What the World is reading

It is currently the stuff of bestseller lists: is the United States in 8220;imperial decline8221;? The Economist8217;s position is clear: 8220;Still No 18221;, says its cover June 28. Consider these statistics. It accounts for 27.5 per cent of the world8217;s GDP, but 45.7 per cent of global military spending of 1.2 trillion. But it is nevertheless a military power at full stretch: 8220;What seem out of the question for the foreseeable future are the medium-scale 8216;wars of choice8217;.8221; Furthermore: 8220;The dilemma for the Pentagon is how to improve its ability to fight today8217;s insurgencies while preparing for tomorrow8217;s conventional threats.8221; These include Russia and China, 8220;the country that most worries the Pentagon8221;. Iran, Venezula, North Korea remain defiant. The sense of waning power is strengthened by worries about financial centres elsewhere gaining dominance and America8217;s soft power being depleted by images of Guantanamo Bay. This, however, is a call to renewal and not a sign of decline, according to the leader: 8220;From the perspective of relative rather than absolute supremacy, a superpower8217;s strength lies as much in what it can prevent from happening as in what it can achieve. Even today, America8217;s 8216;negative power8217; is considerable. Very little of any note can happen without at least its acquiescence8230; In all sorts of areas 8211; be it the fight against global warming or the quest for an Arab-Israeli peace 8211; America is quite simply indispensable.8221; The forecasts for the US: 8220;It will bounce back stronger again.8221;

Time spends some time with Rupert Murdoch to understand why he8217;d make such a sustained bit for The Wall Street Journal and how he understands the future of news to be intimately connected with the Internet. 8216;The Last Tycoon8217;, July 9. 8220;In financial terms, Dow Jones is a simple deal. The 5 billion price tag is easily absorbed by a company that earned 2.3 billion on sales of 25.3 billion last year and has little debt. But if the financials are simple, everything else about the deal is complicated. 8216;The price of the Journal,8217; says Murdoch, 8216;is 60 plus vitriol.8217;8221;

In The New York Review of Books July 19, legendary mathematician Freeman Dyson reckons says a fantastical future awaits us with 8220;the domestication of biotechnology8221;, much like computing technology over the past few decades. He makes a division of technologies: 8220;Roughly speaking, green technology is the technology that gave birth to village communities ten thousand years ago, starting from the domestication of plants and animals, the invention of agriculture, the breeding of goats and sheep and horses and cows and pigs, the manufacture of textiles and cheese and wine. Gray technology is the technology that gave birth to cities and empires five thousand years later, starting from the forging of bronze and iron, the invention of wheeled vehicles and paved roads, the building of ships and war chariots, the manufacture of swords and guns and bombs. Gray technology also produced the steel plows, tractors, reapers, and processing plants that made agriculture more productive and transferred much of the resulting wealth from village-based farmers to city-based corporations.8221; As green technologies replace gray ones, their need for land and sunlight could give rural residents new and enhanced means of livelihood.

Meanwhile: Fortune July 1-9 examines why business loves Hillary Clinton. The New Statesman June 28 anticipates a more constitutionally reformist Labour government under Gordon Brown. The Spectator June 30 sees his emphasis on the 8220;British way of life8221; resonating with Conservative voters.