Reinventing Collapse

Official propaganda has always tried to portray superpower conflict as an obvious and inevitable consequence of the irreconcilable differences between the two sides. One’s own side was represented as the manifestation of all that is good and just in the world and the other as all that is evil and repressive. There was usually a catchy label to go with the description that tested well with the target audience, such as the “Imperialist Aggressor” or the “Evil Empire.” When you switched sides, the orientation of the propaganda you had just heard flipped automatically: it was like stepping through a mirror.

But what is interesting for our purposes is to identify and describe the key elements that made these superpower contestants so evenly matched that their sparring went on for decades. None of these key elements can be sustained forever. The hypothesis I wish to test is that the lack of these same key elements, readily identifiable in the Soviet collapse, likewise spells the demise of America, definitely as a superpower, probably as a major part of the world economy, and possibly as a recognizable entity on the political map.

Dmitry Orlov. Reinventing Collapse: The Soviet Example and American Prospects. ^{Next Excerpt. © 2008 Dmitry Orlov.}