Event Details

End: July 30, 2022
Contact: info@jis3.org
More Info: https://www.jis3.org/symposium2022

It is by now legendary that the 20th century was "the American Century." But did the West celebrate prematurely a much-heralded victory over fascism and communism? Post-Soviet Russia remains a major geopolitical rival, with its hackers holding U.S. companies hostage for ransom. Of the remaining communist one-party states--People's Republic of China, N. Korea, Vietnam, Laos, and Cuba--"China" poses the greatest challenge.  China's hackers excel at stealing U.S. civilian and military tech secrets, while its trade and investment policies aim to create dependent "vassal" states. Thus, U.S. companies are constrained by lack of parts that are manufactures abroad, including strategic high tech, and even medicines. The question arises: Can the U.S. heal its unprecedented internal social divisions, punctuated by identity politics, and find the courage to withstand China's "smoke-and-mirrors" gambit for world domination? According to David Goldman's You Will Be Assimilated: China's Plan to Sino-Form the World (2020), "China" has already thrown down the gauntlet globally, whose success would signify the ultimate triumph of its "Made in China" strategy. Put simply, can democracies compete with dictatorships in the twenty-first century without becoming like their adversaries? If so, how can the American experiment in popular self-government meet the challenges of an Orwellian future?