Neil Shearing’s The Fractured Age: How the Return of Geopolitics Will Splinter the Global Economy tackles the questions that are foremost in the minds of strategic analysts today: are we seeing a phase of deglobalization? What shape will the competition between the US and China take and how will this affect the rest of the world?
Shearing starts with an interesting observation: ‘Globalisation… stands on uncertain ground (p. ix).’ His purpose is to show that we can view the changes in the global economy through the lens of superpower rivalry (p. ix). He situates his arguments within the broader debates about the fate of globalization and the rise of economic nationalism. As the US and China pull apart, other countries will be forced to choose sides, coalescing into rival blocs, one led by the US and the other led by China. Thus, the world is fracturing but not deglobalizing. Divided into nine chapters, the book is a lucid albeit unsettling analysis of contemporary shifts in the global order. Shearing focuses on case studies like semiconductor rivalries, energy as a weapon, and the ways tech bans become instruments of strategic competition to prove his point. The book is therefore a study not just of economic realignment, but also of the reactions from other countries that will take place when geopolitics overrides the logic of the market.
Shearing begins by writing that after the Cold War, the West, led by the US, believed that globalization would not only bring economic reliefs but also ‘mould other parts of the world in the West’s image’ (p. xv). However, it soon became evident that China had no intention of carrying out political reforms; instead, it wanted ‘to use global trade and technology to become a strategic rival to the US’ (p. xvi). The return of ‘geopolitics as a driver of policy decisions’ will end the era of hyper-globalization according to Shearing (p. 4). He posits that China’s emergence as a rival to the US will serve to strengthen relationships within the West as the US tries to counter China (p. 58).
As the world fractures into rival blocs, many countries like India will resist becoming a part of this rivalry between the US and China, especially as they cannot determine its outcome (p. 60). However, it will be difficult for these countries to avoid picking a side and they will be forced by their economic, financial, cultural and political ties to align with one side or the other (p. 64). He argues that India is likely to align with the US, based on the fact that the US is India’s largest export market, invests much more in India than China, has a large Indian diaspora, and because aligning with the US will enable India to capitalize on the opportunities brought by fracturing (p. 71). If the US moves out manufacturing from China to another low-wage economy within the US bloc, India will be an obvious candidate. The Middle East, he says, might be able to straddle both sides of the divide, while ASEAN will be split into three, one aligning with the US, another with China, with Singapore becoming a financial bridge between the two blocs (p. 78). Africa and Latin America, producers of commodities, will likely align with China; some like Brazil might be neutral while Europe will align with the US. However, the US-led bloc, according to Shearing, has an advantage over the China-led bloc because it is economically more diverse as it includes advanced manufacturers like Japan and Germany, emerging market manufacturers like Vietnam and Mexico, service-based economies like India and the Philippines, and commodity producers like Australia and Canada (p. 83).
In the section on ‘Small Yard, High Fence’, Shearing argues that there will be highly selective but rigid restrictions on trade in sensitive areas though trade will continue in other areas (p. 92). He identifies sectors where trade will be restricted: semiconductors, high-capacity batteries, critical minerals and pharmaceuticals (pp. 92-92), and says there will be attempts to secure supply chains. Though China has the lead in several technological areas, the US has the edge in semiconductors and AI, and China will find it difficult to match it despite the quantity of money it pours into this effort. As far as cross-border capital flows are concerned, Shearing suggests that like in the case of trade, flows will be more intra-bloc than inter-bloc (p. 127). However, China’s huge surplus means it has no choice but to invest in the US as no other country can absorb this huge surplus, and because of the dollar’s status as the reserve currency (p. 130). Also, China will not be able to reduce its use of the dollar. He warns that if the US retreats into isolationism, it will diminish its strategic influence in the world (p. 209). He identifies Taiwan and the South China Seas as potential sources of conflict.
This fracturing will be the final nail for multilateralism (p. 229). He dismisses the idea that China will overtake the US and concludes with the hope that the differences between the US and China can be contained by maintaining open lines of communication (p. 249).
One of the strengths of this book is Shearing’s refusal to personalize historical shifts. He argues that Trump is a symptom, rather than the cause, of the world’s fracturing, pointing that the tensions between the US and China predates and will outlast any administration. He further points out that Trump’s policies on China were not reversed even after he left office (p. 6). Shearing focuses on countries beyond the usual US-China binary like India, Vietnam and Brazil, and analyses how such states could leverage their positions in a fractured landscape. However, he does not give these states much agency in deciding their futures. Rather, he relegates their roles to being appendages to the superpowers’ rivalry. For example, when Shearing observes that the US’s efforts to limit Chinese access to semiconductor technology are a new kind of economic weapon, his analysis is primarily through an American or transatlantic lens. He does not delve into the experiences and strategies of countries like India which are trying to maintain strategic autonomy. Moreover, Shearing’s bias is very obvious, especially in the final chapter because of his optimism that most countries will join the US-led bloc without much evidence. He disregards the idea of a true multipolarity emerging. Also, while examining which countries will join which bloc, he takes Latin America and Africa as a whole, failing to look at individual differences within these regions. The other problem is that while the book is written lucidly, Shearing makes the same points over and over again, which can be a turn-off.
In conclusion, The Fractured Age is a provocative and stimulating work, and a valuable introduction to ‘fracturing’ as a model. However, it suffers from Western bias, ad nauseam repetitions of the same arguments and a refusal to examine in detail the agency of emerging countries, making it less than convincing.
Uma Purushothaman is Associate Professor, US Studies Division, Centre for the Study of the Americas (CSA), School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.