The American Century is ending; we’re screwed

Apparently we just can’t seem to get enough of debates this season. Last night, speakers took the stage at the Tsai Performance Center at BU to debate the question, “Is the American Century Ending?,” as part of the College of Communication’s “The Great Debate.”

With a new U.S. President-elect taking the reins of this country, we face some new questions. As journalism professor and Great Debate Chairman Robert Zelnick stressed, our new president has inherited a country that is hungry for change. But is the American century truly ending?

Answering this question was the affirmative team comprised of Andrew J. Bacevich, Professor of International Relations and History, Robert S. Litwak, Director of International Securities Studies at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and COM graduate student Sarah Thomas, ‘10 MS. Responding for the negative team was comprised of Robert J. Lieber, Professor of Government and International Affairs at Georgetown University, Ruth Wedgwood, Edward B. Burling Professor of International Law and Diplomacy; Director of the International Law and Organizations Program, Johns Hopkins University, School of Advanced International Studies and COM student Andrew Jones, ‘09.

The affirmative team argued that the winning formula has been to embed American power in international institutions, and over the last eight years, we have departed from that idea and have overturned our position as a world leader. The world is becoming multipolar. America’s economy is weakening and her international prestige has taken a hit. They continued by arguing that our generation’s legacy has been mortgaged, and America has always lived as though we are at the twilight of civilization. We are up to our necks in debt. We need new leadership that will address our problems, and if we do not, we will compromise our country’s standing in the world. We need to fix ourselves before we fix the world. In order to solve our financial and political and foreign problems, we need to be proactive and focus on domestic issues. It’s not being an isolationist, they argued; it’s good sense.

But the negative team responded that we’ve always faced problems through our history. We’ve always faced criticism by our competitors, but we’ve always managed to pull through. Our country has the top universities, the largest number of Nobel Prize recipients, one of the world’s largest populations, a huge percentage of immigrants and the top military in the world. We, as a country, are known for our ability to adapt and be flexible and other countries look to us as a model. We have political and economic freedom and one of the largest economies in the world. Perhaps America is not at its proudest moment right now, but we are still strong and we will continue to be the strongest country in the world.

I was left wondering, “What does the ‘American Century’ even mean? Was it even the ‘American Century’ to begin with? And how is it ending?”

Regardless, I think both sides could agree that our country’s power is not being used to its fullest potential. No matter our standing in the world, our country is failing to direct our country’s potential to help others and promote peace and prosperity towards the people and places its needed most.

In the end, the crowd was asked to literally move themselves to the side of the stage they agreed with. While the crowd appeared to be evenly divided, Zelnick declared the affirmative side the victor; the American century is ending, making us officially screwed.