed with abundant natural resources and formidable militaries, are well-prepared to navigate this turbulent transition. Conversely, Europe's future seems less secure, as the legacy powers lose their colonial advantages. As per Zeihan's predictions, China stands as a significant loser, grappling with demographic challenges, the imperative to restructure its economic model, and resource scarcity. In his view, the Chinese navy lacks the capability for long-range power projection.
Nonetheless, it's prudent to examine potential flaws in Peter Zeihan's model. Let's break it down:
Underestimating Climate Change:
Zeihan's analysis may not fully account for the impact of climate change, which can have far-reaching consequences. These include alterations in resource availability and an increased frequency of severe natural disasters, potentially disrupting global economic systems and shifting geopolitical landscapes. Recognizing climate change as a significant factor in shaping the future is essential.
Authoritarian Regimes and Their Impact on Productivity and Quality of Life:
Authoritarian regimes can indeed stifle individual freedoms and creativity, potentially affecting a nation's long-term prospects. This can lead to issues like brain drain, reduced innovation, and social unrest. It's essential to consider the socio-political dynamics when assessing a country's future trajectory. For instance, if Donald Trump were to win the 2024 election, he might institute a regime that is supportive of dictatorships and restricts freedoms, which could adversely impact American creativity. The U.S. has never been a fully functioning democracy, and elements of fascism and white supremacy have been persistent features of the country's history, leading to classes of citizens being deprived of their rights.
Role of the U.S. as Defender of the Freedom of the Seas:
Zeihan's prediction that the U.S. might relinquish its role as a defender of freedom of the seas is valid, particularly if Trump were to be re-elected. The U.S. has long maintained a strong naval presence to ensure open sea lanes for trade, but if it's perceived as an expense with no personal benefit, it could lead to a shift in strategic priorities.
Naval Capabilities and Geopolitical Dynamics:
Assessing the capabilities of navies, such as those of the U.S., China, and Japan, is a complex task influenced by various factors, including technological advancements, strategic positioning, and regional dynamics. In this regard, Zeihan's assessments might overestimate Japanese capabilities while not fully considering China's lack of maritime tradition and combat experience. It's also crucial to recognize the significance of full-size attack aircraft carriers in projecting power during maritime engagements, a lesson the UK learned during the Falklands War.
Geographic Advantages of North America:
Zeihan's emphasis on North America's geographic advantages aligns with historical evidence and supports the continent's economic development and geopolitical significance. Many economic historians acknowledge that these geographic advantages have played a central role in shaping what has been called American exceptionalism.
In the final analysis, while Zeihan sees China as the biggest loser and Ray Dalio, using a different model, believes that China is the next dominant superpower, there are signs of decadence in the U.S., and concerns about China's unsustainable debt levels and its police state facing an impending demographic crisis. These factors suggest that both so-called superpowers may be more fragile than they appear.
The purpose of such a book is to engage readers and decision makers with risk management issues and the necessity to make strategic choices without delay and from that perspective I think that Zeihan has achieved his goal.
November 4, 2022
It was an interesting read but the author's approach to the future world order seemed rather shallow and lacking in imagination. Especially regarding the possibilities for the future of energy.
The book takes a realist approach for analysis of the world but is navie about how the current domestic polices of USA would be affecting its future. The author is rather preoccupied with American expectionalism (and takes it a little too seriously). Apparently, America has ONLY PLAYED A POSITIVE ROLE IN THE WORLD ORDER SO FAR (I can't even).
The book takes a realist approach for analysis of the world but is navie about how the current domestic polices of USA would be affecting its future. The author is rather preoccupied with American expectionalism (and takes it a little too seriously). Apparently, America has ONLY PLAYED A POSITIVE ROLE IN THE WORLD ORDER SO FAR (I can't even).
July 15, 2022
This book was a page turner and not because it is the end-of-the-world story but a compilation of data and a connection of the dots of our global economy. The trend lines are already beginning to be evident.
November 17, 2023
This is a non-fiction about the coming end of the world as we know it by the author, who often glosses over facts that don’t confirm his picture of the world. The book can be re-titled: The US with friends will survive the apocalypse, China will perish and in the rest of the globe survivors will envy the dead. I read it as a part of the monthly reading for November 2023 at Nonfiction Reading - Only the Best group.
The main idea of the book, maximally shortened is: “After WW2 the US contain the Soviet Union fostered an environment of global security of travel. This allowed the explosion of trade and specializations, rapid export-backed industrialization, and mass consumption societies. However, falling birth rates, aging of population and decisions of the US politics to turn inside and let the rest of the world be will lead to dangerous waterways, halting specialization and trade, killing everyone (except the USA+).
First of all, I agree with a lot of his predictions and assumptions, from “China descending into narcissistic nationalism” to “For those of you organic buffs out there who refuse to eat anything that’s been touched with anything artificial, know that a roughly half-mile radius around organic banana plantations is practically nuked with (eminently non-organic) pesticides and herbicides and fungicides to protect your proclivities. Organics also tend to be grown at higher, drier elevations to somewhat limit pests, which means the bananas need massive irrigation to grow. The result is the food product with the highest chemical and carbon footprint, as well as the highest staff turnovers from death in any product set in any industry. Happy eating.” Yes, definitely, the globe will face huge problems in upcoming decades and yes, no country (including the US) is ready for coming demographic change.
There are some minor nitpicks, like “the United States features the developed world’s healthiest demographic structure” – I say Israel; or “meat thermometer that can tell your smartphone how hot your roast is, a cheap chip from China will do just fine. If you want a zippy smartphone so you can post your doctored videos to TikTok, it’s best you go with something from the other side of the Taiwan Strait.” – yes, true, Taiwan makes hi-end chips, but when elsewhere the author says that Chinese cannot do (and never will be able to) hi-end chip, ask him (1) why current US administration attempts to limit flow of such chips in China, sale of lithography machines to them and (2) what Huawei Mate 60 Pro handset went on sale on August 29th, 2023 has as its chip, plus finally (3) why in July 2023 Taiwanese TSMC delayed the launch of its first fab in Arizona by a year, to 2025? (because it could not find enough staff with semiconductor industry experience). So, yes, there is still a gap and the US leads, but the gap is rather small and not only because the PRC is better than suggested but also because the US also lacks a professional labor force.
Also a personal dislike for his equating the Soviet and Russian Empire solely with Russia or using terms like “the great expanses of the Russian wheat belt, a zone that includes Belarus, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan.” – calling this wheat belt ‘Russian’ may be what he is used to, but one doesn’t call India, Pakistan and Bangladesh “The British Raj” nowadays.
The author stresses that the US subsidized the global Order, as would Kipling say "The White Man's Burden", while they also benefited and continue to benefit from it, like that US Dollar is the main reserve currency allows the Fed having a much larger swings in its monetary policy – this isn’t a leftist rhetoric, unless one considers Milton Friedman a leftist. Or omits to note such tiny thing as Monroe doctrine when saying that unlike previous imperial world leaders, the US is completely other. I won’t even start on how he mixes currency, debt and working of the financial system both before Bretton Woods and after.
The book is definitely a worthy read, especially to highlight the real issues the world will face in the next 20 years. However, his praising of the US and bashing of almost anyone else is too biased.
The main idea of the book, maximally shortened is: “After WW2 the US contain the Soviet Union fostered an environment of global security of travel. This allowed the explosion of trade and specializations, rapid export-backed industrialization, and mass consumption societies. However, falling birth rates, aging of population and decisions of the US politics to turn inside and let the rest of the world be will lead to dangerous waterways, halting specialization and trade, killing everyone (except the USA+).
First of all, I agree with a lot of his predictions and assumptions, from “China descending into narcissistic nationalism” to “For those of you organic buffs out there who refuse to eat anything that’s been touched with anything artificial, know that a roughly half-mile radius around organic banana plantations is practically nuked with (eminently non-organic) pesticides and herbicides and fungicides to protect your proclivities. Organics also tend to be grown at higher, drier elevations to somewhat limit pests, which means the bananas need massive irrigation to grow. The result is the food product with the highest chemical and carbon footprint, as well as the highest staff turnovers from death in any product set in any industry. Happy eating.” Yes, definitely, the globe will face huge problems in upcoming decades and yes, no country (including the US) is ready for coming demographic change.
There are some minor nitpicks, like “the United States features the developed world’s healthiest demographic structure” – I say Israel; or “meat thermometer that can tell your smartphone how hot your roast is, a cheap chip from China will do just fine. If you want a zippy smartphone so you can post your doctored videos to TikTok, it’s best you go with something from the other side of the Taiwan Strait.” – yes, true, Taiwan makes hi-end chips, but when elsewhere the author says that Chinese cannot do (and never will be able to) hi-end chip, ask him (1) why current US administration attempts to limit flow of such chips in China, sale of lithography machines to them and (2) what Huawei Mate 60 Pro handset went on sale on August 29th, 2023 has as its chip, plus finally (3) why in July 2023 Taiwanese TSMC delayed the launch of its first fab in Arizona by a year, to 2025? (because it could not find enough staff with semiconductor industry experience). So, yes, there is still a gap and the US leads, but the gap is rather small and not only because the PRC is better than suggested but also because the US also lacks a professional labor force.
Also a personal dislike for his equating the Soviet and Russian Empire solely with Russia or using terms like “the great expanses of the Russian wheat belt, a zone that includes Belarus, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan.” – calling this wheat belt ‘Russian’ may be what he is used to, but one doesn’t call India, Pakistan and Bangladesh “The British Raj” nowadays.
The author stresses that the US subsidized the global Order, as would Kipling say "The White Man's Burden", while they also benefited and continue to benefit from it, like that US Dollar is the main reserve currency allows the Fed having a much larger swings in its monetary policy – this isn’t a leftist rhetoric, unless one considers Milton Friedman a leftist. Or omits to note such tiny thing as Monroe doctrine when saying that unlike previous imperial world leaders, the US is completely other. I won’t even start on how he mixes currency, debt and working of the financial system both before Bretton Woods and after.
The book is definitely a worthy read, especially to highlight the real issues the world will face in the next 20 years. However, his praising of the US and bashing of almost anyone else is too biased.
November 2, 2024
My 150th book of the year, finished just a few hours before midnight on New Year’s Eve.
This one is exceptional. One of the few this year that merited five stars.
The reasons I loved it:
- meticulous research and fact-based arguments — but not in a Thomas Piketty avalanche of facts that overwhelms the reader way, but in a targeted iceberg that sunk my Titanic ignorance of the core issues way
- humorous delivery both written and spoken (the author has given 600+ talks, and the audiobook performance is ace) that makes the scary future somehow more palatable— like funfetti on a casket
- I finally feel like I have a grasp on the shape of the future in a way that makes it feel more manageable, even if it’s going to be wild and terrible, it also feels less scary — it’s like my fear of the future had been irrational in the way that thalassophobia is irrational— now that I know it’s a shark beneath me, I don’t have to fear alligators, piranha, giant vampire squid, or eldritch horrors from the deep — knowing is calming, and gives me ideas to work with
This one is exceptional. One of the few this year that merited five stars.
The reasons I loved it:
- meticulous research and fact-based arguments — but not in a Thomas Piketty avalanche of facts that overwhelms the reader way, but in a targeted iceberg that sunk my Titanic ignorance of the core issues way
- humorous delivery both written and spoken (the author has given 600+ talks, and the audiobook performance is ace) that makes the scary future somehow more palatable— like funfetti on a casket
- I finally feel like I have a grasp on the shape of the future in a way that makes it feel more manageable, even if it’s going to be wild and terrible, it also feels less scary — it’s like my fear of the future had been irrational in the way that thalassophobia is irrational— now that I know it’s a shark beneath me, I don’t have to fear alligators, piranha, giant vampire squid, or eldritch horrors from the deep — knowing is calming, and gives me ideas to work with
August 15, 2025
Author tries to make case for globalism and predicts disaster when it goes away. He bases this on worldwide declining birth rates and aging populations(amazingly, he doesn't even mention AI!) which will take over many of the jobs declining populations won't. Globalization created more efficiency and cheaper goods, but it also took away homegrown jobs. He wrote this in 2022, before Trumps 2nd term and tariffs, and again not taking into account AI, shows how contradictory his analysis is.
February 19, 2023
Peter Zeihan is a geopolitical analyst that has previously worked at George Friedman's intelligence consulting firm Stratfor. His book The End of the World Is Just Beginning could end up being a blueprint for the future collapse of civilisation as we know it or just another junk prediction.
The summary of the book is that basically in the past 70 years the world has been at peace and enjoying prosperity as a result of the American created global order. The Americans set international rules and used their powerful fleet to protect free trade allowing for smaller states to specialise, trade and develop under this protective umbrella.
America is now starting to retreat from their position of hegemony which means that global trade and shipping will start being disrupted either by illegal organisations or by other states. This will lead to a collapse of global trade and that in turn will lead to a huge disruption in global supply chains which lead to disaster in most of the states of the world states due to their industries being interconnected.
Add to the above climate change will disrupt global food supplies and then add to that the fact that most of the countries of the world aren't having enough children to replace the growing aging populations and you get disaster: famine, poverty, civilisational collapse and probably war.
Zeihan theorises that only a handful of countries will be able to survive and thrive in the future global order. The first one being the USA, but also several others such as France and Turkey. These countries benefit from a suitable geographical position with access to a good river network, fresh water or trade networks and also have health demographies which ensures that they can replace their aging populations. These countries will create new areas of influence and smaller countries will be forced to join their respective areas in order to survive in some capacity. For example, Turkey will have the Middle East and the Balkans in its area of influence. The US will be integrated with the Anglosphere as well as several Asian countries such as Japan and Taiwan.
Zeihan believes that Russia will completely collapse due its terrible demography within the next 50 or 80 years. This also being the reason they had to invade Ukraine sooner rather than later because this is their last generation that is big enough to sustain a war. He also believes that China will fail because it has major demographic problems and is completely dependent on the West for trade, especially for its food supplies.
One problem with the author is that he has a very obnoxious tone and uses a very informal almost childish tone. Jokes, references to food and even memes abound in the book. Some might find this funny, I found it quite annoying in a serious book about potential global disaster. I know the book is meant to appeal to the layman but it feels like it's written in the tone of an edgy teenager.
Making predictions a few years in advance is hard enough. Making them several decades in advance is almost impossible. But Peter Zeihan certainly tries to do it using his vast geopolitical knowledge. Will any of these predictions come true? I guess we will find out. In the end only gave the book 3 stars due to the ridiculous writing style and also some of the more far fetched predictions.
The summary of the book is that basically in the past 70 years the world has been at peace and enjoying prosperity as a result of the American created global order. The Americans set international rules and used their powerful fleet to protect free trade allowing for smaller states to specialise, trade and develop under this protective umbrella.
America is now starting to retreat from their position of hegemony which means that global trade and shipping will start being disrupted either by illegal organisations or by other states. This will lead to a collapse of global trade and that in turn will lead to a huge disruption in global supply chains which lead to disaster in most of the states of the world states due to their industries being interconnected.
Add to the above climate change will disrupt global food supplies and then add to that the fact that most of the countries of the world aren't having enough children to replace the growing aging populations and you get disaster: famine, poverty, civilisational collapse and probably war.
Zeihan theorises that only a handful of countries will be able to survive and thrive in the future global order. The first one being the USA, but also several others such as France and Turkey. These countries benefit from a suitable geographical position with access to a good river network, fresh water or trade networks and also have health demographies which ensures that they can replace their aging populations. These countries will create new areas of influence and smaller countries will be forced to join their respective areas in order to survive in some capacity. For example, Turkey will have the Middle East and the Balkans in its area of influence. The US will be integrated with the Anglosphere as well as several Asian countries such as Japan and Taiwan.
Zeihan believes that Russia will completely collapse due its terrible demography within the next 50 or 80 years. This also being the reason they had to invade Ukraine sooner rather than later because this is their last generation that is big enough to sustain a war. He also believes that China will fail because it has major demographic problems and is completely dependent on the West for trade, especially for its food supplies.
One problem with the author is that he has a very obnoxious tone and uses a very informal almost childish tone. Jokes, references to food and even memes abound in the book. Some might find this funny, I found it quite annoying in a serious book about potential global disaster. I know the book is meant to appeal to the layman but it feels like it's written in the tone of an edgy teenager.
Making predictions a few years in advance is hard enough. Making them several decades in advance is almost impossible. But Peter Zeihan certainly tries to do it using his vast geopolitical knowledge. Will any of these predictions come true? I guess we will find out. In the end only gave the book 3 stars due to the ridiculous writing style and also some of the more far fetched predictions.
June 23, 2022
Even though I love Peter Zeihan (The Accidental Superpower is one of my favorite books of all time), this book is basically an extension of his previous writings, without any new "big" ideas...but it does have a lot of interesting points...and his witty writing style is always enjoyable.
In a nutshell, his main thesis is we are living in an artificial environment of unbelievable economic global growth and prosperity...and that this has been primarily driven by the United States hegemonic power and safety (for most countries). From 1945 to 1989, the US had a vital interest in providing global security...primarily as a way to curb the growth of the USSR and communist allies (commonly known as the Bretton-Woods agreement). Since the fall of the USSR, there just isn't motivation by the US to provide global security anymore (we are essentially energy independent after the shale revolution and have Canada as a backup, we are food independent, and our economy is large and diverse enough to not be completely dependent on trade...especially outside of NAFTA). The rest of the globe isn't so lucky, and the majority of their economic gains have been derived from focusing on their competitive advantage (specialty agriculture, low end manufacturing, tourism, exports, etc.)...and they were able to do this because for the first time in human history they could depend on safe oceans and zero threat of invasion by a neighboring power. Remove the American security blanket, and the house of cards crashes down for most countries.
While I don't necessarily agree with all of Zeihan's claims (he gets very specific on a country by country basis, with a lil too much confidence), his underlying thesis is interesting and compelling. Modern economies are incredibly intricate, and as we've seen with Covid and Russia/Ukraine, small disturbances create massive ripple effects to all corners of the globe. I personally have taken steady progress as a given, but if Zeihan is only partially correct, we are going to be in for a wild ride the next few decades.
In a nutshell, his main thesis is we are living in an artificial environment of unbelievable economic global growth and prosperity...and that this has been primarily driven by the United States hegemonic power and safety (for most countries). From 1945 to 1989, the US had a vital interest in providing global security...primarily as a way to curb the growth of the USSR and communist allies (commonly known as the Bretton-Woods agreement). Since the fall of the USSR, there just isn't motivation by the US to provide global security anymore (we are essentially energy independent after the shale revolution and have Canada as a backup, we are food independent, and our economy is large and diverse enough to not be completely dependent on trade...especially outside of NAFTA). The rest of the globe isn't so lucky, and the majority of their economic gains have been derived from focusing on their competitive advantage (specialty agriculture, low end manufacturing, tourism, exports, etc.)...and they were able to do this because for the first time in human history they could depend on safe oceans and zero threat of invasion by a neighboring power. Remove the American security blanket, and the house of cards crashes down for most countries.
While I don't necessarily agree with all of Zeihan's claims (he gets very specific on a country by country basis, with a lil too much confidence), his underlying thesis is interesting and compelling. Modern economies are incredibly intricate, and as we've seen with Covid and Russia/Ukraine, small disturbances create massive ripple effects to all corners of the globe. I personally have taken steady progress as a given, but if Zeihan is only partially correct, we are going to be in for a wild ride the next few decades.
October 23, 2022
Zeihan has a couple annoying verbal tics:
After I got past the excessive use of 'well' and ellipsis, I found a lot substance to this book. Zeihan is clearly an expert in his subject area, far beyond my meager knowledge. The factual basis of the book is well documented and sourced. I'm already a pessimist at heart so it's easy for me to nod head in despair with the dire warnings in this book. However doomsayers have been ubiquitous and often they are wrong. Zeihan doesn't give an entirely horrible picture, it is in fact quite nuanced. He makes pretty persuasive arguments. However, actually predicting the specific trajectory of human civilization is a tall order, and at the end of the book, I'm left with the feeling that he might end up being correct about some of the details, but I doubt all of them will be true. There is the potential for disruptive technologies, the possiblity of massive wars, and thousands of other factors. Time will tell.
Our globalized world is, well, global.
no one really wanted to gather and inventory and distribute and ... apply the stuff.
After I got past the excessive use of 'well' and ellipsis, I found a lot substance to this book. Zeihan is clearly an expert in his subject area, far beyond my meager knowledge. The factual basis of the book is well documented and sourced. I'm already a pessimist at heart so it's easy for me to nod head in despair with the dire warnings in this book. However doomsayers have been ubiquitous and often they are wrong. Zeihan doesn't give an entirely horrible picture, it is in fact quite nuanced. He makes pretty persuasive arguments. However, actually predicting the specific trajectory of human civilization is a tall order, and at the end of the book, I'm left with the feeling that he might end up being correct about some of the details, but I doubt all of them will be true. There is the potential for disruptive technologies, the possiblity of massive wars, and thousands of other factors. Time will tell.
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