Impacts - Heg Bad - Michigan 7 2023 BEJJP

Heg Bad
Heg Unsustainable
1NC – Unsustainable
US hegemony is inherently unstable and waning now– Ukraine, China, internal contradictions prove
Danny Haiphong 23, journalist and activist for the No Cold War international campaign, “In 2022 the U.S.-led unipolar order was more unstable than ever”, CGTN News, https://news.cgtn.com/news/2023-01-01/In-2022-the-U-S-led-unipolar-order-is-more-unstable-than-ever-1geS18Tu3C0/index.html, Blitz
Chinese President Xi Jinping meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin via video link on December 30, which drew alarm from certain Western media outlets. The New York Times, for example, concluded that the call came amid a "weak moment" for both leaders. Readers were led to believe that both China and Russia find themselves "isolated and desperate." However, the assertion conceals a more difficult truth. That is, the U.S.-led unipolar order has experienced a number of challenges to its stability over the course of 2022 that show no sign of letting up in the new year.
The signs of decay are both external and internal. Geopolitically, the United States finds itself playing a profitable yet unsustainable role in the Ukraine crisis. The United States has provided tens of billions worth of arms and assistance to Ukraine in contravention of the UN Charter since the conflict began in February 2022. U.S. leadership in the Joe Biden administration continues to reject diplomacy or peace talks in large part because weapons contractors have massively profited from the conflict. The U.S.'s pursuit of strengthening NATO's role in Ukraine has played an essential part in leading Russian leadership to conclude that it is in open conflict with the West.
The U.S. has also leveraged the Ukraine crisis at the expense of Europe. Russia was once Europe's largest source of natural gas. U.S. pressure has led both the European Union and Washington to place enormous sanction on Russia. Sanctions have driven the EU into an economic crisis that, on top of inflation, threatens to cause large scale deindustrialization. While the U.S. dollar has benefited from Europe's economic crisis, some U.S. economists predict that spillover from Europe's crisis will lead to a recession in the United States at some point in 2023.
The Ukraine crisis has been one critical flashpoint that reveals the instability of the U.S.'s unipolar imperial order around the world. While U.S. political leadership hypes China's so-called "isolation," the truth is that the U.S. and its allies are more divided and isolated than ever. U.S. investments on the African continent, for example, remain smaller than China's. The majority of African countries rejected U.S. and EU sanctions on Russia as a clear statement against using economic warfare to resolve conflict. U.S. attempts to create "alliances" in Asia have run into similar difficulties as nations such as South Korea and Japan have been unwilling to economically "decouple" from China.
U.S. hegemony is also waning in the Middle East and Latin America. In 2022, Saudi Arabia expressed interest in joining BRICS and hosted the China-Arab Summit. These moves indicate that even the closest partners of the U.S. in the Arab world are looking to pursue stronger and more diverse relations with China. The election of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in Brazil and President Gustavo Petro in Colombia indicate that political headwinds are occurring in Latin America. Across the Global South, nations are recognizing that U.S.-led unilateralism and unipolarity has little to offer but instability and underdevelopment.
It cannot be forgotten that 2022 also exposed the many internal contradictions of the U.S.'s social order. Unending inflation has decimated wages for the majority of workers. Natural disasters and winter weather have caused many casualties and left thousands homeless and hungry. Life expectancy in the U.S. has fallen to just over 76, nearly two full years below China. A majority of people in the U.S. already distrusted their political leaders and the Biden administration's handling of both the COVID-19 pandemic and the economy has given them no reason to reconsider.
So-called media pundits and U.S. political leaders have relentlessly attacked China and Russia to deflect from the shortcomings of their own system and satisfy geopolitical aims. Yet the blame for much of the instability that exists in the world rests at the feet of the U.S.-led unipolar order. The pursuit of maximum global dominance, corporate profit, and military control has taken a massive toll on the U.S.'s legitimacy worldwide. Accumulated damages to the people and the planet worldwide have piled up and left the United States with a proven track record. Many nations are instead seeking a multipolar world capable of creating a global environment where people-centered development can occur peacefully.
A growing number of the world's countries already recognize China as a leader in this effort, as the growth in the Belt and Road Initiative investments over the last year attest. U.S.-led unipolarity, on the other hand, enters 2023 in a state of instability and decay. The contradiction between multipolarity and unipolarity will no doubt remain significant in 2023. While it is not possible to predict the future, the existing condition of the U.S.-led unipolar order presents challenges to global peace and stability that will require stronger solidarity and integration among peace-loving forces to overcome.
Heg unsustainable- China war and decline of dollar heg prove
Sarmad Ishfaq 23- independent researcher and writer whose work has been published by Harvard Kennedy School Review, the Diplomat, Open Democracy, Paradigm Shift, Mondoweiss, and Eurasia Review, and has a master's degree in International Relations from the University of Wollongong in Dubai where he was recognized as the 'Top Graduate'. - 4-17-2023, "Waning US Hegemony, De-Dollarization, & the Incoming War with China," Paradigm Shift, https://www.paradigmshift.com.pk/china-us-world-order/ //nvb
Introduction
The international world order as it currently stands is in a state of flux. In this impetuous environment, a clash between the US, an aging giant desperately holding on, and China, an emergent power hopeful for its coronation, is indeed imminent. This is what history has taught us as has nature. In the aftermath of this forthcoming great conflict, a new king will be crowned and a new world order brought forth.
I state two important facets that explain why the world is headed towards such a conflict. The first is how American hegemony is waning. This section discusses the political, military, and societal failures of the US as well as Chinese inroads. The other facet is a recent one specifically deliberating on the China-Russia-led de-dollarization project which is undermining the global reserve currency, the dollar. The last section explains why the environment created due to these facets will lead to the collapse of the US and the rise of China, thus bringing a new world order.
Waning American Hegemony
The American empire has not only peaked but is on the descendancy. This is best reflected by how different countries are behaving with the superpower or behaving with its opponents. The US’s failures in Iraq and Afghanistan, societal dichotomies, and the rise of China have shown that the once ineluctable shadow of US hegemony is rapidly dissipating.
Internal Rifts
In the last few years, the US’s domestic issues have left the world in perennial consternation. The George Floyd murder and riots displayed to the world that US racial fractures are still abundant; the plethora of gun violence and lone gunmen shootings reflect poor American policies and safety; neo-Nazi militias juxtaposed to all-black militias mirror something from a dystopian third-world country while the Capitol Hill insurrection is indicative that perhaps the US is now just a house of cards.
Most of these domestic quandaries and others such as student debt, abortion, and universal health care can be boiled down to the raucous left vs right divide. Things became so volatile during and after Trump’s presidency that it was commonplace to find articles or videos on a brewing US civil war – shades of which the world has witnessed.
Unfortunately, these fissures in American society and the people’s psyche endure even after Joe Biden’s election win – and will remain due to their deep-rootedness. The most recent polls indicate that 57% of Americans disapprove of him and many of his supporters would not want him re-elected. While he was an insipid Democratic candidate during the elections, the left rallied behind him simply because of their animosity towards Trump, not due to any redeeming quality of his.
Juxtaposed to the left, Trump’s supporter base, i.e., conservative Christians and Evangelicals, remain vocal and even frantic for his triumphant return to the presidency which they feel he was robbed out of (alleging electoral fraud). Trump’s recent arrest will provide further impetus to his supporters and his anti-deep state narrative; he will be a serious contender for the 2024 elections if freed.
Military Failures & Foreign Relations
Apart from internal strife, American influence amongst other nations has also plummeted. For example, in the Middle East and South Asia, mistrust of the US is at an all-time high. The atrocious and prodigal invasion of Afghanistan cost around 2 trillion dollars and more importantly, led to the deaths of an estimated 70,418 civilian deaths (in Pakistan and Afghanistan).
The harrowing optics of the severely handicapped Taliban breaking the US Goliath’s back showed that American omnipotence is merely illusionary. Pakistan, a formerly key US ally, has also seen the error of its ways. Joining the War on Terror led Pakistan into the flames of insurgency that had to be put out by many sacrifices.
The ignominious war in Iraq, founded on false pretenses, not only destroyed a relatively stable country but also created an incubator for the menace of ISIS. Around 300,000 people in Iraq died due to the US, its allies, or the Iraqi security forces from 2003 until March 2023. While Putin is made out to be the next Hitler by the media, Bush and Obama, the latter winning a Nobel Peace Prize, were never even tried for war crimes – exposing American hypocrisy.
The post-9/11 wars have been lethal for the Middle East and South Asian region with almost a million people dying including 387,000 civilians. Syria, Yemen, and Libya have all suffered due to American interference and proxy wars. Furthermore, American submission to Israel is palpable and exhibited by the absence of any inimical action against Israeli transgressions. Instead, the world is subjected to selective American outrage and hackneyed pontification vis-à-vis Chinese wrongdoings in Xinjiang and Russian violations in Ukraine.
Even robust allies such as Saudi Arabia have realized that anyone is dispensable to American interests – save Israel. Hassan Awad, a US-based expert on the Middle East states that the US allowing “…a close ally like Hosni Mubarak to fall [in 2011] was a shock to leaders in Riyadh, Abu Dhabi, and elsewhere…,”.
The China Factor
China’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and its massive exportation of goods have created an economic dependency on the country for most. While countries like Russia and Iran, which are vehemently anti-US, are proudly in the Chinese camp, other countries have expressed their commitment to non-alignment.
Countries such as Japan and India who have had historically frosty relations with China cannot isolate themselves from the rising power. Japan, for example, has committed to the BRI even if done cautiously. India which has long-standing border disputes with China, which have worsened in recent years, is engaging with the country as much as it can including via BRICS. While the BRI has had its fair share of ups and downs, studies show that it has vastly improved China’s soft power.
For the first time ever, more people in developing countries prefer China over the US. This is especially true for the BRI-supported countries where almost two-thirds of inhabitants hold a favorable view of the country. This is symptomatic of how the BRI is not only an economic endeavor but has been skillfully leveraged by the Chinese as a diplomatic and political tool.
economic superpower china
“China’s Rise to Economic Superpower” by Statista is licensed under CC BY-ND 4.0.
The extent of China’s influence was highlighted in the Saudi-Iran détente which completely blindsided the US. With respect to trade too, China is an indefatigable juggernaut. It is the leading trade partner of over 120 countries. Its trade in Africa, for example, stands at around $261 billion – four times more than the US’s. Chinese trade with other integral US allies such as Saudi Arabia has completely dwarfed US-Saudi trade as well.
According to a Brookings Institute policy brief, “The new non-aligned countries in South Asia, the Middle East, and parts of Africa repeatedly say they do not want to have to choose between the United States and China.” Even reliable US allies like Germany, have been unable to decouple from China as much as the US has wanted.
A caveat here is important: this “non-alignment” does not mean that such countries have become absolutely pro-China and abhor America but instead remaining non-aligned bodes better for nations. However, even this much is a huge defeat for the US and signals its ongoing diplomatic downfall.
Hegemony is unsustainable
Andrew Kortunuv 22 - Director General of the Russian International Affairs Council, Noveber 23, 2022- Modern Diplomacy, “ U.S. Attempts to Preserve Hegemony Will Only Make the Transition to a New World Order Harder for Washington”, https://moderndiplomacy.eu/2022/11/23/u-s-attempts-to-preserve-hegemony-will-only-make-the-transition-to-a-new-world-order-harder-for-washington/ //nvb
Nevertheless, last week the world’s attention was fixated on the twists and turns of another round of the perennial Democrat-Republican rivalry. Europe and Asia, Latin America, and Africa closely followed the election, recording any shifts in the mood of certain groups of the American electorate, noting the emergence of new potential leaders and making predictions about the likely future of the American political system. They were not watching out of idle curiosity—the future of the rest of the world depends to some extent on the political dynamics within the US.
Not only in America itself, but far beyond, there is an endless debate about the fate of US leadership and the limits of its international influence. Is it fair to say that, at the beginning of the third decade of the 21st century, we are witnessing the beginning of the revival of the former American hegemony in world affairs, or is the perceived restoration of a unipolar world nothing more than a delusion created by the efforts of skillful illusionists from the White House and the State Department?
The return of the unipolar world?
Most of the current talk about the resurgence of Pax Americana is in one way or another related to the unfolding conflict between Moscow and the collective West. There is a broad consensus in the expert community today that the US is the main beneficiary of this conflict and in particular of the Russian-Ukrainian dimension.
The current crisis has undoubtedly come in handy for President Joe Biden’s administration. Russia’s special military operation immediately overshadowed the not-so-successful conclusion of the US’ own 20-year offensive in Afghanistan. It also allowed the collective West to be united again under American leadership, disciplining previously not-always compliant European allies.
NATO was unexpectedly enriched by two promising members, and the American military-industrial complex entered very attractive new markets not only in Europe but also in other parts of the world. Unprecedented export opportunities have also opened up for US energy companies, which are increasing the supply of their expensive liquefied natural gas to Europe as an alternative to the cheap Russian pipeline variety.
Among other things, the current crisis has shown that the intellectual and psychological inertia of the old unipolar world is far from being overcome and continues to actively influence the world’s politics and economics. The surprising unanimity shown by the countries of the European Union in their willingness to reject any form of “strategic autonomy” from the US makes one wonder how serious the desire for this very autonomy was in the first place.
But the recurrence of systemic unipolarity is not unique to the West. For example, the threat of secondary sanctions by the US has in many cases proved to be a decisive factor in determining the opportunities and constraints for non-Western countries to develop economic and other cooperation with Moscow. Under US pressure, Turkey decided to refuse to service Russian Mir payment cards, and China’s Huawei was forced to begin winding down its activities in Russia.
The new US National Security Strategy recently signed by Biden is steeped in outright restorationist pathos. The document speaks of the indispensability of American leadership, the unchanging task of “containing” China and Russia, the promotion of liberal values around the world, etc. While US officials use the “politically correct” rhetoric of multipolarity and multilateralism, the Biden administration is determined to restore a unipolar world, exactly as it existed in the 1990s. To quote a well-known aphorism from the days of the Bourbon restoration to the French throne after the Napoleonic wars, one can state that Washington strategists “have learned nothing and forgotten nothing.” Which is not surprising when you consider what age group Biden, Nancy Pelosi and Donald Trump belong to.
You cannot step into the same river twice
Perhaps the main weakness of the Biden administration’s foreign policy strategy is in its undisguised desire to reverse history back to the golden age of American hegemony of the last decade of the last century. An acute politico-military crisis can, of course, completely change the picture of international relations for a while, but it cannot undo objective long-term trends in the development of the world. For the US, the Ukrainian crisis has become a kind of political anesthetic, but if a patient has, say, a severe form of peritonitis, no medicine can replace surgical intervention.
Abuse of analgesics or tranquilizers tends to do no good. The current crisis in Europe, for all the tactical dividends the Biden administration is drawing from it, is inevitably distorting the system of US foreign policy priorities, forcing Washington to focus mainly on European problems, postponing for an indefinite future the more important strategic task of containing China’s growing military and economic power. During the two years of the current administration, the White House has not even been able to begin solving this problem, which is perceived, at least by part of the American establishment, especially the Republican part of it, as an obvious shortcoming of the Democrat administration.
Moreover, the Ukrainian crisis has already clearly demonstrated the fundamental impossibility of reviving the unipolar world in its old format. The White House has not been able to regain the trust of even its traditional partners and allies. A clear evidence of the failure can be seen in the tensions that arose in US relations with Saudi Arabia, when Riyadh actually refused Washington’s request to increase Saudi oil supplies to the world markets by going beyond the quotas defined in the OPEC+ format.
US political pressure on Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to abandon his country’s privileged strategic partnership with Moscow has not been very successful either. The strategy of reviving

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