"An historic shift is occurring in the global balance. This century will see the assertion of Asia as the locus of world power and the relative decline of Europe. The United States will remain the dominant power for a long time, perhaps until the middle of the century. But the world will progressively become a multipolar world with three Asian great powers (China, Japan and India) and one Eurasian power (Russia) competing with the United States. The central question of the next 20 years will be whether this new correlation of forces in Asia is a peaceful one or one of competition and conflict. Asias future will be determined by whether there is a cooperative and largely peaceful interaction between China, Japan, India, Russia and the United States or whether there will be a much more unstable struggle for influence and power in the years ahead. New pressures are emerging that could change all this: climate change; the struggle for scarce resources (particularly energy); ageing populations; and the fact that economic growth is inevitably leading to greater expenditure on arms and nuclear weapons. There are other serious problems looming in Asia: outstanding territorial claims, deep-seated historical antipathies combined with rising nationalisms, ethnic and religious clashes, and the fact that globalisation is not benefiting all countries (or all regions or people within a country) equally"--Publisher
